Mother Love

When i was a little girl, i wanted nothing more than a mother who could hold me together. And she couldn’t, through no fault of her own. She just couldn’t. I came flying apart, daily, bringing her the pieces of my shattering, but she had her own to reckon with.

I didn’t know what mother love looked like, but when my son was born, I loved him with an unparalleled ferocity. I still do, though he is taller and stronger than I am now. I would push him from a speeding truck and be run over, without thinking.

I am here, always devoted, whenever sought for. Quietly unobtrusive. Noticing. Waiting. Watching my mother has taught me awareness. I sense rain coming, before anyone’s predictions. I feel the sudden shifting of the wind, the darkening shadows, as if they are happening inside me, and I can’t explain how i know what i know, but i am certain it’s true, and i always believe it.

Perhaps this is my mother’s gift to me. To trust my intuition, even in the face of contrary evidence (she would send me to bed when the sun was shining. Drunk, she couldn’t be reasoned with). Perhaps learning to hold myself together prepared me for her death, my father’s leaving, my beloved grandma dying.

I used to resent the “give what you wish you had gotten” idea. Spent a lot of years parked in resentment. But I can assure you it’s true; what you give comes back to you, seeps into you, becomes you. The gift of your love, given freely from your heart of hearts, holds you together.

LBM 4/13/13