Call Your Mother
“Call your mother. Tell her you love her. Remember, you’re the only person who knows what her heart sounds like from the inside.”
Practice Calling Your Mother:
Keep it Causal. Call to share the everyday moments.
Stay Consistent. Call regularly to create a rhythm of connection.
Show Compassion. Call to listen with intention, compassion, and care.
My mother, Marilyn Mackey, called her mother every Saturday morning for 30 years. “We would call to stay connected and know what was going on in each other's lives.” My mother reminds me, “That was when we paid for long-distance calls too.” But the practice of staying connected begins a generation before her. “My mother’s relationship with her mother, Grandma Miller, was that we saw them every weekend. We would go to their house on the farm and have a meal and play games.”
I inherited the practice of calling your mother from my mother. I’ve called her almost every day since my father’s death in 2019. It’s a quick call to check in and hear about her plans for the day. It’s often less than 5 minutes each morning of casual conversation. I called my mom to ask her perspective on her children calling. “It is very encouraging just to hear from my children on a regular basis. It shows me their care and love for me as I'm older and living alone.” Some families live in the same neighborhood and interact consistently without a need to call. Many are more like ours scattered around the country and requiring intentionality to remain connected.
I was interested in hearing my mother’s view on the importance of the practice of staying connected. “I think it’s very important. It continues a healthy bonding that hopefully started when they were growing up. I think it can give encouragement both ways.” She offers how adult conversations among children and parents can provide important perspective. “There are things I know now I didn't know when I was 30. So, I can be an encouragement to share what we walked through, and it was tough. But those tough times you walked through you learn a lot about grace and mercy and how it extends both ways.”
I asked my mother what her encouragement would be for those who do not call their mother (or other family members or primary caregivers in their life). “It can just be very casual. Sometimes I send text to the grandkids, ‘Just checking in to see how your day's going and let you know I’m thinking of you. I love you!’” She notes consistency allows the day-to-day communication to build an important foundation for when a particularly hard or celebratory occasion occurs. “And show compassion. Whatever they're walking through in this time, whether it's joyful or tough, you can show compassion.”
My mother and I were both raised in Baptist faith traditions. She notes with a lighthearted laugh our unconscious leaning toward alliteration. Keep it Casual. Stay Consistent. Show Compassion. “We got three things. We can preach it,” says my mother. She’s right. We can preach it. Call your mother.
Thank you to Marilyn Mackey for her conversation and contribution to this article. Thanks Mom for your faithful example of staying connected and being a source of strength and encouragement for our family.
