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Dear Readers: Happy Mother’s Day. Today would be a good time to phone your mother, grandmother, mother-in-law, stepmother or foster mother and wish them the best. And please don’t forget those for whom this day is filled with sadness. Please give them a call and say you are thinking of them.

Every year, salary.com prints an article about what a mother is worth in actual dollars. At press time, we didn’t have the figures for 2015, but here is how they broke it down for 2014:

n Housekeeping: $10.19 an hour for 14.6 hours (stay-at-home mom) or 8.3 hours (mom with an outside job).

n Cooking: $14.04 per hour for 14.5 hours (stay-at-home) or 8.7 hours (outside job).

n Day care teacher: $12.84 per hour for 14.3 hours (stay-at-home) or 5.6 hours (outside job).

n Computer operator: $16.44 an hour for 8.6 hours (stay-at-home) or 6.2 hours (outside job).

n Laundry: $10.10 per hour for 6.5 hours (stay-at-home) or 4.2 hours (outside job).

n CEO: $53.81 per hour for 3.2 hours (stay-at-home) or 2.5 hours (outside job).

n Facilities manager: $31.63 per hour for 10.9 hours (stay-at-home) or 7.3 hours (outside job).

n Van driver: $13.65 per hour for 7.8 hours (stay-at-home) or 5.9 hours (outside job).

n Janitor: $10.14 per hour for 7.8 hours (stay-at-home) or 4.4 hours (outside job).

n Psychologist: $38.94 per hour for 8.3 hours (stay-at-home) or 6.3 hours (outside job).

The base salary for a stay-at-home mom at a standard 40-hour workweek would be $38,126, plus overtime of 56.5 hours ($80,779) for a total of $118.905. For a mom with an outside job, that would be $40,583, plus 19.4 hours of overtime ($29.524) for a total of $70,107.

Of course, these figures depend on what each mom does individually, but the bottom line is that every mother is worth a lot more than you might think. The next time someone makes you feel your job as a mother isn’t valued, keep these figures in mind. And now here’s a sweet tribute to a mother-in-law:

Dear Annie: Every morning I could hear her walking down the hall. “Good morning, John,” she would say with a smile. She’d sit down next to me and enjoy every sip of her coffee, read her paper, prepare Cheerios with a banana and continue on with a day full of joy.

My mother-in-law lived with me for 27 years before she passed away. She was born in Japan in poverty and died in my magnificent home, which she helped us acquire. She died peacefully and with dignity in her home, surrounded by loved ones. This is part of what I wrote when she passed:

They came and took you away,

Your last trip down the long driveway.

Your house is clean, your work is done,

You left the mountain at the setting of the sun.

The vine you planted grows and is so tall,

A cool breeze and shade, it covers us all.

Anyone can go there, in the heat of the day,

Ask a question and you always show the way!

Who will I read the paper with? No worries, old friend. We will drink our coffee and talk sports, until your daughter gets up and I remember who I am. — Your Son-in-Law

Annie’s Mailbox is written by Kathy Mitchell and Marcy Sugar, longtime editors of the Ann Landers column. Please email your questions to anniesmailbox@creators.com, or write to: Annie’s Mailbox, c/o Creators Syndicate, 737 3rd Street, Hermosa Beach, CA 90254. You can also find Annie on Facebook at Facebook.com/AskAnnies. To find out more about Annie’s Mailbox and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com. COPYRIGHT 2015 CREATORS.COM

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