Dear Mother,
This is my fifth Mother’s Day without you.
I should clarify: without you physically here.
You are indeed, here.
I talk to you and listen to you more than ever. Never thought I’d say that.
Your stories, wisdom, advice, and crazy sayings all come out of my mouth.
Your stories, wisdom, advice, and all crazy sayings come out of my mouth.
You are remembered, your songs sung, and your recipes grace my dinner table often.
I’m now the family matriarch, and I’m somewhat comfortable with that new role. I’m the remember-er, the keeper of
the stuff (birth, marriage, and death records, photos, jewelry, heirloom furniture), the family repository. In some ways,
I don’t feel dignified or old enough for this role, but I guess I am. Old enough.
I still long to be somebody’s daughter. Do you ever get over that?
And yet, I do see that I needed you to get out of my way. Sorry, mom, but it’s true.
I needed this emotional space so that I could step into my own womanhood. This transition is natural. Mothers die. I too, will die. This is to make room for all the new mothers and all the new daughters. But mothers don’t just die, their seeds fall into the hearts of those who love them.
I also don’t want to sugar-coat you-or us. We were far, far from perfect.
I’m not even interested in perfect, who learns from perfect?
I see some wrong choices you made-some wrong choices I made.
I understand why: pain, fear, selfishness.
By analyzing “us” I can learn a few things, make different choices. I can’t imagine you being bothered by this now because whatever the “here-after” is, it has to put our petty issues in perspective, and I refuse to think of an eternity wracked with guilt and regret.
You’d be proud though.
My skirts are longer now, and I actually do own a slip.
I wear your broaches and scarves when I talk about you to caregiving and Alzheimer’s groups-and I show your picture. I talk about you more now than when you were alive, and part of me finds that rather annoying. I hope to have as long of a shelf life as you are.
I’m a mother-in-law, which is completely weird, and I understand things different now.
I understand how trusting someone to love, respect, and care for your child is so scary, even when your daughters or sons are grown and tell you they don’t need your protection. They do. Spiritually, emotionally, not in your face, tell you what to do, but in a broader sense.
I understand how a wedding isn’t just about the bride and groom-how your dreams, your hopes, your family’s expectations somehow get tangled in the mix. It took me 25 years to stop blaming you for controlling my wedding.?
I understand how you long to have a quiet alone moment with the child you bore-how it’s hard to be second fiddle to person who once thought you carved the moon out of cheese and flung it to the sky.
I understand how hard it is to scoot one seat down and let the next generation take center stage when you feel like you barely got there.
I eat breakfast every day, something you couldn’t force me to do as a kid. I also hear those words slip out of my mouth-“Wear a hat, it’s cold.” I think of you and me, and all the hats I snatched off my head the second you weren’t looking, and here I am, dolling out the same advice. Did put a whammy on me?
I also insist my children call me every day. Just like you did.
It was the best thing you could have done, you know.
Even after five years, I so miss our calls. I can’t tell you how irritating they were, some days.
But those “I’m all right, busy today, love you, mom,” calls kept us going. I thought they were just for you, about you being needy.
I think of all the things I didn’t tell you in those phone calls -all the marital fights, the worries about my first gray hairs, my own children rebelling against me, the world’s best mother. I didn’t tell you what was going on in my life-not with words, but I think you knew because I know. I can measure the tone of children’s voice with my handy mother-barometer I now possess.
You didn’t need me to say things out loud, but you took your cue and prayed.
My daughters call every day. They do it automatically because I’ve forced them into this habit.
Many days are short and sweet-and I too, listen to what all is not being said.
You taught me how to be a wife. Watching you love Daddy, dote over him, worry over him, and hearing you two laugh and talk until late at night and even as a child I’d have to holler to you, “Some of us have to go to school, you know!”
What a legacy to leave to a child when so many couples don’t know how to weather life side-by-side. You also showed me the price of this love as I watched you grieve his passing, your body draped over his, your cries so heartbreaking I had to leave the room.
I miss you in a million small ways. I miss having a woman to pal around with-not to necessarily agree with-lord knows that wasn’t out strong suit. But I do miss your company, your sense of style, and I remember everything, everything you loved-pecan pie, Co-cola as you used to say-and a Snicker’s bar, homemade macaroni and cheese, and fresh sheets. Somehow, your preferences are now a part of my own-a way to remember you.
I’m a different woman now. Caregiving, sitting beside a loved one as they pass from this earth changes a person. I find myself more tolerant of the ambiguities of life and perhaps less tolerant of social situations where people simply posture, brag, or argue for the sake of arguing. I don’t have the patience for that sort of thing-even when, and especially when it’s coming out of my own mouth.
You’ve made me into an old soul. I could sit outside in a lawn chair and stare at the stars for hours.
But death had another effect on me as well-I want to live, to accomplish something you and my daughters will be proud of, to really be present-for all the big and small moments, to accept myself and those I love on an “as is” basis knowing good people only get better.? I can trust that this world still has a lot of goodness left in it, and I can be patient enough to wait for it. I can also accept the random chaos, the sorrows of all kinds of losses, and the uncertainty of something as out of our control as the weather or a nasty disease can obliterate your life as you know it at any time.
It’s all part of the package.
You’d be proud of me. I’ve grown up a little. I love with fierceness, and I’m tired of taking guff from people who just don’t matter.
I’m somehow coming into my own as a woman, a wife, a mother, a friend. Did you have something to do with that? Did caring for you, learning from you, learning how to be a woman, how to become a widow, how to grow old, and how to die get incorporated into me? I hope so because I can’t fathom how to do all this without you.
I need you to still teach me. I need your Southern wisdom. I need you to disagree with me. I need to butt up against somebody who will sharpen me a bit, force me to figure out what I believe-and what I don’t. I need a mother who will tell me, “Don’t buy that dress, your thighs look like tree trunks in.”
No one but your mother would dare.
I share this day with you.
You taught me how to be a woman, complex and defined, and how to be a mother even when your kids are grown and no longer think they need mothering-but they do, only in more subtle ways.
You taught me how to dig deep for strength and sit by someone dying without dying myself.
How not to fall apart. How to choose hope and faith when circumstances would say otherwise. How to speak my mind and hold my tongue, as needed.
You taught me that I could love more than I could ever imagine.
~Your daughter.
~Carol D. O’Dell is the author of Mothering Mother: A Daughter’s Humorous and Heartbreaking Memoir
