Dear Mom, Dear Mom

Dear Mom,

You left this world when I was two.

I have met you through your children, your siblings, your parents.

I have pieced together an idea of who you were through the memories of others. In this way I have learned that you were a caring mother, a hard working woman, and a kind soul.

You touched people in this world, leaving behind a distinctive presence all your own. Those who had the chance to know you talk about you with reverence.

You lived life delicately, took the time to notice the little things most people take for granted, and you believed in the kindness of humans. Even before you knew your life was going to be cut short you lived this way, because you knew that any day could be your last.

Over time the pain of you being gone has lessened, and I am glad to say that I can now listen to your stories without having to walk away. I hoard these pieces of you, tucked away in a corner of my heart.

I walk through the memories of others in an attempt to reach you. Knowing you through their eyes is better than never knowing you at all, but you left before I could learn who you were.

My earliest memory of you—my only memory of you—is one I'm not even sure is real. I remember being in the arms of my father at a church, I remember approaching a box, and I remember seeing you inside. I remember leaning over to place a kiss on your cheek, and I remember turning towards my father to ask why you felt so cold.

I cling to this memory.

I have no way of knowing if it's real, but it's the only one that I made myself. It is the only memory that I can think back on that I see through my eyes.

I have pieced you together, and I hope everyone is doing you justice; but at the end of the day I cannot help the bitter resentment at life that I will never know you through my eyes, so I hold on tight. I hold tight to the pieces of you that others give me, and I convince myself that it is enough.

Dear Mom,

You, you I know intimately.

You took me in with my brother after my father passed away.

I have grown up with you, I have come to love you—and love you I do—but is loving you supposed to be this painful?

Growing up with you was turmoil. I had to assimilate into a completely new family, and though difficult at first, I did. It became easier for a time, being around, but the older I grew the more difficult it became having you as a mother.

This is not to say that I don't love you, far from it. The very fact that it hurts so deeply proves that I love you, but you are a very difficult woman to live with.

You are stubborn, and hard headed. You refuse to acknowledge that we are our own people at times, and you treat us as an extension of you when we are most decidedly not.

You suffocate, you squeeze, you always need to know the why, and everything is an affront to your person.

No matter the subject, no matter the conversation, everything eventually revolves back to how it affects you. This is also not to say that I don't care how you feel, far from it. If I didn't care I wouldn't have bottled up all of myself in an attempt to keep you happy.

I could have raged, and disagreed, and made my mind known... but that's not possible with you. You twist everything on it's head, and somehow you always come out the victim.

You've asked me before, why do I not talk? Why do I not share?

Well, you have made it very clear that you are not a safe space for me to share. You don't know how to just listen, and everything becomes my fault. You had a hard life in your early years, yes, but because of this no one else is allowed to struggle?

You view life through the lenses of your personal adversities, and if the person speaking hasn't lived through what you have lived through, why are they speaking? They have no idea what you have been through. How can they sit there and complain when their life has been so much easier?

You don't take into account that people are built differently. You do not have a soft heart, and maybe that's because life hardened it over the years, but your pain does not lessen someone else's. Your struggles do not make mine smaller.

In time I hope we can come to a better place in our relationship, but for now, I wonder if I want one anymore.