This is the last Mother’s Day of its kind for me.  Next year it’s going to have a whole new meaning.  I’ll BE a mother next year (I guess technically I am now).  My relationship with my own mother will probably be totally different next year at this time, or will at least have grown in ways I can’t even imagine right now.  I can only hope that someday I will have a relationship with my daughter like I do with my own mother.  And I can only hope that she doesn’t put me through some of the things I put my mother through.  But we came out strong on the other side, and that’s what matters now.  I remember calling her after my first year in college, appologizing through tears at what I had put her through around the time I was in Middle School and early High School (I think that’s when it was!).  These days I call her multiple times a day on weekends, and usually touch base with her at least once a day during the week.  When something happens – funny, sad, surprising – she’s one of the first people I call.  The running joke when I call my dad is – what, your mom wasn’t available?  I babble non-stop on the phone about this and that, and sometimes I wonder if she’s making faces of boredom on the other end of the line, but I know she’s not (even if she is bored to tears).  She’s my mom, and she listens – it’s what she does.  I call her when I’m crying, and just hearing her makes me cry more – but she always cheers me up.  Lately, I’ve been thinking even more about my parents, how much I miss them, how hard it is to live far away from them, how it’s going to be with them when my own daughter is born.  I can’t wait to see the Grandparents they are going to be.  I know they’re going to be great.  Grandma Sue and Grandpa Ron – they already have a grandcat and a granddog, but I am so happy to be able to give them a real grandchild to dote on in less than 12 weeks.