My Mother Used to Always Say: The Catchphrases of My Childhood

My Mom, Dena Carol ‘Hargrove’ Mojica

In honor of Mother’s day, I would like to share my most beloved one-liners from my Mom.

Throughout the years, these catchphrases echoed through our home and now they echo through my heart.  My mom is a power-house of a woman with the energy of the Energizer bunny on Red Bull.  As the writer, Michayla White puts it, she “raised kids and dreams” and continues to crush it in her career as an Assitant Superintendent at Mabank ISD.

She looks like God mashed Jennifer Anniston and Sally Field together and then deep fat fried her in the fountain of youth. Like all true southern belles, she can be charming but can also put the “kill” in “kill ’em with kindness”.  She loves her four kids tenaciously, and very few obtain her passion for teaching.

She is fierce, at times unruly, she is my mom.

Even though it is annoying when she looks at me like I don’t feed my toddler, when I don’t blow dry said toddler’s hair, my goal has always been to make her laugh–to bring her joy. Her laugh is quite the experience. It is unquenchably wild, as it involves her entire body and is explosively loud. When I was in 2nd grade she and my teacher encouraged me to be a comedian, and ever since then, I have been living up to the challenge with her. I hope you laugh as well, friend, and to enhance your experience, please read the below in a southern accent.

• Upon all 4 of us wanting a sip of her Dr. Pepper she would say with a grin, “I swear if I was drinkin’ cow pee you’d all wanna drink!” 
• Whenever I was experiencing friend issues at school, she would say, ” Trash attracts Trash, ya know? It’s gonna happen naturally at work, at school, and all the days of your life. You gotta be careful with the friends you choose and maybe this friendship’s not workin’ out because you’re not trash.” 
• Museum trips were huge in our family, which is explained in her most popular line, “Surround yourself with beauty, Meg, and you will feel better.” 
• While checking the bathroom of the three sisters, we would hear her shout, “There’s a pink ring in this toilet!!!! Someone’s gonna get a staff infection!!!” 
• After a high school break up, and I was sobbing on her shoulder, she said, ” One of these days, you are gonna look back and be so thankful for this moment. Even though you are crying  now, one day you will be thankful.” (And she was right.)
• Anytime one of us was dating someone that she wished we would break up with she would say with a chuckle, “My prayer for you is that you land a man who does not take nearly as much work as your Dad did.” 
• For some reason, my mom created a new term for when she talked about physical boundaries in dating, so in my teen years I would hear, “Now don’t be too frothy now!” (Yes–‘frothy’ is the ladylike term for being too H-word.) 
• After tiffs during my last year at home, she would swing open the front door and shout, “You can be mad at me, but don’t you drive fast out of anger!” (I still hear this one whenever I leave a meeting angry.) 
• After hours in the lake, she would holler as she picked up sopping wet swimsuits and towels, “cootie-booty, cootie-booty, baths are not an option tonight! If ya don’t bathe after playing in the lake, you will get cootie-booty!” (‘Til this day, I’m still not sure of what medical condition she was referring to, but her strategy sure kept us all clean.) 
• Church was important to my mom. I recall her leading church at our kitchen table when I was a kid because we had just moved and had yet to find a church home. One of my favorite lines regarding “the church” and its inhabitants was, ” Some Saturday nights lead to you rightfully taking your place in the back pew on Sunday mornin’. That’s the problem with leaders today. They don’t know when to humbly step down from the front pulpit and take their place in that last pew. If your personal life is not lining up with the values of your public position of leadership, ya need to take a season of sittin’ in that last pew ’til ya figure it out.” 
• Sometimes after a heated meeting, she will call me and say, “Ignorance, just plain ignorance. I mean–are they even thinking about what’s best for the kids?!” 
• Anytime I would call her to vent on a crappy day, she would end the convo with, “Tomorrow is a brand new day. And although you can’t control all of this, you can control how you look and feel. So wake up tomorrow and put on your lipstick and feel good about yourself!” 
• (This last one needs no setup.) “My hope for all of my kids is that they speak their minds, infuse every conversation with love, know that when one door closes, the one that opens will be better, and above all else, I hope that they know not to fear because God will take care of them.” 

Please share your favorite lines from your mom in the comment section below and happy mother’s day, friends! ❤