A Mother's Day card from 3News' Leon Bibb: I Remember Mama

CLEVELAND — Decades ago a Hollywood movie about a San Francisco Norwegian-American family caught America's interest.  

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"I Remember Mama" later became a television show.  

The family's mother was the center of the story. I could always see a connection between television's Mama and my mother.  

Similarities.  

Just as Mama on TV, my mother brought a special heart to our family.  

Today is Mother's Day in this country.  

Always the idea is to celebrate Mom.  Even if the Mother in your life may have been someone other than your birth mother.

 Someone who maybe nurtured or helped guide you in some way.   

My mother is gone now, having passed away a few years ago.  But my memories are there.  Her images in the family photo album speak to me.   Mother,  the young woman. Mother in middle-age. Mother in maturity. Throughout the years -- mother. 

Maybe you don't have as tender mother memories as I.  

But perhaps there was or is someone special in your life.  

Grandmother, aunt, friend, teacher, mother-in-law, a wife, mother of your child or sister. 

This day can be for them also.      

The old photograph album of my mother in all her years is precious.  

So, too, are the photographs of my mother-in-law, my wife's mother.  

In my life I celebrate them all: mother, wife, mother-in-law, sister, aunts and daughters.  

All have given or raised life.   

I'm not able to telephone either my mother or mother-in-law.  But we will put flowers on their graves, knowing, in reality, they are not really there.  They are where good mothers and their memories are held.  in the heart.    

Still, I send this TV greetings card to them.   

And to you.  

And to moms or mother figures in your life in whatever role they brought to you. 

So allow me to send a personal acknowledgment here.  If my mother and mother-in-law are somehow able to hear me – and I think they do – I send this television greeting to them.  It goes also to the mothers in your life.  As well as to the people who were mother figures in your life.   

With heartfelt words coming from a thankful child.       

To Mother, 

Happy Mother's Day.   

Love, Leon.

EDITOR'S NOTE: The video above previously aired on May 5, 2023, in an unrelated video.