Hero of the Week

This week I have decided that I should pick a hero within my family.  We have several - Mike, of course, has been my hero for almost 20 years, and has served in two wars.  My grandfather fought as a partisan in WWII, so clearly he was a hero.  Emma is a hero because she has suffered greatly in her short life and still has the best personality and outlook on life.

Sooo, drum roll, please, this week's hero is.........my Mom.  Cliche', right?  Wrong!  Let me tell you about this great lady I am proud to call my mother.

My Mom was born in the 1930s and lived through WWII.  She moved oodles of times, overcame some significant physical struggles, graduated from law school at a time when women where expected to stay home and raise kids, survived a 40+ years marriage, and three very naughty kids.  She did all this without ever asking for anything for herself.  Never asked for fancy clothes.  Never asked for fancy jewelry.  Cared for her ailing parents until the day they died in their late 80s.  Travelled all the way to the United States to see her newborn grandson being born, two weeks after watching her premature granddaughter making her grand entrance.  Travelled to the United States to stay with that same grandson when I had to travel to China to meet Mia, while Mike was in Iraq.  Stayed up all night with me when Mia had night terrors.  Travelled once again to the United States to watch me graduate from college.  I could go on for a long time listing everything she has done for me, my husband and children, along with my father, my siblings and their families, and still it wouldn't do her justice. 

I wish I could be half the woman, wife and mother she is to the rest of us.  There is nothing I  can do to ever repay her for everything she has done and still does for me. 

She is a my hero. 

Mom holding me - 1974