Somebody Said

By Renee Hawkley

Somebody said
... a mother is an unskilled laborer.
"Somebody" never gave a squirmy infant a bath.

... you know how to be a mother by instinct.
"Somebody" never took a three-year-old shopping.

... that "good" mothers never yell at their kids.
"Somebody's" child never sent a baseball through a neighbor's picture window.

... a mother can end all the answers to her child-rearing questions in books.
"Somebody" never had a child stuff beans in his nose.

... a mother always adores her children.
"Somebody" never tried to comfort a colicky baby at 3 a.m.

... a mother can do her job with her eyes closed and one hand tied behind her back.
"Somebody" never organized seven giggling Brownies into a cookie-selling brigade.

... the hardest part of being a mother is labor and delivery.
"Somebody" never watched her "baby" get on the bus for the first day of kindergarten.

... your mother knows you love her, so you don't have to tell her.
"Somebody" isn't a mother.