Days like today are days when words never seem to suffice. How can you describe someone who is your source of life, who unconditionally loves you like no other, who means the world to you? It is almost impossible because there are not adjectives enough. So in order to honor my mother today, I decided to post a letter I wrote almost ten years ago to nominate her for Oprah's Great Mom's Getaway. She didn't win, I suppose, because my writing was not eloquent enough, but she should have. So here's to the most influential woman in my life, the epitome of godliness and motherhood, a true lady who is as lovely on the inside as she is on the outside, and someone who mothers me as much today as she did almost fifty years ago when God gave me to her. She is, my mother . . . Mrs. Evelyn Blount!
603 W. Dixie St. • Plant City, FL 33566
(813) 752-4131
February 2, 1999
The Oprah Winfrey Show
Great Moms Getaway
P.O. Box 811071
Chicago, IL 60681
Dear Oprah and Panel of Judges:
My mother, Evelyn Blount, is truly a remarkable woman and a Great Mom of America in both the northern and southern hemispheres. Her story, however, is more than just a checklist of the things that all wonderful mothers do. It is the story of a woman whose life has been dedicated to blessing others. Mama was raised the daughter of an alcoholic sharecropper, but she made a decision at an early age to move beyond the strawberry field and make her life count for something good. The sixth of nine children, she was the first in her family to graduate with a high school diploma.
In spite of opposition from family and friends, she fell in love with and married my father, Rev. Roland Blount. Some were afraid that this blind preacher would never be able to provide for his young bride. That was forty-one years ago. My father went on to become the first disabled foreign missionary appointed by his denomination, and my mother eventually became an ordained minister herself. My father has never seen the face of his beautiful wife, but the loveliness of her spirit shines through.
Not only has my mother loved and nurtured her own children, she has been the mother of hundreds as a missionary to Latin America for twenty-eight years. As a child, I remember her bringing passing merchants inside to sit at our table and be served whatever we had to eat. Over the years she has mothered “the least of these” on a personal basis whether it be giving anonymous gifts to those less fortunate, visiting the elderly, encouraging a young person having difficulty in school, giving a ride to someone in need of transportation, or investing time on her knees, lifting up others in prayer.
Within the past year she has faced surgery for cancer twice. When she heard that a relative was questioning how God could allow this to happen to someone who had given her entire life for Him, she responded by saying, “No, He gave His life for me!”
Evelyn Blount has always been a godly example, living before her children and others the things she deeply believes. I love her and thank God for giving me to her. She is the virtuous woman described in Proverbs 31. “Her children rise up and call her blessed.”
Mama’s story is far greater than the limits of a single page allow, but I’m sure you will agree that my mother, Evelyn Blount, is a most deserving candidate for a Great Moms Getaway.
Sincerely,
Howard Blount
To read more about our wonderful mother visit my sister Carla's post entitled My Beautiful Mother.
Howie
