Well Mamas, Happy Father's Day.

It's a funny thing, Father's Day, when you're a single Mama. Especially the first one on your own. What to do? Wine with lunch? Dress all in black? Pedicure? Yoga? Fly to Vegas?

For my first post-kiddo, unattached Father's Day, I did not fly to Vegas. (There's always next year.) It was actually kind of low key. A mixture of chores, errands, some down time and--gasp--writing!

Right, I know, I make my living tossing words around for others, sure. Lots of words, for lots of others. But today, in honor of my single mother-and-fatherhood, I relished in the gift of a few kidless hours and used them to write for myself. It's incredible, the power of a few thousand words, added to a few thousand more. If I keep this up, I might actually finish my book! Too bad I won't make Oprah's show before she hangs up her mic.

Having the time and space, though, reminded me just how hard we single Mamas work. Not that I needed reminding. Ha. No, rather, I had a moment or two to reflect on just how flipping hard single parenthood is. Hard! (I thought this over while I took an indulgent 20 minutes to blow out my hair. It was kind of fabulous.)

Please don't misunderstand: I love my kiddo. Pick an appendage, I'd saw it off myself to save her discomfort. But having a few hours to myself, to be a grown-up and throw myself into what I love, well, that didn't suck.

So, to all the Single Mamas out there, I hope you were able to celebrate yourselves today. It isn't easy, what we do: blood, sweat, tears, tantrums, the lot of it. (I don't even want to get into what high school will look like.) If you didn't have the opportunity to celebrate yourselves, let me honor you here: it takes guts to do what we do. It takes strength and creativity. Our days are never over and there is rarely a moment when we are off duty. But our perseverance, our determination and our blind and reckless love for our kiddos see us through. We are Superwomen.

Single Mamas, I salute you.