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by Tom Amselm

A good friend of ours shared a quote with us recently.

“To be a mother is to Forever have a piece of your heart walk around outside your body.” As I observed my own mom, once we both had grown a lot older and I began to appreciate her as she deserved, I saw this to be quite true.

She shared her heart with me and my family in so many ways. And now, for the last 40-plus years, I have had the great gift of watching another practitioner of this often-underappreciated art.

It has been a daily, hourly, sometimes breath-by-breath demonstration of what it is to have, as the quote indicates, a piece of your heart walking around outside your body.

From the moment of conception, the sharing begins. Physically and emotionally, she is changed forever. No longer just one self, the mother is subtly joined with another living being. In less than a year’s time, the pain of birth yields to improbable joy and her chipped heart is now on the outside as well as inside her own breast.

And from total dependence, that small piece of her moves gradually but inevitably to independence. But the heart of the mother continues on in the child. Along the way, there are triumphs and losses, smiles and tears, hugs and… rejections. Still, that fragment beats on, apart but still connected to its source. Whether it happens once or many times, the mother’s internal being is shared. Not to be diminished. No, remarkably, not at all. Rather, by some miracle of the cosmos, this heart expands to accommodate the needs of all to whom she has partitioned.

Yes, I have seen this, firsthand. It is a wonder to behold. Her children have been given a golden reward, unsolicited but fully accepted. A selfless breaking-off of the essence of a woman who so loves. She had the best examples, this woman of whom I speak. Two grandmothers and her own mother, who gave of her own heart until it quite literally had nothing left to give.

I watch it grow on with our children’s children, and in their own mother’s hearts. I sometimes wonder how these singular hearts can give so much and still stay whole? But I see it, daily, hourly… sometimes breath-to-breath.

So here, on the advent of their day, is a Testimonial. It goes to all who serve in this wondrous role:

“You have, through the sharing of your heart, attained the highest achievement, the most cherished title of all… that of “Mother.”

And to The Lovely Jill… Happy Mother’s Day.

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