Rose from the Cracks

February 24th, 1966 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Joesahapa Mary Morlte entered our side. From then on, the world knew one more angel that walks amongst society. Thirty-two years later the start of my experience under the angel began.

This angel is my mother. As a child, she always told us she was an angel in disguise and if you know her you’d know there’s no exaggeration. From the time she was born, she was a fighter. Coming into this world as a premature baby and fighting to survive. If there’s one inherent quality humans possess it is the fight to live and to this day that essence rings true.

This beacon of light saw plenty of dark days. It’s safe to say my mother and I have a relationship that is in stark contrast to the relationship she had with her mother. Although out of her control and due to the effects of a visious cycle she never seemed to catch a break. Her mother, my grandmother once told her “I love you because you’re my daughter, but I really don’t like you.” To this day my mother expresses how that hurt her to her core. Abuse whether physical or mental seemed to be the consequences of my mother simply existing. Existing alongside a brother, my late uncle who then, even as a problem child, received enough love and attention for the both of them. We’ve seen this ever so common in older communities and toxic family cycles where a mother babies their sons and almost neglects their daughters. Luckily, my mother strived to change the narrative and break the cycle. The abuse did not stop there. My mother endured multiple instances of sexual trauma from childhood to adulthood, and in her career in the military.

Joesahapa finally made the biggest decision of her life and joined the military. Nineteen years old, virtually alone beside her unit, and in the middle of a foreign country. Her work ethic was and still is unmatched. By the time she was twenty-one her routine had become; go to PT (physical training), go to work, take a class during her lunch break, go back to work, pick my older brother up from daycare, cook for him and her then, abusive husband. She did that for two years and soon she was met with yet another trauma. My would-be older sister died at only 8 months old due to a rare kidney disease. Even today my mother grieves that loss. That and many others. For, at a point in her life she started to think everyone that really loved her had died or left her. Her uncle Tony was one of the only people who understood her as well as her best friend who became sister-like, Michelle.

My first memories are of an apartment on the East end of Norristown, Pennsylvania. Twenty minutes away from Philadelphia. At the time my mother was a functioning addict. My two younger sisters were born and the late father of the youngest became our step-father that I refer to as my father and my mother’s soul mate.

My mother went through many trials and tribulations due to her addictions and still managed to raise my siblings and I with the utmost love, care, and protection. She was serious about us getting an education and need I say, did not play when it came to school.

We weren’t the only ones that received my mother’s love and positive energy. My mother has the pressing urge to help the world. We’ve seen this in many instances where she allowed people in need to move into our house, family or not. I was eighteen and I recall a time where my mother, siblings, and I were heading out of a gas station and heading to Fort Bragg, North Carolina. This woman desperately stopped the car to tell us that she was so grateful for my mother. In the past, my mother stopped the woman from committing suicide. Needless to say, it was a tearful reunion between the two. It was also an insightful moment for myself I learned how much my mom generally has a heart of gold and how much she has impacted people.

Moving to North Carolina in 2016 was a big decision but one that was long-awaited. We desperately wanted to get out of PA and my mom desperately wanted to get away from people, places, and things that would influence her past relapses.

North Carolina didn’t prove to be the end all be all of the trials. Facing financial problems, the loss of her brother, the loss of her soulmate, my father to cancer, the drama of family life, and a breast cancer diagnosis she still stands strong.

I look at my mother today, a diabetic cancer patient and army veteran, in the middle of a pandemic and think this is where I get it from. Everything that has influenced the woman I am today stems from this woman Joesahapa Mary Montague. Her footprint here is stamped permanently in the energy network of nature and her godly presence is felt by the entire room when she enters. I am proud to say she is my mother.