Queen for a Day
Hey, moms: This one's for you! Sort of.
In honor of Mother’s Day, I’m dusting off this gem from the original “Mommy Confidential” column in the Lowell Sun. Enjoy your day, queens!
Queen for a Day
(May 16, 2010)
“Pssst! Mommy! Mommy! Mom! Wake up!”
Someone is jabbing me in the arm. I open one eye. “Hmm?”
“Happy Mother’s Day!” my 6-year-old son says. He is standing about three inches from my face.
“Thanks, honey!” I look at the clock. “Wow, it’s… early.”
“Yep. It is.” He climbs over me and burrows under the covers. “Are you having a good Mother’s Day?”
“Uh… yes! Of course.”
“I’m so glad you’re my mommy.”
“You are? Awww, thank you, sweetie!”
“You want to know why?”
Probably not. But I ask anyway: “Why?”
“Because I got to make lots of cool Mother’s Day stuff at school. If you weren’t my mommy, I wouldn’t get to make anything.”
“Ah. Glad I could help.”
“Mommy, why do we have a Mother’s Day?”
“Because, um…”
“And why don’t we have a Kid’s Day?”
“Because every day is Kid’s Day.”
He furrows his brow. “No, it’s not.”
“Yes, it is.”
“It’s not on the calendar,” he points out.
“It doesn’t have to be.”
He thinks about that for a minute. Then he shrugs. “So, you wanna see all the cool stuff I made at school?” He disappears momentarily and returns with a pile of papers. One by one, he makes the presentations. “That’s you, and you’re surrounded by hearts because I love you so much. And that’s a three-headed monster with five legs and six arms. And those are all the foods from the Very Hungry Caterpillar book.”
“Wow, I love them! Thank you so much! Can I hang them on my wall?”
“Sure,” he says. “But this one, you can wear on your head.”
I blink. “My head?”
“Uh huh,” he answers. “See how it’s long? You can wrap it around your head and staple it together.”
“Oh,” I nod. “Kind of like a Mother’s Day crown.”
“Yep. Do you want to wear it when we go out to eat?”
“Oh… I, uh…” I clear my throat. “Yes. Yes, I do.”
Meanwhile, down the hall, a ruckus is brewing. I can hear my husband trying to convince our 3-year-old daughter to do something. Whatever it is, she’s having none of it. Finally, a few minutes later, she comes stomping into the room and throws a card at my head. Then she collapses onto the floor in a tantrum.
“What’s wrong with her?” my son asks.
“Beats me,” I answer, rubbing the paper cut on my cheek. “She’s probably mad it’s not Kid’s Day.”
Nice try, little lady. But this crown ain’t big enough for the both of us.
Trisha Blanchet is the author of Murder Like Magic (coming August 25, 2026, from Crooked Lane), The Neath Trilogy (Herrick’s End, Herrick’s Lie, and Herrick’s Key), The Cow Crashed into the Moon, and more. She’s also the producer and host of A Mighty Blaze Podcast, a member of the Tall Poppy Writers, and the founder of Operation Delta Dog: Service Dogs for Veterans (OperationDeltaDog.org).
Murder Like Magic < Preorder here!
The Neath Trilogy (Herrick’s End, Herrick’s Lie, and Herrick’s Key) < Get your copies here!
Operation Delta Dog: Service Dogs for Veterans < Learn more here!
A Mighty Blaze Podcast < Great author interviews here!