Loren Paulsson

When Christina Paulsson shared these thoughts with me, and it occurred that her experience represents the experience of many others and the hope she expresses here might also resonate.  Guest post author Christina Paulsson, her mother, and sister. I'm sitting here in my PJs at 4:50 a.m. contemplating Mother's Day. Remembering Mother's Days with hymns of motherhood and sermons on Proverbs 31. Of all the mothers standing up... getting prayed for... being handed carnations. I remember as a little girl being in awe of all of the perfect mommies with their curly headed darlings and longing for the day I could be among them. I think we've got it all wrong. What about the mothers who definitely don't have it all together? What about the dads, daughters, and grandmothers who are left to raise the family when mom is gone? What about those who long to be mothers and never will be? The ones who have lost little ones. John Newton, who lost his mother as a boy and who is famous ...

One evening as my sister and I finished mowing E.M. Bower’s lawn, Mr. Bower talked to Mom for several minutes—sharing his discount book catalogs and describing his antipathy for computers. When Dad drove up and joined the conversation, it struck me Mom might be the biggest difference between Dad and Mr. Bower. If it weren’t for Mom, Dad’s overalls wouldn’t have patches, and he wouldn’t have eaten nearly as well. Perhaps he wouldn’t care about the distance between the gladiolas in the garden, and who knows, he might even have become an alien enthusiast. While I enjoy a quiet apartment, doing dishes when they bother me, reading Heretics on public park benches, and buying hamburgers for homeless guys on Sunday nights, it appears guys who do this too long end up resembling the sad old dogs who wear paths just inside the fence and bark absently at the moon. If you’ve ever lived in a smallish town, you’ve seen the type. Paperboys say his house smells funny and wonder that his living room on...