My Mother Rough Draft

   Did you know your face still lights up when Dad walks in the room? Do you know that you smile when you speak his name, listen for his car, and think and speak of him often? Do you know I watch every time he kisses you, thanking God that He taught you both to love for years constantly, tenderly, and unselfishly? Do you know that from you I have learned that a wife should love what her husband loves? I have watched you learn baseball, fantasy baseball, and the baseball game you played this week. I have watched you learn to love the Cubs. I have watched you grill and buy Cubs clothing and look forward to those boring baseball games...because you learned to love what he loves.
   Do you know that I have learned, from both of you, what it is to support and strengthen the other? I have learned a definition of godly marriage that I have shared with friend after friend as they get married. I have learned from them that your unselfishness and joy in each other is a gift granted to you, and to us, to all those your children discuss marriage with.
   From you I have learned to cook (especially from scratch), to balance a checkbook (to spend and to save...I needed the former), to clean (with bleach!), and to organize bookshelves and clothing. But I have also seen what it is to try every day to see God in life, to work in a place where God is denied and yet live the light of the gospel and to learn to trust Him still for life. I have learned it is possible to do a hundred things well and I have learned to take time to rest. I have learned that God can be trusted when we are physically weak. Your physical condition has taught me to pour my heart out to God for something I desperately want, and yet, watching you, to trust Him if He says no. You have taught me that He gives overwhelming grace.
    You show me that I can come to you, speak with you, tell you what is in my heart, and you will give me good, sound advice. I would trust you with any decision I had to make, and yet I know how to make many of them without help, because you taught us independence. I know that you pray for me as I make those decisions, and that gives me courage. I know, when you reach heaven, that your life as a mother will be one thing where He will say "well done, good and faithful servant." I am so thankful that He gave you to me, Mama.