When you're 80, you get whatever you want.

[judecorp]

So it's coming on Mother's Day, and on this day, I especially celebrate the two women who can most easily be considered "mother" to me: the woman who gave birth to me, and my paternal grandmother. My mother and father broke up when I was three, and my smurfbrother and I are some of the rare instances of children who lived with a single-parent father. My grandparents lived next door, and a lot of the childraising was done by them.

Anyway, if there's one thing in the whole wide world that my grandmother likes, it's fresh flowers. Honestly, I don't think it would matter if I picked them out of someone's lawn, or if I ordered the most expensive delivery bouquet. She just loves flowers. She likes to set them on her table, and every time she walks by, she smells them. Every time. She gushes about them and thinks they are the most wonderful thing. It's great when there's something, that one gift that's guaranteed to make someone's day. With Grandma, it's always easy: flowers.

I don't really like sending flowers. Sending flowers bums me out kind of, because the flowers are just going to die and cost too much money. When I lived locally, I would bring her potted plants which would make me feel better, because they wouldn't die. But you know what? She prefers delivery flowers. And well, I love my grandmother with all my heart and if floral arrangements will do it for her, well, that's what she gets.

On holidays like Mother's Day and Valentine's Day, everyone jacks up the prices of floral arrangements. To save a little money, I had the flowers sent a few days early (today), and I picked a medium-sized arrangement. Just a simple basket with a bunch of brightly colored flowers. I figured it would be good to send them early because a) I would be the first gift, which could be kind of fun, and b) she would be surprised.

She called this evening to thank me for the flowers, and to tell me that she had been feeling kind of blue until she got the flowers. She said she was so happy, she cried a little, and even my grandfather was a little jealous. She said it made her whole day, and that she wasn't expecting it at all (even though I send her flowers at least twice a year, really, it's too easy to make her happy). She always says that she wants all the flowers now, while she's alive and can enjoy them, and doesn't want any when she dies.

Happy Mother's Day, Grandma. You get anything you want - you deserve it. Thank you.