Hokey Pokey (What this blog's all about)

A writing challenge I've given myself to write every day for six months. After some posts, I'll put in a comment with a brief explanation of the inspiration for the piece. Some posts will be practice for bigger projects: character sketches or settings. I don't really know what all will happen which is why I'm doing it.

Sunday, May 13, 2012

Day 41

I remember lots of things about my mom.  I remember how good it felt to hug her and how I couldn't wait and would hug her legs for loving her too much to wait to hug her body.  I can't say our relationship is without complication or difficulty or it's own moments of strange.

But I was never tortured or humiliated and that's not true for everyone.  Lots of people grow up with mothers who are so mentally ill that all the adult walks away with is the idea of NOT growing up to be her.  Or so wasted.  Or just mean.

Some of my friends have moms like that.  Lots of my former students do.  And they're working really hard at seeing that path that was laid for them and steering around every turn to avoid walking that way, being that way.  I'd imagine that results in some strange dreams:  your conscious disagreeing so wholeheartedly with your unconscious. 

Every year on Mother's Day, I first feel happy for all the things I'm doing with my family and what a beautiful life it is.  And at some point in the day I always give pause to the people sitting in the background that don't have such uncomplicated feelings about this day.  I wish for unconditional love for as many children as possible- they all need it and all deserve it.  And I feel for a moment the loss of not having a mom.  I know plenty of people whose mothers died before they were ready to be adults.  Long before they were ready to not have a mom.  I'm still not ready to not have a mom. 

I had a brilliant mother's day.  I took Magnus skiing for the first time at a closed ski resort so it was just my family: Rob, Magnus, and me.  We skated around and he skied down between my legs, calling out "Weee!!!" on the way down, and "Gah-gah-gah-gah gaaaaain!!!" when we got to the bottom (again.)  I can't imagine a better way to spend it than my 20 month old saying "key!" (ski) and grabbing his coat to go.

If you don't have a mom, or you spent the day feeling the strange of a complicated relationship, I hope this makes you smile.  It's the only thing I have to share today and I'm sharing it with you.

P.S. This post was a total cheat. BUT, I did a lot of editing of my grad school work and turned that in and didn't feel like posting the final version of the second assignment I worked on since I did a rewrite yesterday.  So you get something autobiographical and off the top of my head instead.  Tomorrow, a return to fiction!
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1 comment:

  1. A Beer for the ShowerMay 17, 2012 at 9:24 AM

    This post wasn't a cheat, I liked the autobiographical aspect of it. Very heartfelt. Solid writing. I have to say, I laughed when I saw that the tag 'cheating my way out of a post' has been used 4 times.

    Also, we've heard of Lighthouse Writers, but we've never been. I'll have to look up more about it. We want to get more involved with writers groups... currently we're involved with the Pikes Peaks Writers, but we only go to the yearly conference since it's so far away.

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