Happy Mother's Day to every mom. Everywhere.
I had the exquisite good fortune of being born to, and raised by, an all-time legend. Once upon a lifetime or two ago, I embarrassed Mom more than just a little bit. Well, that is simply not true. Far too many times to count, I embarrassed Mom more than just a little bit. However, on this particular occasion, I did so utterly by accident.
In the Spring of 1997, I wrote what I had intended to be a "Letter to the Editor" to The Star-Ledger, which Fran Wood decided she wanted to place on the front page of the paper's "TODAY" section on Mother's Day. She could not provide me with an advance copy of the paper so on Mother's Day, as Margaret and I drove down to Princeton to visit Mom, we stopped at a Quick-Chek to buy a copy of the paper and at another store (I cannot remember where) to purchase a picture frame and paper in which to wrap it (we already had the card and a pair of scissors with which to cut the paper). We gave it to Mom. She read the piece, smiled a bit sheepishly at having been revealed to the world, thanked me for writing it, gave me a kiss, and told me she loved me.
Mom moved to Florida in the fall of 1997. She died on June 3, 2017. When Kara, Jill, and I were packing up her apartment, I saw that she had kept her now-two-decade-old "press clipping" in her China cabinet, among her treasures. Seeing it, again, made me smile.
The Star-Ledger
Mother's Day 1997
During the run of "Springsteen on Broadway" I was lucky enough to see the show two times. First, in November 2017, shortly after it opened, courtesy of the generosity of my great friend, Lynne Kizis. Thereafter, in November 2018, shortly before it closed, courtesy of the generosity of my son, Rob. Both nights, The Wish, which Springsteen wrote for his mother, Adele, a number of years ago, was part of the set list. It has been among my favorite Springsteen songs since the first time I heard it. As beautiful a piece of music as it is, and I consider it to be exquisite, the highlight of his performance on it at his Broadway show was not the song itself, but rather its introduction, which I invite you to listen to here:
Happy Mother's Day to every mom. Everywhere.
Mothers are the bedrock and cornerstone of our society.
I know that every opportunity I have ever had to
achieve anything has been provided to me by my mother.
She is, without exception, the strongest person I have ever met.
My father died when I was 14, leaving my mother three kids'
college tuition to pay for. Nevertheless, my mother persevered.
Freed from my father's strong, and sometimes domineering,
personality, my mother proved herself to be a woman of
amazing strength and determination. Nothing, including cancer,
has stopped her. She has always done all she can do to present
her children opportunities for achievement without
making excuses for failure.
Shame on me.
I had let all of that stuff slip into the recesses of my mind.
Perhaps in a world of "instant everything" I had let a
lifetime's worth of everything get lost. Too often,
life today revolves around a
"what have you done for me lately?" mentality.
Lucky for me and, I suspect, scores of others
that mothers do not subscribe to that philosophy.
Thank you, Mom,
for being my bedrock and my cornerstone...
- Adam Kenny (1997)
and the world's most gentle art critic...
My "Masterpiece"
Mother's Day 1975
-AK
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