If you’ve been around these parts for any length of time, you probably know that Mathy is one of my best friends. My mom and I are super close. Today is her birthday, as well as my parents’ 31st wedding anniversary. They got married on spring break because my mom was still teaching in Delaware. They actually didn’t live together until the following summer when she moved down to DC from Wilmington. I was born just before their first anniversary. I tried to get married on their 30th- but we “couldn’t get married on a Monday” so it ended up being 2 days before.
Mathy is one of the strongest people I’ve ever known, and I’m not just saying that because I’m her kid. Even before Candace died and she started crusading against her wrongful death, she was a fierce mama bear. It took me a while to catch up with her fierceness, but I think I’m doing an OK job now. I’ve had a great example to follow.
When Candace was born, my mom gave my dad two options: either we got a live-in nanny or she would stop working. Getting two babies up and ready for daycare before getting to work and then trying to pick us up by four was becoming an increasingly less viable option. (Any teachers reading this will understand that timeline is a joke). So we had nannies from the time I was two through 4th grade, but there was no mistaking who my mommy was and I would never say I was raised by nannies. We had live-in big sisters! My mom was at the doctor with one of us and we were being very calm but affectionate with her. The doctor turned and told her, “THIS is why all mothers should stay home with their kids so they’re this well-adjusted,” or something like that. I’m not sure if she corrected him, but she probably did.
I grew up in and out of her classrooms- watching her work with kids who had issues ranging from homelessness to abuse to simply having learning differences. One of my proudest moments, and there are a lot, was once chatting with an Uber driver who had two daughters she had taught. One was in college to become a mechanical engineer, and one was in college to become a math teacher. Not only did he make me feel like a celebrity simply for being Mathy’s kid, but when I told my mom she remembered the girls right away.
This is really pretty impressive because she taught somewhere in the range of 600+ kids in her career with Montgomery County, but each child mattered to her. She bought coats for kids who needed them and had snacks on hand for hungry tummies. I’ll never forget how proud she was that one of her kids, who didn’t speak or really participate in class, learned the sight-word, “fish.” It was the only word he seemed to know, but it was progress for him and that’s what mattered to her.
All of this doesn’t even touch on her extracurricular. She’s on my committees than I can ever remember and still finds time to advocate health safety for children and talk to other families who have lost kids. She’s super awful at being retired and continues to work with kids who need extra help hitting their targets.
Basically, this has been a Mathy appreciation post.
I love you, Mommy! Happy birthday, and happy anniversary. Thank you for marrying daddy and doing a great job for and with us.
photos by Darrell McDavid photography
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