On Motherhood (an essay)

My biggest fear about being a mother was that my daughter would not understand me, nor I her. I imagined the possibility of dedicating my life to a child I had to hold at arm's length, contemplating the remains of our bond unraveled on the floor, looking into blank blue eyes. Perhaps this fear stemmed from my relationship with my own mother, who never understood my passions or seem to appreciate my interests and talents. She was a woman I couldn't exactly talk to, I couldn't easily trust, I couldn't completely admire, growing up. I was, and am, a daddy's girl, forever admiring his gentle patience, simple laughter, and working hands, even loving him in the moments of his anger, understanding the firey temper I inherited from him. I love to read like him, and make things with my hands. When I realized my daughter was not going to have a father in her life that could hold a candle to my own, I vowed to keep my daddy and my brother close, and to be the mother mine had not. She did not fall short in caring for us in the least, and she loved and spoiled us, but the relationship with my child had to go deeper than that. I was determined to raise the daughter who would be forever my best friend, my deepest conversation, and a hero and a helper in this world.

     I have always thought there are basically two kinds of people: the ones who drift through life without existential questions or creative passions, and those who plunge through life with plenty of both. I find association with the former to be exasperating and mundane, and with the latter, intrigued, overwhelmed, and not quite so alone. As a child I threw myself into various artistic enterprises: books written on construction paper with ball-point, later more entailed stories on loose-leaf. I tried to draw like my brother, a left-handed artist a year my senior; I tried to do everything like my brother. I had little interest in playing with Barbies with the girl up the street, I wasn't allowed to watch TV, and you couldn't have paid me in candy to play a sport of any kind. I lived in my books, those that I wrote and read, and in the world created for us by my brother, with my help. Gradually I have left that world of creativity, only to visit it again momentarily, as the pressures of adult American life and motherhood demand so much time and energy.

The first eight years of my daughter's life were full of obstacles, some I threw in my own path and others dumped before me against my will. Being a mother demanded so much: the first two years of absolute dependence on me, where a wailing cry threatened to interrupt every precious moment spent with my notebooks and novels. Then there were the years in which I was in construction, working myself to death to make sure she had the best of everything. I could not have been a writer in those days no matter how hard I tried to squeeze in time; it was hard enough to be a mother.

 

 Early mornings I'd be commuting to work before the sun was up to leave her at daycare and not returning until after 5pm rush hour. It bought us nice things and sent us on trips, but in between there was little time to get to know one another. I was frustrated easily at her whining and perhaps I wished she would hurry and grow a little older. Two serious relationships dominated my life during that time, too. I was focused on being a mother only to the extent that I satisfied all her needs and taught her, as my mother had done. Emotionally and mentally I was just as often focused on work, and men.

    Now we are onto the next eight years. There are no more vacations and shopping sprees, but no more early morning daycare and construction work, either. I allow myself to fall for no man, and when I need love and affection and conversation she is the one I go to. I have time on my hands, both for her, and for my creative enterprises. And the most beautiful thing of all is that I am discovering that my worst fears that threatened to come true in her younger years are long gone. Together, effortlessly, we are becoming best friends. I love how we are, her and I. Those rocky years drew us together, and I realize with overwhelming delight and a certain relief that SHE is one of those people: my daughter plunges into life with passion, and at nine she is the best conversationalist in my life. She prefers reading and art and writing more than any other activity, and her questions and interests are profound and intelligent.

    Being a mother has a whole new feel for me, now. I don't believe the hardest part is over- I imagine the preteen years, adolecense, and when she makes my mistakes when she's in her twenties. then I think of us as old together, her 60 and me 78. I only believe that now I have a partner, a smart, passionate, loving and talented little partner. We have each-other, and she is no burden to me in any way now; our lives are integrated into one without compromise: I am exactly who I am with her, and she with me. I want her to be strong and wise and I affirm my own meanings in my speeches to her.

     I realize I will never be one of those mothers that views her child a burden. I would never stick her outside out of my hair, as my mother so often did, and my friends do. they wonder how I could prefer her company to theirs; she's just a child. I use reason with her instead of punishment, and it works.

 Have I molded my child into what I want her to be? I think I have just opened every door possible to her, including both the ones my own parents opened and the ones they locked and I plunged through later. Motherhood to me is buying pretty little barrettes for her hair and teaching her mythologies and religions over a picnic lunch. It's making little art projects to surprise her, never forgetting her spelling word practice, and discussing every profound concept to the best of my ability. It is looking toward to our adventures: It is never being alone, but always being able to be myself, and it is the purest love.

2010