My mother

Remember when I wrote this (the third of the three dialogues)? Did you get that I was talking to MY mother? Not my daughter talking to me. Right? A friend inquired whether I was still feeling like a non-person and I had a long moment of huh? before I realized that he had been all worried thinking that I was the one feeling like a non-person. And now I’m worried that I was less than clear. Of course I was. Part of the point of that post (for me) was how roles randomly circulate — one minute the mother, patiently enduring the minutiae of her children’s brains, next moment, the daughter, inflicting minutiae on her own mother.

More to the point, it is my mother who is unhappy, who feels like a non-person, who is patently not making the transition from work to retirement well, whose memory is slipping. She is disappearing before my eyes and neither I nor my sisters quite know what to do about it. She’s very private, has never wanted to talk about how she feels and yet is quite clearly depressed and getting worse. And my father is oblivious. The wedding has really thrown all this into such painfully clear relief. It seems to bring her no joy. Which is so sad.

Part of me completely wants to walk away. My parents are adults, for gawd’s sake. They have been adults longer than I’ve been alive. They’ll deal. That’s what adults do, deal. Hell, I’m having to deal. I’ve got plenty to deal with over here trying to be my own adult when what I really really want is some sort of UberMother who knows some answers and makes really good tea.

Another part of me knows that I can’t walk away. That life is a cycle of caring for and being cared for. Of looking after and being looked after. Independence, self-reliance are myths. Unless I am about to go into the Vermont woods somewhere and build my own cabin out of wood I chopped down and eat bear steaks and roots and berries (and so on), then I am part of the web of family, village and community. I am connected. And I want to be, very much, despite my occasional (okay, daily) desire to run, run like the wind.

So I’ll deal. And as soon as I deal, I’m going to find (as I am already finding) that there will be lots of people who also want to deal and we will deal together.

But just to be clear, if Ed left bits of paper on every conceivable surface, like my father does (which he wouldn’t), there would be strong words. There might even be cursing. And we would deal. And also to be clear, my child is bright, but she’s not yet up to reading Douglas Adams (from whence the very useful image of the Somebody Else’s Problem Field (SEPF) comes). Someday I’ll explain to you my theory of SEPF and healthy relationships.

Similar Posts:

• Parents. Part I
• Fear
• What do you really want for your children? Week 1