Mother’s Day has a different feel for me this year — because my mother’s no longer here.

She died at age 90 over the winter. And while I didn’t get a chance to see her as much as I would have liked in recent years — work and geographic distance can get in the way of such efforts — I will never underestimate the impact she had on my life.

Most moms make that impact, after all.

My mother was caring enough of her kids when we were young to be the only person to go with me to a Steelers-Green Bay Packers game at Three Rivers Stadium in 1970. This was before the Steelers became so good later in that decade.

Snow was swirling and the wind chill factor was below 0, and our seats were in the upper deck. A guy sitting next to us handed his flask to my mother, saying, “Lady, it looks like you need this more than I do.”

She claims to have not taken a sip from it, but I think she did.

My mother cared enough about allowing her kids to defend themselves when she told me I could go after the Little League pitcher who hit me with a pitch three times in the same game — even though it started a bit of a brawl.

My mother cared enough to feel so badly when she dropped me off at Ohio University to begin my freshman year, driving away while looking at me through the rearview mirror. I noticed that.

She also cared enough to return to Ohio University for Parents Weekend. Knowing I was homesick, she brought a couple of my best friends from home with her. I didn’t drink, so she went to a bar and drank with members of the football team on Saturday night.

It was I who had to go in there and fish my mother out of the bar … what’s wrong with that picture?

And it was my mother who cared enough to talk me into accepting a stringer assignment to cover a high school football game the fall after I graduated. I was still looking for a full-time job and had tickets to Game three of the 1979 World Series that night.

My mother said if I was serious about making sportswriting my career, I better learn that it means sacrificing certain things. She was right about that.

She also told me the Pirates would make the World Series in other years and I could go to the games then.

She was wrong about that.

While I felt badly I couldn’t see my mother or family as much as I wanted to over the years, there was something I realized about my mother that made me feel better about that.

It was more important to her to see me succeed than to just see me.

I imagine that’s true about mothers in general.

I appreciate Mother’s Day more now than I ever have before — because it will make me take pause and enjoy my memories of her.

Appreciate your mother while she’s here.

Cherish her long after she’s not.

John Enrietto is sports editor of the Butler Eagle