Mom (Saint Susan)

I wish a very Happy Mother's Day to my Mom, Susan.  Here are a few of my favorite stories about her.

 One Saturday morning Mom was in the yard raking leaves when two Jehovah Witnesses going door to door approached her.  One of them asked, "If you were to die today, are you one hundred percent certain that you would go to heaven"?
Mom replied, "Yes, sir.  As a matter of fact, I can't think of anyone who deserves to go to heaven more than me."
Mom went back to raking leaves.  The two guys looked at her, looked at each other, and quietly walked away.

When I was about ten years old, I wore my "Pirates Lumber Company" T-shirt almost every day.  I remember we were at the beach and my mom told me that if I came downstairs to breakfast wearing that shirt, she was going to cut it off me.  I sat down to the table sporting the aforementioned shirt.  True to her word, she grabbed a pair of scissors and cut it off.  To this day I still search ebay and the internet in hopes of finding one to replace it.

One day we were driving home on US 13 through Felton, a small farming town.  At an intersection, my mother saw a chicken that had fallen off of the poultry truck on its way to be slaughtered.  She promptly slammed on the brakes, jumped out of the car and began to dodge in and out of traffic to catch it.  She eventually did and it rode home in my lap.  She nursed it back to health and named it Magoo.  That chicken literally ruled the roost.

My mother is a University of Delaware alumni and is a hard-core Blue Hen football fan.  Our family spent many a Saturday tailgating at the home games and traveling to the away ones.  After one glorious Delaware upset, Mom drank a few too many whiskey sours in celebration.  While in the parking lot of a nearby restaurant (that was packed) she decided it was her duty to lead everyone in a boisterous rendition of the Delaware Fight Song.  She is only 5 foot 2 inches tall, so she thought it best to stand on the hood of a parked car to insure that everyone would see her.  My father promptly drove away and left her to get a ride home with relatives.

Mom would experiment from time to time in the kitchen to create new entrees.  Our family favorite was pork chops covered in sauerkraut and melted parmesan cheese.  When she placed it on the table for its first and last appearance, my father, my brother, and I began to gag.  Our eyes watered and our nostrils reared at one of the foulest stenches ever experienced by any of us (mind you, my dad was a homicide detective at the time).  We still rib her about it and it is now a family joke.


Happy Mother's Day, Mom.  I know a lot of sons and daughters think that their mothers are the best, but in my case, it's true.