Mother of the Year contest

We aired the finalists and winner of our Mother of the Year contest, the same contest which I had been helping to 'judge' a while back.  I say 'judge' because a group of us were assigned to wade through the thousands of submissions and give the green light to some, so producers could wade through those green lights and narrow it down even further.  We were mainly looking for who followed the rules, and who included a good picture.  Like I said earlier, I couldn't power through it as well as other big, onerous projects, because many of these submissions came from families who were struggling with diseases and finances, which made me a little depressed after three or four hours.

Our three finalists and their families were excited to be here, and it was contagious.  They were all so nice, and easy to work with, my job was to lead them from area to area until it was time for our segment to air.  I also ended up unwinding the giant check they would win, and flattening it on the floor with some heavy boxes so it would become rigid.  I hadn't ever handled a big TV check like that, so it was fun. I also learned that it was made of some plastic material instead of paper or card, which was sort of surprising.

I expected the family who won to be ecstatic and scream for joy, but instead they became very emotional. The mother was shocked and started to tear up, which made the father and their two boys weepy. They were all outgoing and excited before the segment, but you could tell that they were such a solid family unit once they won. They weren't crying because they won the money, but crying out of love and gratitude for their mom/wife, and for the recognition of something they all wholeheartedly believed: that they have a fantastic lady in their lives.  Even afterwards, and until I was finished with helping out, the family didn't say anything about what they would spend the money on.  Instead, they reminisced about times when their mom had been stellar as a mother or wife.