The Human Constant
Throughout our lives, we are constantly aware of the reality that change is ever-present and, along with death and taxes, not much else is constant in our lives or world…
But I would like to add one more entity to the list of constants that, no matter where in the world I have been, always holds true.
I’ve seen this constant observing a mom in a wind-blown thatch hut in Zimbabwe while helping her children brush their teeth after my group gave a dental presentation in the bush. I’ve witnessed it with a Namibian woman teaching her children to hoe and plant a vegetable garden. And my most poignant example of this “constant” was a mother in the Omo Valley of Ethiopia, who jammed a sick baby wrapped in a blanket into my arms, pleading to take her child to a hospital in Arusha, the capital, where we were headed!
It was only a three-seated plane, but we got the child back to Arusha to a Russian hospital and, several months later, I received an email that the child had survived and was flown back to the village with another med/dent team.
And in my own office on a weekly basis, a mom with jumbled up or sometimes missing teeth has brought her child into our office for an orthodontic exam because she wants the best for her child (even if she hasn’t had the same luxuries herself). All of these are examples of the other “constant” that I would like to add to the list — the warmth and compassion of a mother’s love.
A mother will lift a car off her child, risk her life in time of need, and feed her children the last morsels of food in the village as she starves!
The strength of a mother’s love is written in the Bible, the core of Hollywood movies, and seen on the evening news, never to be taken for granted. And this weekend, it’s to be celebrated by families around the world.
Whether spoken in German, (“Alles Gute / Liebe zum Muttertag”), Spanish (“Feliz Día de la Madre”), Thai (“Suksan Wan Mae”), or simple English — “Happy Mother’s Day” — these words will be lovingly expressed around the world in many languages and locations, wherever moms are found.
The truth be known, I have spent my entire career watching family dynamics and decision-making situations in my office. As dads, we’re important, but the family’s cohesiveness and centerpiece has to, I feel, revolve around mom.
I have had big name judges’ children in for an ortho exam and, when asked if they want to start their children in treatment or make their next appointment, they would remark, “I have to ask my wife. This is out of my wheelhouse. I just shut down corporations or send people to prison for life!”
I always found those answers amusing, but extremely to the point, as to who runs most family units.
This weekend, I hope all the dads and children have planned a nice “thank-you” for their special moms.
As most of my moms in the office this week have quietly remarked, it doesn’t have to be expensive or lavish… just simply from the heart.
My hand-scripted Crayola cards I made as a child produced more hugs and tears than anything I ever bought from Hallmark!
This being my second Mother’s Day without my mom and my wife’s first without hers, please don’t waste this holiday weekend and end up running out of time and not seeing your mother! Remember what she has done for you and how many times she went to-bat for you or was in your corner even when she knew she shouldn’t be…
Go for a hike in the Metroparks and come home, build a fire, and roast hotdogs and marshmallows, with a nice Rosé for mom. Flemings can’t touch it on the culinary or love scale!
So there you have it — my findings from a career of working with moms and having a mom for nine-tenths of my life… as much as us guys think we rule the world, we only do when moms let us!
On behalf of my family and staff, let me wish all of our moms and moms-to-be the most heartfelt and meaningful Mother’s Day weekend you could ask for.
Cheers to our “human constant” — the mothers of the world,
Dr. Pfister