My mother... she is beautiful, softened at the edges and tempered with a spine of steel. I want to grow old and be like her.

Reason number 106 why dogs are smarter than humans," I say. "Once you leave the litter, you sever contact with your mothers

I wonder if other mothers feel a tug at their insides, watching their children grow up into the people they themselves wanted so badly to be.

I always wondered why God was supposed to be a father," she whispers. Fathers always want you to measure up to something. Mothers are the ones who love you unconditionally, don't you think?

Sometimes, mothers say and do things that seem like they don't want their kids... but when you look more closely, you realize that they're doing those kids a favor. They're just trying to give them a better life.

Taking a deep breath, I shake my head and find Judge staring at me. "Reason number 106 why dogs are smarter than humans," I say. "Once you leave the litter, you sever contact with your mothers.

It's the child who's supposed to cry, and the mom who makes it all better, not the other way around, which is why mothers will move heaven and earth to hold it together in front of their own kids.