As one progresses from childhood to adulthood, a person will come to many startling realizations. There is no Santa. Babies come from sex, not heaven. Mommy and Daddy are sometimes wrong. Life isn't fair. Fortune cookies don't always have fortunes in them. Et cetera, et cetera.
One of the eeriest realizations for me is the fact that my mom isn't just Mom, but an actual...person. A woman.
WEIRD, isn't it?
I was reminded of this while reading "Behind the Scenes at the Museum," by Kate Atkinson (who by the way is a frigging kick-ass writer, the kind of writer I wish I could be). The main character at one point looks at her mom at a moment when the mom is particularly vulnerable, and is just struck by that raw vulnerability and the life her mother lived (or rather, didn't live).
Most of the time I see my mom as Mom. Cooker of food. Nagger. Affixer of band-aids. Disciplinarian. Comforter. But every once in a while, something I witness or read will remind me that she's a real person with this whole life story that preceded my existence.
It's frigging WEIRD.
1 comment:
and think about her role in how you were made. haha...
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