Moms are the bomb. They put a uterus over our heads before we’re born, then they put a roof far above our hairless, rugrat domes. The best offer themselves to us as human milk dispensers, often not caring that strangers are staring at their massively engorged mammary glands. Before we learn to crawl around on the floor or even hobble around on wobbly appendages, moms rescue us from our prison-like cribs and chauffeur our helpless fannies around like human taxis. They let us crap in our pants for the first few years of our life, kindly clearing the Klingons from our stinky behinds and magically producing new pants from thin air. I could go on and on for eons–and I will.
My first memory of my own mother is as Wonder Woman. When I was four or five, my parents had a Halloween hoedown at our house. My old man dressed up as Superman—except he wore Jesus sandals instead of red boots—and my mother was Wonder Woman. Although the shiny, Superman logo-emblazoned tee shirt and light blue tights were likely purchased, my mother handmade every other piece of each costume from scratch, utilizing skills she’d acquired from her mom—The Quilt Queen of Indiana. As far as I knew at the time, my parents were actual superheroes and that was their coming out party. Little did I know I would grow up to impersonate both Superman and Spiderman in the singing telegram field. Coincidence? Methinks not.
Even after Uncle $cam says we’re no longer their legal responsibility, few mothers disown us. In fact, most would take us back at a moment’s notice if dire financial circumstances required it. It’s no secret I was obsessed with the color orange for well over a decade. I’ve also had some bad car karma in the past. One time, my mom had a spaceship-like Subaru painted orange in Indiana and drove it back as a present. When that car eventually went to junkyard heaven, she helped my then starving artist @$$ finance an antique orange Bimmer. These days, even though she still teaches math nearly full-time at past retirement age, she is still a one-woman stilt pants sweatshop. I would have to stilt walk naked if it weren’t for my mom (and I somehow doubt there are many booking opportunities for height-enhanced nudists).
Happy Mother’s Day, Nancy Pants. Sorry for the bad things we did as kids.
George Peele enjoys strapping on height enhancers and aurally ambushing strangers. He is Music Editor for 303 Magazine. Follow Peele on Twitter: @Orangepeelmoses. Avatar image courtesy Jonathan Shoup.