Seven Deadly Mother's Day Sayings
by Maggie Van Ostrand
When Mother's Day rolls around every year, I remember my mom's often-said favorite lines that my sister and I called the 7 Deadly Sayings. And how much we hated hearing them. I suppose my own kids are saying the same thing about me, since I unwittingly carried them forward with the next generation.
I expect most moms have their own 7 Deadly Sayings but, just in case you want to compare notes with mine, here they are.
1. On a slovenly room:
How many times are you going to step over those dirty jeans before you pick them up?
2. On whining, such as "OMG, the prom's tonight and I've got this huge pimple ... "
That should be the worst thing that ever happens to you.
3. On abject misery:
Give up your pain for the poor souls in purgatory. They'll get out sooner.
4. On a way to make me shape up:
Do you want me to tell your father about this?
5. On a mini skirt:
Are you really going out like that?
6. On bad behavior:
Just wait until you have kids of your own.
7. On how she apprehends a transgression:
I've got eyes in the back of my head.
Along with my dad, she would sometimes spout off with:
If a job is once begun,
never leave it till it's done.
Be the labor great or small,
do it well or not at all.
I especially loathed that poem, partly because it took so long to hear. I never wanted to hear it again in my entire life. I hadn't realized back then how much and how subtly it influenced me. I learned that lesson in the most embarrassing way: when my own daughter was encouraging me to stop procastinating, she said the hated poem and she said it imitating me, as I used to imitate my mom. Nonetheless, hearing it once more, I was forced to complete my tax returns.
The worst thing about mom's sayings, and that dreaded poem, is that they were usually right, and they always worked.
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