There was no question about it –

Mother’s Day was a day to celebrate our mother.

And back then it meant walking to the local 5 & 10 store to buy the perfect gift.

I will never forget that year when I was eight and my brother ten.

We talked together in whispered voices in our room

and counted out change –

dumping out all the pennies, nickels and dimes onto  our bed from our money jars

our savings from weeks and weeks of quarter allowances.

That year it hardly seemed enough

but it was all we had.

And if we put our money together we thought  we just might be able to buy something really nice.

That particular day as we walked back and forth in the aisles of the store

we saw nothing that caught our eyes. Absolutely nothing!

Jewelry, purses, delicate figurines of birds, etc –

Nothing was quite good enough

for our one –in–a-million mom.

I was just turning to leave when my eyes fell on a red hat.

It was beautiful as it perched on the holder for all to see.

I reached over and tugged at my brother’s sleeve

and pointed.

“That’s it,” he said looking at me with excitement.

But almost at the same time we wondered.

Would we possibly have enough money to buy it? It was so pretty —

He glanced up at the carefully tucked under price tag

and pulled it out  to see the cost.

I immediately knew that it would be close and wondered if we had enough to buy such a beautiful gift.

We pulled out our bag filled with all our savings.

“We’ve got it,” my brother doing some mental figuring  and my heart jumped for joy.

I could just imagine our Mom wearing this gorgeous  red hat.

“Can I help you?” a voice from behind us asked.

I turned and looked up at this very tall, straight faced  woman.

“We’d like to buy this hat..for our mother.”

She reached over and took the hat off  its stand

and began walking towards the checkout.

My brother and I followed closely behind her.

There at the counter we counted out our pile of change.

Yes, all those pennies and nickels and dimes

and surprisingly we had enough. My brother was right!

Just enough to buy the best Mother’s Day gift in the world.

Yes, I can still see us walking, practically skipping home that day.

And I can still remember my mom’s smiling face

when she opened that box and took out that hat.

Sometimes words don’t even have to be spoken.

We knew,

my brother and I,

that she liked it.

Well the years have come and gone

I have no idea whatever happened to that hat

but the memory of that time will stay with me forever.

If hats are worn in heaven she is proudly wearing that red one today.