You are one crazy mother

It's 12:01 am - Mother's Day. Dude's bassinet is next to the bed, empty, and I have mixed emotions about it. It definitely feels like something is missing, like he should be here - but of course he shouldn't. He should be right where he is. With his mother.

So even though I am missing him, and feeling his absence, and wishing I could give him a cuddle, I am excited to spend Mother's Day sleeping uninterrupted for as long as I want,excited to spend it with Max and Lucy who are my finest accomplishments in life by far, and shining examples of why people have kids in the first place.

But I need to take a minute to remind everyone that you don't need to be a mother to celebrate Mother's Day.

I mean, the number of guys (from boyfriends to employers to house mates) who have acted like I was their mother should have earned me the right to celebrate this holiday long before I actually had a kid. And I had a puppy, you know. Back when I was 20 I had a puppy named Zora, and I loved her and raised her and dammit that should have counted for something, because the amount of time I spent cleaning up after that dog far surpasses any cleanup I have experienced with a real live baby.

Mother's Day is, in my opinion, a day to express gratitude for every woman who has every nurtured a living soul. It has absolutely nothing to do with your uterus - those things are totally over rated. After my trial run at mothering man and beast, I had a child of my own - and it felt less like a miracle and more like a science project. I was not glowing, and it didn't come naturally. Then we were foster parents, which is when I really learned that the hard work of being a mother has nothing to do with biology. And when we adopted a child, I realized that Nature vs Nurture is a Real Thing.

Turns out, I am one hard core mother.

Which is why I can say with confidence: Ladies, if you have ever loved someone, been invested in their future, stayed awake at night worrying about them, taken care of them when they needed you, lifted them up at their lowest point, fed and clothed them, cleaned them or cleaned up after them, taught them and listened to them and encouraged them and kept them safe and watched them grow and kicked their ass when it needed it, then Ma'am, this day is for you.

So here's to the teachers and coaches, the doctors and nurses, the day care providers, the animal lovers, the kindly neighbors, the officers and firefighters, the aunties and tutus, the kumus and grandmas, and anyone else who has given a damn, inconvenienced themselves, put someone else first, been the last phone call from jail or the first phone call to get the good news -

I salute you.

This one is for the Mother in all of us, because damned if we aren't all in this together. All of us are mothers of some sort. In fact, I challenge you to find a woman who does not have a shred of maternal instinct. Because even the most stone cold bitch has held someone's hair while they puked, or cheered someone up when they were blue, or given a tampon to the stranger in the next stall. Women are sisters are mothers and this world would be a filthy miserable lonely hungry desperate boring place without us and our magical vaginas (which according to spell check should actually be "vaginae" but whatever, we only have one and I think I know what I am talking about SPELL CHECK).

So like it or not Mama, Happy Mother's Day. Give your vag a high-five and take a nap. You earned it.