I guess the first time I ever really saw some soft spots in her seemingly tough armor was the night our ceiling caved in. This happened just a couple of days after I got back from England. The tenants upstairs managed to flood their bathroom and the ensuing deluge had nowhere to go but down, straight down into our apartment. There's never really a good time for this to happen, but in this instance, it happened in the middle of the night. I woke my mom up, and even though I was a bit panicked, I didn't want to alarm her. We both just quietly cleaned up the mess and threw away the remnants of what was once our ceiling. It was the first time I noticed that she was worried and sad, not just angry. I wanted to hug her, but thought it might embarrass her more. In reality, I probably didn't want to be the one to feel embarrassed. Up until this point, I felt as though the only emotions I ever saw her express were anger, and crazy anger. Sadness was a new one, but it made me realize how human she was. I always understood that there were things she went through in life that weren't great, but her pain seemed to turn into bitterness, and bitterness turned to anger. In her older age (though I still think she's young), the anger subsided, and perhaps hopelessness filled its void. I find myself angry, bitter and hopeless quite often and I understood all to well how she felt. I am too much like her.
Tonight, she peeled another layer. She was a writer, you know. She never mentioned this before to me. I knew she had gone to college for Journalism, but every time she talked about it, it was with a sense of nostalgia and regret. I never asked her what happened, and I rue not having this conversation sooner. She told me about a short story she published in High School. I asked her what she wrote about. "Gangsters and girls" was her answer. No one can argue with how awesome that is. My mom wrote about gangsters and girls. This is unbelievable. Gangsters and girls won her first place in a writing competition and publication, which is how she decided to go into journalism. So what happened? I needed to know. For as long as I knew my mom, she always pressed into me and my sister the need to make money over being creative. We weren't allowed to be artists, and I had to watch my sister shelve her wonderful artistic gifts in the pursuit of stability. I was less permeated by the money making brainwashing but more so because I needed to rebel. It was crazy for me to see my mother as a lover of writing and philosophy. She told me about how she loved thinking and reading, and all she wanted to be was a journalist. It broke my heart to know that the need for money suffocated her passions.
Before she could finish her degree, my grandmother eloped with another man and left the family high and dry. My mom being the next in line found the responsibility of feeding a family firm on her shoulders. She had to work, there was no question. Livelihood before dreams, food before fancies. These were the things that buried her passions. I hate to say that passions die, because I don't believe they do, they just get buried in crap until we forget they ever existed. She says those days are over, that she'll never have the wandering thoughts she once did that lead to such outbursts of creativity. She tells me that you never make money doing the things you love. Journalism wasn't going to give you three meals a day. I ask her if she'll ever write again, she says not now. She is still worried, except this time it's about me. She tells me that she wants me to have things settled in my life first, that I'm able to have a career, get married, and find some stability. I am too much like her.
These days, I find myself wrapped up in the same worries. I don't know when the sense of overbearing responsibility creeped into my heart, but it's there. I worry about money, about where my food will come from, about where I'll live, where I'll work, and everyday seems to be filled with the anxieties of survival. I complain that I don't have much, and these days it seems to be justified. I worry about finding a job, because working gives me purpose and buys me a warm meal and small apartment. I'm willing to bury my dreams for that. I have buried my dreams for that. I've waited years for time to just create and write, and when time came, money was absent, so time went to making money. I am on the verge of sabotaging an opportunity to live out my dream. I believe that nothing in life is an accident, and this conversation with my mom, this is divine timing. It broke my heart to know how much my mom sacrificed for her family; for me. I am ungrateful to say the least, and at the same time, perpetuating the same fate upon myself. I wonder if it's selfish to want to escape the wheel my mom has been running her entire life. I've condemned myself to hard work because I feel it is too selfish; too selfish to take what she's given up and use it for myself. She tells me this is what she wants. I am humbled. I am too much like her, she see's this, and she knows that we can spend our days together on the same wheel, or she can sacrifice just a bit longer, just a bit more for me. I am not worthy, I am too much like her.
She leaves me with some advice before she puts her layer back on that has left her bare and perhaps a bit ashamed. She tells me that the secret to good writing is to be able to touch others hearts. She is sensitive, thoughtful, encouraging. She knows the secrets of life all too well, and will one day find herself with a pen in hand I'm sure. For now, she says she doesn't have the time. We share the same philosophy about writing, though I always wonder if this over-sexed, over stimulated generation wants to read about love and all things good. I wonder if they still want to read about God? She reminds me to just write things that can speak to people's hearts, and to believe that every heart still needs love, and still needs God. I want to tell her that I love her, that I am too much like her, and I have never been more proud to be.
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