Mickey Z

Cool Observer

Monday, February 20, 2006

Screw Washington and Lincoln...today is my Mom's birthday

As a some of the regulars here know, my Mom had major health issues in 2005. This makes today—her 70th birthday—all the more spectacular.

To celebrate, how about a mother of a piece I wrote a while back? First, an excerpt:

With all due disrespect to Joan Crawford and Michael Keaton, I’ll take Mother Jones (the woman, not the mag) any day as my pop culture maternal icon. Born in Ireland and raised in Canada, Mary Harris “Mother” Jones did her agitating right here in the U S of A from the late 1800s right into the twentieth century. Her organizing of workers—mineworkers in particular—earned her the nickname of “Miner’s Angel.” Barely five-feet tall, Mother Jones lived 100 years...most of them according to her personal credo: “Pray for the dead, and fight like hell for the living.”