By Bill Sniffin, Cowboy State daily
When Mother’s Day occurs, this column serves as a salute to all the mothers out there.
A special note to my own 96-year old mother, my wife Nancy and our daughters, Alicia, Shelli and Amber, who are also mothers plus daughter in law Lisa Sniffin and finally, granddaughter Mallory Barnett.
Also, a pat on the back to all our friends who are mothers and grandmothers and even great-grandmothers and one special great-great grandmother. Have a great weekend! You deserve it.
Famous humorist Erma Bombeck wrote one of the finest pieces about mothers that I ever read and I want to reprint it here.
It certainly is true, in my opinion:
When the Lord was creating mothers . . . and way into the sixth day of overtime, an angel appeared and said:
“You’re doing a lot of fiddling around on this one.”
And the Lord said:
“Have you read the specs on this order? She has to be completely washable, but not plastic . . . have 180 movable parts — all replaceable . . . run on black coffee . . .have a lap that disappears when she stands up . . . a kiss that can cure anything from a broken leg to a disappointed love affair . . . and six pairs of hands.”
The angel shook its head, “Six pairs of hands? No way.”
It’s not the hands that are causing problems,” said the Lord. “It’s the three pairs of eyes that mothers have to have.”
“That’s on the standard model?” the angel asked.
The Lord nodded and said:
“One pair that sees through closed doors when she asks, ‘What are you kids doing in there?’ when she already knows. Another in the back of her head that sees what she shouldn’t but what she has to. And of course, the ones in front that can look at a child when he goofs up and say, ‘I understand, and I love you” without uttering a word.’ “
“Lord,” said the angel sympathetically, “go to bed. Tomorrow is another . . .”
“I can’t,” the Lord said, “I’m so close. Already I have one who heals herself when she’s sick, can feed a family of four on one pound of hamburger, and can get a six-year-old to stand under a shower.”
The angel circled the model of a mother and sighed: “It’s too soft.”
“But tough,” said the Lord excitedly, “you cannot imagine what this mother can do and endure.”
“Can it think?”
“Not only think, but it can reason and compromise,” the Creator said. The angel bent over and ran a finger across the cheek: “There’s a leak!”
“It’s not a leak,” said the Lord. “It’s a tear.”
“What’s it for?”
It’s for joy, sadness, disappointment, pain, loneliness and pride.”
“You’re a genius,” the angel said.
The Lord looked somber. “I didn’t put it there.”
The above appeared in a Denver Post column by Trisha Flynn, who describes herself as: an Irish-Catholic, Republican, middle-class, middle-aged, married mother who writes from her Denver home.
When Flynn called her friend who gave her the above clipping, to ask who wrote “When God Created Mothers,” she said what Flynn felt: “Are you kidding? At this point, all I retain is water!”
Flynn wrapped up her column with:
“There’s an old joke that applies here: How can you prove God is a man?
“Who else would give a woman teenagers, menopause and a wedding to plan at the same time!”
