5-10-2026 4:25am

Musing About Mother's Day ...

Lesley Misko Editor

It was so easy to find this image on the internet because everyone seemed to have one of these...

by Lesley Misko

As Mother’s Day 2026 hit the horizon, my Facebook feed began to fill up with friends’ warm memories and tributes to their mothers. I read them and silently applaud them; I feel glad for those who have a store of warm, nurturing memories. I wish I had those too.

Unfortunately, my childhood was less than idyllic. My mother’s emotional make-up lacked the ability to be loving and nurturing. Instead, she was harsh and hypercritical. I grew up feeling that I could never do anything right. I spent my childhood trying to understand what was so bad about me that merited persistent anger and criticism, and I repetitively struggled to try and figure out what I could do to fix it so that she might love me.

I wanted my mother to be “normal,” “ordinary,” the way other mothers seemed to be, but the more I wished and prayed for that, the more contrary she became. In my mind I had the image of a smiling mother greeting her child with a plate of homemade chocolate chip cookies when s/he came home from school and asking, “How was your day?” My foremost childhood memory is feeling sad, confused, and crying. Somewhere along the line I realized that she couldn’t help the way she was. She was shaped by the episodes, emotions, and people in her own childhood. The best I could do was distance myself and strive to be the opposite of her as a parent. I do, however, have one warm and happy Mother’s Day memory.

When I was about six years old, my parents took me to a jewelry store to pick out a Mother’s Day gift for her. It was to be a charm for her charm bracelet. I was shown several and I selected one: it was a gold circle meant to look like the sun with rays of sunlight streaming out of it. I liked it because I had seen other mothers wearing similar things on necklaces and bracelets. I wanted to believe that this charm held magic in it. If she looked like other mothers, maybe she would act like them too.

As you might guess, she did not like it at all. There were other more unusual charms that she liked, but I was vehement in insisting that we had to purchase the sundial charm that I picked out. The ordinary one, the one that was just like what other mothers had. We argued for a while, but for once, I triumphed. I think she was reluctant to be nasty in front of the salesman. Finally, it was decided that the back of the charm would be engraved to my mother from me. It would also say “Mother’s Day” and the date-- 1956.

The years passed and in 1983 I was blessed with a special Mother’s Day: for the first time, I was a mother. It was an emotional day for me. My parents, who lived in another state, were with us for the weekend. Inviting them was the right thing to do, I knew, and so I did, even though I also knew there was a good likelihood it would turn out badly.

Mother’s Day morning, as we were about the leave the house to go out for brunch, my mother tossed a small fabric pouch to me. I didn’t know what it was. In my entire life, I never received a wrapped gift from her. Things were usually just handed to me and she would say, “Here.” Not even, “Here, this is for you.” Just, “Here.” I cautiously looked inside, and there it was—the sundial charm I had given her decades earlier on Mother’s Day. I began to laugh. It was just so perfect: funny, clever, and warm, like a real mother-daughter moment. She laughed too and though it was a brief time amid a lifetime, it was a wonderful time. I hold this good memory close to my heart every Mother’s Day since.

Whether we are mothers in the traditional way or in a different way, whether we have positive or sad memories of our relationships with our own mothers, I hope that you, too, have at least one good memory in your heart this Mother’s Day 2026.