Rant #2,890: Mama

Did Mother’s Day come up on us really suddenly this year or what?
 
It is just so early in the month this year that I nearly passed it by.
 
I honestly thought that it wasn’t on this coming Sunday, but on the next Sunday.
 
So even though it is on May 8, I could have sworn that it was on May 15.
 
There are several reasons for this, at least on my behalf, because my daughter’s birthday usually coincides with Mother’s Day, or thereabouts.
 
She was born on May 15, so I usually use that date as a gauge for when Mother’s Day is, and this year, it doesn’t work out that way.
 
Mother’s Day is on the second Sunday in May, so since May 1 was the first Sunday of the month, the second Sunday is on May 8, so yes, Mother’s Day is a bit early this year … but it has happened before.
 
One year that it happened was in 1966, sort of a “parallel year” to 2022 because the calendar is pretty much the same between the two years, so yes, Mother’s Day was on May 8 that year as it is this year.
 
I was nine years old then, so I just went with the flow, and I certainly didn’t think that way off in the future, in 2022, the special day would also be on May 8.
 
But that being what it is, what are you doing on the big day?
 
Personally, I don’t know what we are doing right at this moment. It has to do with factors beyond my control, and we will see how things pan out by May 8, and then decide what we are going to do.
 
But I won’t be at a baseball game, that’s for sure.
 
Way back in 1967, my father celebrated my birthday on April 28 by taking myself and two of my friends to Yankee Stadium for a game against the Yankees and Orioles.
 
He had no idea that it was Mother’s Day on that day, May 14, and my mom was not too happy about what he did, but he did it, we had tickets, and the four of us went to the game.
 
And we ended up being among the 20,000 or so people who actually saw Mickey Mantle hit his 500th home run that day.
 
About a million people have said that they were there for that momentous occasion, but it was just 20,000 or so people who actually witnessed it right there and then.
 
Was the pitch grooved to Mantle? That is part of my family’s folklore, as, in a story I have told many times, my father had Orioles manager Earl Weaver in his cab and he asked the Orioles manager to let Mantle hit the homer because we were going to be at the game.
 
Weaver was completely inebriated, my father had to help him out of the car to the front of the hotel the Orioles were staying at, and the Orioles manager maybe paid my father back for his kindness by having his pitcher groove a pitch to the Yankee slugger.
 
Who knows, and it makes for a wonderful story, even if Weaver did not do what my father asked him to do.
 
But anyway, back to Mother’s Day …
 
I will honor both my wife and my mother on Mother’s Day, because without them, I literally wouldn’t be here, physically with my mother, of course, but mentally and emotionally with the two ladies in various different ways.
 
These two ladies are strong women in my book, and I owe them plenty.
 
So while Mother’s Day gives us an official day to celebrate them, really, every day is Mother’s Day in my book.
 
But for this one day, there is a lot of pomp and circumstance, which is fine with me, and I hope they enjoy their special day to the fullest extent that they possibly can.
 
And to think that I pretty much didn’t realize that this Sunday was Mother’s Day … well, I caught myself and opened up my eyes in the nick of time.
 
It should be a great day, a day that they will be able to bask in their glory of being mothers.
 
And that is what it really is all about.
 
So happy Mother’s Day to them and to all the moms out there.
 
You all have done really well as moms and as people.
 
We love you all!
 
Have a great Mother’s Day, and a great weekend, and we will speak again on Monday.