Mother’s Day has come and gone, but that doesn’t mean we can’t pause to honor the women who carried us, raised us, believed in us when no one else would, and loved us in ways we’ll never fully understand. Every day is Mother’s Day – because without mothers, let’s be honest, most of us wouldn’t remember to bring a sweater or call the doctor before it’s “too late.”
One of the first concerts I ever went to turned out to be a life-altering moment. I went expecting to hear great music, but I left changed. U2 played with the kind of fire and purpose that shook something loose in me. I stood the entire time, completely entranced – locked in.
And while the whole band was electric, Bono’s on-stage presence was something else entirely. His charisma and command were like watching a modern-day Irish Elvis with sharper lyrics and a deeper soul.
His voice echoed something raw, prophetic and just beneath the skin. Since that night, I’ve been a loyal fan. I’ve bought every album and listened to every song.
Bono released “Surrender: 40 Songs, One Story” a few years ago. I’d known about it, of course, but life has a way of pulling your attention elsewhere. And then, one quiet day, I finally started listening. I came to the chapter “Iris (Hold Me Close)” – a song I’d known for years – but hearing Bono tell its story landed differently.
I’d always appreciated the song but hadn’t known the whole backstory. Iris was his mother – I didn’t realize she died so young from a stroke when Bono was just 14.
And I certainly didn’t expect what came next: That on the very same day I listened to that chapter, I would get a call saying my own mother, Arlene, had likely suffered a stroke, and was being moved into hospice care.
It felt like more than a coincidence – a strange, cosmic alignment. And there I was, listening to him talk about his mother – her humor, quiet strength, and absence – and all I could think about was mine.
Bono’s lyrics resonated deeply:
Iris standing in the hall
She tells me I can do it all
Iris wakes to my nightmares
Don’t fear the world, it isn’t there
That’s the thing about great art. It doesn’t always make you focus on the artist’s pain – it turns the mirror around. It makes you think about your own life. Your own joy. Your own grief. And in this case, it made me think about my mom.
These lines mirrored my own childhood. My mother would come into my room during nightmares – always comforting me, always believing in me.
It made me think about how she always put others first and hid pain behind her smile. How she showed up to every event – no matter how tired, no matter how invisible she may have felt in her own life. It made me think of all her quiet sacrifices that nobody noticed – except me. Thank you, Mom.
There’s a line in the song Iris where Bono sings, “The ache in my heart is so much a part of who I am.” And I feel that.
In “Surrender,” Bono recounts a conversation with the Dalai Lama that stopped me: “You can only begin a real meditation on life with a meditation on death. ... Everything we do, think, feel, imagine, discuss is framed by the notion of whether our death is the end or the beginning of something else. ...”
As I faced the impending loss of my mother, I found myself turning it over again and again. Whether death is the end or the beginning of something else, I know this much: Love doesn’t die. A mother’s influence doesn’t end. It shapes who we are, how we love, how we show up in the world.
This column didn’t land on Mother’s Day. It’s a few days late. But mothers don’t check the clock. They just keep showing up – day after day, year after year, life after life. And sometimes, they show up in a song you’ve heard a hundred times, but suddenly it hits you differently.
This one’s for Arlene.
And for Iris.
And for every mother who held us close, let us go, so we could learn to stand on our own.
Happy (belated) Mother’s Day.
• Toby Moore is a Shaw Local News Network columnist, star of the Emmy-nominated film “A Separate Peace,” and CEO of CubeStream Inc. He can be reached at feedback@shawmedia.com.