Mother's Day

Today is Trudy's favourite day of the year. The other 364 are good, if you like that sort of thing- banal, day in, day out, get up, go to work, come home, make a meal or two, go to bed, wake up and do it all over again kind of days. But today is Mother's Day. Although Trudy isn't a mother, she is an aunt and a daughter and a sister and a surrogate mom to all of her friend's kids. She's the crazy aunt everyone pours their hearts out to; the one her friend's kids turn to with stories of heartbreak or embarrassing questions about boys and bodies and the difficult truth on life and why their mom's are so harsh. A confidante, secret-keeper, truth-teller and comfort food maker. Truthfully, most weekends and statutory holidays are filled with the people in her life that love her so, but oddly enough it's on Mother's Day that Trudy beomes a bona fide star. A raucously celebrated, boy-I-wish-you-were-my-mom kind of day. The flowers and chocolates, the brunches and lunches and dinners and movie dates compound so that she has to spread them out over the following three weekends which makes for an incredible transition into Spring from the dog days of what has become an inevitably long, cold, difficult winter. Don passed on in February going on six years now. Tough enough, being the darkest, most depressing month, but to also have it as the anniversary of her husband's death is a bitter pill for Trudy to swallow. So she extends herself deeper into her family outside of herself. Her sister's boys come over for a skate on the pond, Clarice's daughter learns how to successfully proof and bake her own bread and Trudy helps her aging dad keep up with the grounds. It's a lot of work, pouring herself into everyone else but it keeps Trudy busy, out of her own way. One day it will get easier. Some days are better than others, but today- Mother's Day- when Trudy is championed for all the things she does and is and continues to be to everyone else but herself,  today is the best day of all.

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