She remembers the day her daughter
was born; she was such a beautiful little creature, her head full of little
blonde ringlets and an angelic rosy face, perfect in every way. It was such a happy day and yet filled with a
sense of something missing. She knew
what it was that was missing, she felt it and it was strong within her, that
feeling of absence; the one that a daughter knows at that moment she yearns to
share with her own mother the birth of her child. But her mother wasn’t there, they had been
estranged for years and the weight lay heavy upon her as she cradled her infant
in her arms.
There wasn’t much that she could do
to change what was and so she began the task of raising her daughter. She was her third child so it was old hat to
her by this point, the act of being a mom, the endless diaper changes and late
night feedings, but still she missed that first bond that a mother shares with
her daughter when she gives birth. Many
times she wanted to pick up the phone and call her mother, to invite her over
to see the new bundle of joy; she never did because she knew what would become
of it, the hassles that would ensue within her marriage and the turmoil in her
life. She hated turmoil and so she
existed within the status quo that was her surroundings.
The days turned to weeks and weeks
into months and years. Time didn’t stand
still for her yearnings and her children began to grow up, get older and yet
her mother was not there to see them mature or to know what they had become,
she needed her there; wanted her near to hold and nurture her children. It saddened her so and she missed her mother
in her life and that of her children as she watched them reach the milestones
that they all do, the piano lessons and recitals, the graduations from high
school. She had raised four children all
together and there was always this feeling that they had been shortchanged,
that they had missed something; an extended family a group of people that would
love them unconditionally and be a safety net for them. She knew that the choices that she had made
had been the catalyst for what their lives were and though she wanted to take
responsibility for those choices she wasn’t sure how to do so.
Months and years turned to decades
and she knew that her turmoil with her own mother was partly due to her father
and that she had taken sides in her parents’ struggles, which while she
shouldn’t have been placed in that position she had willingly walked into
it. She also knew that her own marriage,
her desire to keep her children with their father had played a rather large
roll in not reaching out to her mother and mending fences. Her husband, the father of her children had
an uncontrollable disdain for her mother and any contact would have caused a
war within her home and so she kept quiet, remained silent about her own
needs. Her silence was a part of who she
was, she withdrew from the things that her heart needed in favor of those that
she loved, those that she brought into the world.
It would be years before she would
break her silence and stand up for what she knew she needed what she wanted out
of her own life. It would be too late to
mend the fences with her own mother, but her conviction and determination would
cause a repeat of her past, and the past of her own mother. The repetition would be resounding and
difficult for her to comprehend in some ways and yet so familiar it would
frighten her to the point of nightmares, always wondering what the final
outcome would be for that beautiful little girl that was her third child, the
baby that she craved so much.
It would be a familiar scene for her
as she embarked on her own path, one that included a divorce, a sense of
freedom and loss. She tried to keep the
relationship with her child, but that little girl had, not unlike herself,
always been a daddy’s girl. That
relationship would ultimately determine how she related to her child, how far
she could trust her and prove to be what would separate them. It would come at a great cost for both of
them, the child and the mother, for the daughter that she had given birth to
was now a mother herself and there was a longing for her to hold those
grandchildren, to love them. She thought
about her own mother in those moments when she couldn’t fulfill the need to hold
her grandchildren and it saddened her to think that she had inflicted pain on
the person that had raised her and loved her.
She understood better now than she ever had what she had done by not
picking up the phone and calling her own mother.
She waited for the call, the
communication from her child and wondered if she could deal with the pain of
the call, how to address the hurt and if she could ever just accept it and move
forward. She wasn’t sure that she could,
if she knew how or if she should just protect herself from it all. And then, there came the text message
announcing the birth of her daughter’s third child. It was an announcement that was filled with
pain and remorse for it was an announcement that brought with it the fleeting
memories of the birth of her daughter so many years before. Memories of the loss of a mother, of a relationship
that she wouldn’t have the time to recapture or the opportunity to set right
before her mother left this world. She
knew that her own child was, in an odd coincidence of fate, taking the same
path that she had with her own mother and the familiarities frightened her.
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