Daria Doering

Today is Mother’s Day. I have been crying since last night. I know it seems silly. I wasn’t expecting much, since Jake and Nina came down from LA last month for my birthday, which is more important to me than Mother’s Day.

Then Jake called a few days ago to say he was planning to come see me for mother’s day, but then some friends invited him on a deep-sea fishing trip, so he was going to do that instead, and would we watch his rabbit for 2-3 weeks while he and his girlfriend take a trip to the east coast in a few weeks? Then daughter Nina texted me last night to tell me she was having dinner with my sister and celebrating Mother’s Day with her, and she wished I was there! 

I told Jake we’d be happy to take care of his bunny, and Nina that I was so glad she was getting together with my sister … and Mike bought me three bunches of flowers last night and was so sweet. So I don’t even know why I’m crying. 

My latest thought is that it’s just the sadness that our kids don’t live with us anymore. Maybe I need a “day of sadness over not having our kids with us anymore” every Mother’s Day. Truly. No matter how many times people tell you to “enjoy your children while they’re still little,” you do, but it’s such an intense time that it either flies by or is too painful due to the work overload or … I don’t know. 

When our kids were little, I did absolutely love it and love them, and I had this funny feeling that this time would go on forever. I knew it wouldn’t, but I guess it felt like we were such a closeknit family, that maybe I thought that would never end. Gretchen Rubin has a saying, “The days are long but the years are short.” I could never wrap my head around what that meant, but recently, several years after reading it, I suddenly understood.

Oh, and we can be glad we are so affluent, because I’ve also noticed that the more money you have, the further flung your children are … or that’s how it seems to me.

Mike’s nephew Don was with us for about a week recently, and is going to move in with us in about another week. We love him, and it’s SO nice to have him around. He is 50, I think, but it almost feels like having one of our kids with us. He shares many of our views and interests, is so easy and pleasant to be with, and it feels like he appreciates us and doesn’t pick fights with us. So we’re looking forward to his living with us, though he says it will only be for a few months, and then he will return to New York.

I’ve also gotten some very sweet “gifts from the universe.” About five years ago, Mike tried to crack an egg into a pan, but it slipped and spilled all over, and even seeped between the pieces of glass of our oven door, creating an ugly smear. Mike said he would take the oven door apart and clean it up, but never did. 

Fast forward to a few months ago … for some reason I started thinking about stoves, and went to the Home Depot website, and located the exact stove I would love to have – a top-of-the-line GE Café double range. I “saved” it, and figured I would buy it some day when we remodel our kitchen. 

That afternoon, I came downstairs and saw Mike – cleaning the oven door!!! After all these years, he had suddenly decided to take it apart and get rid of that gross egg smear! I was so thrilled and thanked him profusely! However he was unable to get the door back together again … some tabs had sheared off when he took the door apart. He told me to buy a new stove and he would pay for it … having no knowledge that I had picked out a new stove that very morning!

So I ordered the stove from Home Depot. It was backordered, due to manufacturing delays, due to COVID. So we had to wait about three months, with no door on the top oven! But it finally came on Thursday! It is so gorgeous, and is the first time I have ever bought a full-priced stove, rather than a second from Sears Outlet! With my love of cooking, I’m kind of amazed I never had a super-deluxe stove before! 

It also happens to be the same stove that our older son Nick bought – he found it at an outlet store for a fraction of its usual price – so we have had some fun chats about its features, and its funny habit of sending a text every time it does anything – like “Your preheat is complete” or “Your timer has rung.”

Another gift – several years ago, Jake gave me some beautiful and expensive gold colored wireless headphones so I could listen to music while working out. I had never dealt with wireless headphones before, and things kept going wrong – I lost the charging cord and couldn’t locate a new one, and then the headphones just quit and wouldn’t work at all. After several attempts to get them to work, I put them into a drawer and told myself I would try again later. 

Fast forward several years – the wired headphones I use to listen to Audibles on my walks quit working. Actually they didn’t – it was my old iPhone’s headphone jack that broke. Rather than get it fixed, I decided it would be cheaper to use wireless headphones.

So I bought some cheap wireless headphone, but then thought – before using them, I will try one more time with the much better ones that Jake had given me. So I got them out, and used the cord from the new headphones to charge them (and learned what kind of charging cord is needed for wireless headphones). They still wouldn’t work, so I fiddled with them, reconnected them to Bluetooth, and discovered that all this time, the problem was that I didn’t know you had to hold down a certain button to turn them on and off! Now they work perfectly! Another Mother’s Day gift.

Well, I always remember when I was about 13, and I told my mother – I saved up money to buy you a Mother’s Day present, but we’re here at this concert, and my friend Sam didn’t have any money for a ticket, so I spent the money on a ticket for him. She gushed that she was glad I had done that. Wonderful role model, as always.