It’s Women’s History Month, which encourages us to identify and commend the women in our lives that have been the most influential. I think of powerful trailblazers like Emma Gonzalez (advocate for gun control) and Marsha P. Johnson (gay liberation activist), and I think of quiet changemakers like Jane Goodall (primatologist/anthropologist) and Rosa Parks (activist in the Civil Rights Movement). Each of these women have advanced our world in groundbreaking ways, though without fail, the person who always comes to my mind first is my mom.
As a baby, she was the only one I let hold me; in college, she’s the only one I send my daily Wordle score to, and in preschool, I cried every day when she dropped me off, though I think my devastation was justified. She is the embodiment of all things good and beautiful. Through her, I’ve learned to love laying out in the sun, coffee with lots of creamer and solitude. I love my sweaters because most of them I stole from her, I love Burts Bees chapstick because she always carries it, and I love my face because she’s always in it.
My favorite thing about my mom is her heart. When I was in third or fourth grade, she took my siblings and me around the neighborhood to clean up trash on Earth Day because she believes in the power of doing your part. She always leaves Christmas cookies out for the garbagemen, donates when pressing issues are facing our world and reminds me that as long as I try my best, there is no failing in this life. She’s sensible, thoughtful and smart, and a great friend just as much as she is a great mom. Even though she taught me many important life lessons herself, she introduced me to a lot of great muses when I was younger, too.
At birthdays, we decorated cakes with Dolores O’Riordan. In the summertime, we played in the sprinklers with Sheryl Crow, and when we were feeling creative, we painted by numbers with Avril Lavigne. I developed a strong affinity for Janis Joplin (for allowing nothing to dull her untamed sparkle), Stevie Nicks (for advocating women’s rights and making vulnerability “cool”), and most memorably, Natalie Maines from The Chicks (for encouraging girls everywhere to speak our minds, even when nobody is on our side).
Every morning before I felt confident enough to take the bus to school, my mom and I would drive through our little town, listening to Natalie, Emily and Martie harmonize with the same ease and instinct of the birds flocking south overhead. We listened to them sing about blankets made of stars, pink RVs and crazy parades as we passed water towers, gazebos and that billboard with the two faces made out of squiggly lines. The first song I learned on guitar was their cover of Patty Griffin’s “Top of the World,” and I still had their “Taking the Long Way” CD playing when I was old enough to drive that car to school myself. My mom and I still listen to The Chicks when we’re together and adore them just the same, though I don’t think she knows that who I most want to be even more than Natalie is her.