Something’s Fishy…

It’s Flag Day in the US. The national holiday, which falls on June 14 every year, marks the day that the Second Continental Congress adopted the US flag. I was the only kid in my class that knew when it rolled around every year and for good reason: it’s also my mom’s birthday.

So, on today, which we celebrate across the country (who knew my mom was so popular?), indulge me for a moment while I tell you a little non-tax related story about my mom and her birthday.

When I was a kid, my mom made the most phenomenal cakes. She would ask what we kids wanted on our cakes for our birthday and voila, we would have it. We thought we were cool. Little did we know, we just couldn’t afford a store-bought cake. But nonetheless, from Strawberry Shortcake to a Duke Blue Devil (no booing, remember, today is a national holiday), I had one amazing birthday cake after another.

And one year, as a kid, I wanted to return the favor. I found a recipe and I knew where to find all of the ingredients from flour to sugar to Crisco. But I didn’t know two very important things:

Being the frugal Southern woman that she was, my mom stored the old grease from fish fries in a Crisco can; and
I had no idea what Crisco looked like.

So, of course, you know what happened: fish cake.

It was not pretty. It was not tasty. And it did not smell good.

My mom took a bite and asked how we made the cake. I proudly showed her, fish grease and all. And this is the thing about my mom… That wasn’t my last cooking disaster. Because, despite such a huge mistake, we were back in the kitchen again in no time, trying something new.

I’ve learned lots of things from my mom over the years – like how to properly identify Crisco – but the one thing that I learned most was to keep trying. I have an odd sense of self, I guess, because I’ve believed all of these years that I could do anything if I just tried. And I have to thank my mom for encouraging that in me. She didn’t tell me that I couldn’t do things even when she might have known better. She let me try – even if it meant that her birthday cake tasted like fish. And for that, I am forever grateful.

Happy birthday, Mom!