Carolyn Poem by cassidy Lovato

There are people
who spend a lifetime
trying to become
someone worth remembering.

Then there is my mother.

She never tried.

She simply was.

She is the first to open her door,
the first to pull out another chair,
the first to ask,
'Have you eaten? '
before asking anything else.

She would give away
the coat from her shoulders
without a second thought,
though she'd probably wag her finger first
and remind you
not to put yourself
in that situation again.

That's who she is.

A heart so open
it forgets to protect itself.

A voice so honest
it sometimes arrives
before the gentler words.

She has never been cruel.

Only human.

She feels deeply,
loves loudly,
and forgives
far more than most people deserve.

She has carried burdens
I will never fully know.

Storms she stood through
without asking
who would notice.

Choices she made
to protect my brother and me,
many of which
I'll probably never understand,
because she never asked
for recognition.

She simply became the shelter.

Growing up,
I thought she was teaching me
how to live.

Now that I am a mother,
I realize
she was teaching me
how to love.

Not with perfection.

But with consistency.

With showing up.

With sacrifice.

With grace
even when grace felt impossible.

She let me become
who I was
even before
I knew who that would be.

I know there were moments
she wanted to stop me,
to tell me I was wrong,
to spare me the heartbreak
waiting around the corner.

Now I recognize
the quiet restraint
behind her eyes.

Because sometimes
the greatest act of motherhood
is allowing your child
to learn a lesson
you wish you could carry
for them instead.

I have seen her
be a daughter,
a sister,
a friend,
a wife,
a Meemaw,
an aunt.

To so many people,
she is something different.

But before she was
any of those things,

she was simply Carolyn.

And somehow,
that has always been enough.

She annoys me
like no one else can.

She knows exactly
which buttons to press.

She laughs
before I finish the story
because she already knows
where I'm going.

She is the person
I still want to call
to tell the smallest,
most meaningless parts
of my day,
because somehow
she has always made
those little moments
feel important.

I wish I could give her
the moon.

But I know she'd smile
just as brightly
over a handwritten note,
a shared meal,
or another afternoon
surrounded by the people she loves.

That's the beautiful thing
about women like her.

They have never measured love
by what they receive.

Only by what they give.

If my grandmother
could see her now,
if she could witness
the life my mother has carried,
the storms she endured,
the family she built,
the love she poured
into every corner she touched,

I know she'd be proud.

Because I am.

She didn't have to become
someone extraordinary
to earn my admiration.

She only ever had to be herself.

And if one day
I become even half the woman
she has always been,

I will consider my life
a beautiful success.

Thank you, Mom.

For your sacrifices.

For your patience.

For your laughter.

For every lesson
you never realized
you were teaching.

But most of all,

thank you

for always being you.