A Mother's Day to Remember

Today was Mother's Day. And I had a great day. I was given flowers by my husband and children. A picture frame with me and my grandbabies in it. An Audrey book. A purple butterfly coffee mug and keepsake box. A lap desk for my laptop. Dinner at Red Lobster with Stan, Megan, Matt, Amber and Chase....and Barb and Wayne at the last minute. Other than Melissa, Mark and Audrey not being here, I had a great day.

Over the years, I've had alot of great Mother's Day moments. Lots of flowers and gifts and dinners out (mostly at Red Lobster). I have a wonderful family. And I love every one of them very much.

But....(isn't there always a but somewhere?).....I do have one Mother's Day memory that is not a pleasant memory for me, although probably one that I will never forget. Nor will I let Stan forget it.

It was Mother's Day 1995. We lived in Virginia. We went to church and then I picked Red Lobster for my nice dinner out. So with all three kids packed in the back seat of the car, off we went. When we got to the restaurant, we were told it would be a 90 minute wait. Well, that was just too long for Stan. Way, way too long. So his opinion was that we should try another place because clearly not all restaurants would have a wait as long as this one. There were a few good places around that area so we packed all three kids back in the car and off we went...again. Second place? Hmmmm....90 minute wait. Third place? Hmmmm....2 hour wait. By this time we are just driving around looking for a restaurant that didn't have people hanging out the door waiting. Eventually Stan saw the perfect place. It's called Bob Evans. There were no people waiting outside, lots of parking available and no list to put your name on. I'm sure there was a good reason for that.

I went along with him, mainly because I'm stunned that he would spend so much time driving around, looking for the perfect place (meaning NO LINE) when obviously we could have already been seated at Red Lobster. We got seated at a table (yep...no wait), and I order spaghetti...yum (didn't see any shrimp or lobster on the menu and don't think I would have ordered it anyway). I really think he was clueless at this point on my mental state, or the thoughts that are going through my mind. Completely clueless. So, I spent MY day at a place that I didn't like, just because of a little bit of a wait at the place that I WANTED to spend MY day.

Well.....naturally, being the forgiving and understanding wife that I am, I forgave him....NOT. I stewed on this for weeks. Still stunned and in disbelief that this happened.

Eventually, I got over it (well, maybe not). All was well, until Father's Day came along. Stan's choice was to go to Outback. So we packed up the kids, went to church and then off to HIS choice for dinner. And the wait when we got there??? Glad you asked! It was 2 hours. And what did we do? Without hesitation, Stan put our name on the list and we stood in a corner and waited....and waited....and waited.

I think that that's when he really started to get it. Really started to think "uh huh...what have I done?" He didn't want to wait an hour for a table at MY place but he was okay with waiting 2 hours for HIS place. This is where the light bulb goes off over his head!

I have to say, that since that fateful day, we have ALWAYS gone where I wanted on Mother's Day. They could have said that the wait is 5 hours long, and Stan would have sat his butt down and waited.

Yep....he's been sucking up to me ever since!!!