My mother didn't call to complain. She called to ask if I was doing okay. That made it worse.
It was a quarter past nine in the evening. I picked up with my head still half at work, and only halfway through the call did it land. She was telling me about the cake my sister had brought. It had been her birthday. All day. And I, her son, was just about the only one who hadn't said a word.
I tried to fix it with an "I was just about to call you". She pretended to believe me. That's what mothers do.
Why do we forget the people closest to us?
Here's the uncomfortable part. I rarely miss the birthday of some vague ex-colleague, because an app neatly pings me about those. But my mother sits in no system at all. The people who matter most never get written down, because we "just know" them. So on a busy Thursday they slip straight through.
It has nothing to do with love. I genuinely thought about my mother that month, doing groceries, passing a woman with her haircut. Just not on the fourteenth between nine and five, the only window where it counted.
You can outsource remembering, not the thought
After that call I set things up differently. Not with resolutions, I'd had those for years. I simply stopped letting the remembering depend on me.
Now, two weeks ahead, a suggestion shows up: her birthday is coming, here's a fitting card, with a message in my own tone. All I have to do is say yes and write something personal. That last part stays my job, as it should.
My mother knows about Attentico by now. She calls it a bit like cheating. Then her card simply arrived on time this year, and I never heard about it again.
Looking for words for a card like that? Birthday wishes for your mother has twenty-five examples, from short to personal.
Recognise that phone call? Attentico is free to try, and your mother will never know.