THE DAY MY MOM WENT TO THE FATHER-DAUGHTER DINNER

Once upon a time, (too) many years ago, I was an 8-year-old Brownie (that's a type of Girl Scout). I lived with my divorced mother who worked two jobs to keep a roof over our head and food on the table. This was prior to the dead-beat dad laws that are out there now to protect children. (Although to be honest I think some of those have gone overboard.) My dad paid little to no child support and spent very little time with me.

Though my mom did a great job of shielding me from his uncaring ways, I was a pretty smart kid and could see what was going on. There were times when I would be in the other room and could hear her pleading on the phone with him to come and see me.

To be honest, it wasn't all horrible, I did actually spend some time with my father. We went on annual vacations to Beach Haven, NJ and some other random outings. (It's important to mention that there were always other people along on the journey, a kind of buffer between my father and I.)

Anyhow, back to my story. Every year my Brownie troop held a Father-Daughter Dinner. It was a big deal. The girls got dressed up and showed off their dads who were generally not fixtures at Girl Scout events like the mothers were.

I had called my dad weeks in advance and asked if he would take me. He promised he would and I was really excited!

The day of the event I was all ready and waiting by the door for him to show up. I can't remember if he called us or my mom called him but the resulting message was that he wasn't coming.

I was crushed.

I was in my room crying and feeling dejected when my mom knocked. She was all dressed up and said "We're going!"

And we did.

I'm sure my mother was nervous. She was after all only about 27 and the only "divorced" mom she knew. This was the early 70's and though divorce was just starting to become more common, it was still rare in our world.

My mom and I had a great time at that dinner! Besides my troop leader and a bunch of little girls, she was the only other woman there and she had a blast.

I'll never forget that day. Sure, she did a lot of things for me while I was growing up, made a lot of sacrifices, but that was the turning point. That was the day I realized that she would be there for me no matter what.

And for that, I will always love her.

Happy Mother's Day mom!