This image I drew for my mother sadly enough she never saw it in person. The letter which follows was my sharing with a friend. In Memory of my mother Marion Plumer Feb 1942 - July 2008
I remember her as a towering enormous sight I can see her walking into my mind. Many times I compared my mother's face to that of the Bergermitzer in "Santa Claus is Coming to town" not because she was an unattractive woman but because of the features.
Her eyes hard, cold and the frowning of eternal displeasure was it with dad, the boys, my sister or with me, was it with some one outside the family or just everything with her life in general.
My youth seemed spent fighting her for one reason or another, sometimes there didn't even have to be a reason. I can hear her "Cherry Kim (I always knew she was serious when she used both names) you don't know to stay to your own kind", "You never know when to hold your tongue" "You better leave your heathen ways", "you're just too damn stubborn and willful for your own good."
In some ways she was right, in some she was wrong. In 2001 when I brought mama to live with me (Yes everyone was shocked) It was in fact a selfish act on my part really as I thought if I could give her what she couldn't I could heal myself and the wounds, put to rest old ghost.
At the airport seeing her I thought how very small she seemed, so fragile in body and while the Bergermitzer frown was there the eyes where not hard and cold but filled with something much worse. They held pain, sorrow and hopelessness. the pitiful had replaced the frightening.
She held her head down and somehow it made her seem defeated and the woman I had known in my life was a stranger to me, my mother had sworn like a sailor, could nail you with a shoe as you ran for cover, make you cry and cringe when she used your full name.
This vision of my mother only made me feel protective of her and determined to care for her.
As the days passed I had began for the first time to see, to understand and even to know the woman who was my mother.
A woman with dreams as shattered as herself, with wounds perhaps even deeper then the ones she had inflicted. I wondered was it choice or chance that had made her as she had been.
It doesn't excuse her actions, but it does give an understanding of maybe why? I found it easier to give her what she couldn't. It didn't change what had been but I was able to give her some peace and some for myself too.
Now sitting here waiting to hear that final call I just want for her to have the peace and happiness, she never found here on earth in her life, I don't know that my mother ever knew her place in the world.
She was my father's wife, she was our mother but she never really knew or belonged to herself until it was too late. Then dreams turned to ashes and hope dimmed each year.
She sang like an angel. I remember her singing to me now, she had heard me once singing to Kat and told me she had sang that to me when I was little.
Tonight I remember her singing the "The Old Rugged Cross", "Soldier Soldier"(The song I sang to Kat) and my favorite "Beautiful Dreamer".
Tonight I recall a doll that cried and her removing the batteries in the middle of the night ( I was up playing) and I recall watching her drawing and designing the wedding dress I never wore because we had a fight I refused to wear it even if she had time to make it.
I don't get to say good bye to her but at least a couple years ago I got to say hello to my mother, not perfect but we had come to terms with one another, had a better understanding of each other and maybe became a bit more like mother and daughter.
No one is all bad or all good. Mama was no different.
1 comment:
You My Dear, Have a beautiful soul and a good heart. You are so loved. I hope when it is my turn to say good by , that I have your strength.
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