May is here for another go around and has brought with it the typical unpredictable spring weather of the Dakota’s.

You’re an optimist or an idiot if you pack away your mukluks, muffs and mittens before mid-August around here. Idiots don’t know any better and optimists will just grin and bear it, so it’s hard to differentiate sometimes.

Speaking of idiots and optimists it’s Mother’s Day this weekend and behind every idiot is an optimistic mother just hoping that all that pain and suffering wasn’t in vain. For some of our mothers the physical pain of childbirth was merely a warm up for the lifetime of mental anguish to follow. Idiots don’t know any better and our mothers just grin and bare it.

My mother is no exception; she is an eternal optimist but is not content to just grin and bear it when it comes to her idiots. She has been my and my sibling’s mother for as long as I can remember and during that time, she has always been there for us. She was always in the bleachers, always behind the camera, and always willing to call us “idiots” when it was warranted.

It was, and still is, warranted a lot and in the true spirit of idiots it never has stopped us from doing whatever it was that seemed idiotic to her. It’s a pretty sure bet if it seemed idiotic to my mom, it was, because a woman who appreciates the endless entertainment a whoopee cushion provides is no fun hating prude.

As we’ve gotten older it seems Mom’s reference to us as idiots has lessened. This is either due to maturity on our part or acceptance on Mom’s. “Eternal optimist reduced to realism by idiots.” Film at eleven. Swing by our next family gathering and judge for yourself…it’s worth the price of admission…a whoopee cushion and a jug of rum.

I remember my first whoopee cushion. My brother, Jarvis in his zeal to make the loudest fuuuuurrrrp, jumped up and landed on it and blew it out. He rolled around clutching his backside and yelping while I, the concerned brother, ran to check the status of my poor whoopee cushion.

We took it to the gas station to get it patched and nervously paced the floor sipping Coke and eating Corn Nuts waiting for the prognosis. They were able to patch it but it never sounded the same after that. It had a listless half-hearted “fss” sound that just didn’t pack the same humorous punch. So I sat on my brother and produced the real thing to teach him a little lesson.

Mother’s Day is a day set aside for us to drag our mothers and wives to overpriced buffets in an attempt to put our conscious at ease for another year. Don’t you think they deserve more effort than that? They smile and remain optimistic while their kids drag whoopee cushions to the local gas station to get patched.

Let’s strive to make Mother’s Day more of a sustained effort that sounds like, “fuuuuurrrrp” rather than “fss.”

Happy Mother’s Day.