I made a difference

Happy Friday evening,

How is everyone doing on this wonderful Friday? Are you ready for the weekend? I am. John and I are having lunch with some friends of ours from San Diego that we haven’t seen in months, so it will be awesome to just catch up with them.

What about you? What are your plans? Shoot me a text or drop me a comment, I love hearing from all my amazing readers who have become my friends.

Today has been a busy day. My youngest stopped over to pick me up and we had a quick bite to eat then we picked up a lifelong friend of his and headed to the golf course where the boys will begin their three day golf tournament. This is their 9th year doing this tournament. I believe there are 12 guys who participate and every year they golf somewhere different. This year they golfed at a course in Murrieta and tomorrow and Sunday they’ll be golfing Journey at Pechanga. They always have the greatest of times.

Tonight after they finished at the Murrieta course, Kevin called me and asked if I minded picking him up and dropping him off at Pechanga and if I did, he said no worries, he’d just Uber. Of course I told him I’d pick him and Shane up. I always love spending time with the boys especially now that they’re all grown up. They all have such busy lives, so I take every advantage of the time I get with them.

To my happy surprise I ended up picking up not only Kevin and Shane, but Danny and David too. I’ve known all these boys since they were in kindergarten, they’re 32 years old now, well except Kevin, he’s 27. The other three boys grew up with my oldest son and from the time Kev was little, he officially became their adoptive little brother. My boys have always had the same friends. Many of the boys Kev grew up with Tommy is besties with and vice versa. I must have done something right that all these guys are still connected and hang out and my boys are not only brothers, but buddies too.

Tonight as I drove the 4 boys (they’re actually grown men now) to Pechanga, Shane sat up front with me. He’s always had a special place in my heart. From early childhood until this very day, he’s called me Mama Dawn. Now most all the boys call me Mama Dawn because Shane does.

It’s an honor and blessing to be thought of in such a loving way by these guys. Shane’s a teacher and varsity coach of the basketball team at his school. One of the boys is a physicians assistant and the other boy tonight is a marketing rep. for a professional baseball team and my son is a licensed general contractor.

I’ve watched these boys grow into men and begin their own families. I’ve seen them graduate from kindergarten, elementary, middle and high school. I’ve seen them graduate with amazing careers from college and now I’m getting to see them get married, buy their first homes and have children of their own. Most of the boys married their high school sweethearts. Pretty awesome.

Shane and I were talking about his coaching and his amazing wife Camille. During our conversation he looked at me and said the sweetest thing. He said, “I want you to know that when I call you Mama Dawn it’s because I think of you as another mom. You have treated me like your son and I love you. You are a big part of my life and I hope you will always be in my life and be a part of my children’s life when they arrive someday.”

Sniffle sniffle happy tears. My heart was beyond warm and fuzzy.

David told me how much he’s always appreciated me and all the love and support I’ve shown to him over his life and Danny said the same thing, “I appreciate you, I always have.”

When we are raising kids we sometimes don’t realize the affect we may have on the lives of their friends. Knowing I made a difference in so many lives was an extremely humbling moment for me.

I don’t know if I’ll ever truly understand the impact I had in each of these boys lives and that’s okay, just knowing I made a difference is the greatest feeling in the world. Hearing my own boys tell me how much I matter to them is my greatest reward in life, and the bonus in life is hearing how much I meant to each of their friends who say, “you always made me feel like one of your own.”

“A child’s life is like a piece of paper on which every person leaves a mark.”-Robert A. Heinlein.

It’s pretty amazing knowing I left a mark on so many children’s lives. Hearing I made a difference first hand from them was incredible.

“When I look back on my life as a whole, it is impossible for me not to feel blessed.”-George Best.

My heart is overflowing with so much gratitude and love tonight. It’s not everyday we hear that we made a difference in someone’s life. I think most of the time those words go unspoken, but the feelings are still there. I think sometimes the opportunities to tell someone the difference you made in their life hasn’t manifested itself yet, but believe me, I’m sure we’ve all made some sort of difference in someone’s life.

Shane said to me before he got out of the car, “I’m sorry for not telling you how much you meant to me as my Mama Dawn when I was growing up. I’m sure as teenagers many of us fail to express our feelings, but as a grown adult now, I think you deserve to know, you did make a difference in my life and in the lives of so many of us. You always made us all feel welcome and at home. The meals you made for us, the snack and desserts when we had our tournament guitar hero weekend. I’ll never forget that and neither will any of the other guys. You will always be our Mama Dawn.”

Sniffle sniffle again.

I can tell you this my dear friends, it’s one of the greatest feelings in life having discovered that I am appreciated, I was appreciated by these boys (men) even though I had someone in my life during that time that was hell bent on making me feel unworthy.

“You’ll never be good enough for the wrong person. If you find yourself trying to convince them that you deserve time, respect or loyalty, then that’s settling for less than God’s will. God will send someone that appreciates you, that’ll give you the same love you keep trying to give to people who don’t know how to accept it.”-@godlydating101.

I might not have been good enough for the wrong person who was in my life for so many years, and I have struggled with feeling guilty for breaking up my family because I felt I was hurting my children, but today I realized just how much my sons truly do love me and so do all my bonus sons.

I spent much of my children’s life struggling to keep my sanity, keep them safe from the verbal and mental abuse I endured, but I underestimated them, they knew and today, I got to hear just how much they love me and how much they appreciated all I did and continue to do for them.

Tonight when I lay my head on my pillow I will thank God for the abundance of blessing he’s given me in my life. My children. John. Family. Friends and the many many many bonus sons and daughter in laws along with the few and upcoming bonus grandbabies that I get to see grow up.

I hope you can thank God for your blessing too my dear friends. Sleep well and thank you for stopping by and reading tonight’s blog.

Until next time, don’t forget, Love Life++ Hugs.