I've been thinking a lot about who I AM and who it is that my children will know when they're grown up and thinking of me. Will they know me only as the conservative, well-intentioned woman holding on a little too tightly to control in her life? Or will they know me as I wish to be? How will they describe me to their soulmate before I've met them? Passionate? Easy to laugh? Always ready to play a game or a trick, eager to tickle them to the floor, wrap my arms around them for a too-hard squeeze at every opportunity... Will they know the me that loves to try new things? Or will they see me as stuck in my old ways... Will they see me as a rainbow of colours, of emotions, of passions? Or will they think of me in beige and navy blue... Who will they call when they want to plan a trip thru the crowded markets of Morocco? or when they decide to trek through Mongolia? Will it be me? Or will they think me uninterested in such alarmingly wild adventures... Will they connect me to the girl who studied wildlife in Kenya, sleeping in huts with mud floors? Will they see me as still the girl who rode camels through the Cholistan Desert for 8 days, sleeping under the stars? Or will they be disconnected from those stories, seeing me as anything but adventurous? They will know the stories of me diving deep into the Indian Ocean in my bikini, reaching deeper still deeper for the conch shells so big that I could hardly lift them to the surface... But will they see me as still being that person? Who will I be to my children?
I know wildly wonderful goddess women who I experience as being great big happy crazy amazing adventurous women. And I know their children. And I know that their children don't see even a glimpse of who these women REALLY are. Why is that?
I can't help but wonder how my children will know me when they are grown. And I guess I wonder if it doesn't depend on who I am to ME. Right now, as I raise them. Definitely something to keep in mind as I go about living my BEST life...
How would you describe YOUR mum? How well do you REALLY know her? Why not open your mind just a little wider, put away your small beliefs about her, open yourself up to the possibility of who she really is? I know she'll be grateful...
2 comments:
Beautifully written! I think part of how we see our mothers also has to do what what we needed from them and how their interactions impact on us. I don't think we can truly see our mothers until we can heal ourselves of what we needed but didn't get. When we can REALLY move on, then we get to see our mothers as the amazing, loving women that they really are.
this post certainly made me think! and wonder! i agree with andrea too, and wonder though how we make sure our children see us for who we truly are? i took a little trip down my own memory lane while reading this one. it also inspired me to expand my view of my own mom.
jacq
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