inky black raspberry

My Mother’s body is sick. It has decidedly and determinedly declared war on itself, thoroughly amassed a disgustingly organized army and (before sunrise; unbeknownst) begun its violent decent into battle. Although this scenario has arisen in me many, many feelings and thoughts, the burning, juicy topic that surfaces today, as I write this is such: The only two things I have as a reminder of her presence are Myself and the african violet plant she gifted me years ago. Like her, that plant has been knocked around, spilled, gutted, uprooted, replanted and left teetering on the edge of death on more than several occasions (it is currently flowering, full of spring potential, one fragile branch of buds awaiting the momentum to unfurl and lift its face to our Apollonian Sun-Star). Yet, so very unlike her, my face shows nothing of our blood bond – my body a vague frame of the physicality she may have experienced as a youth, my personality a violent and somewhat opposite projection of her own…I read a quote yesterday that said, “There’s nothing more satisfying than seeing your mother appear in your own face as you grow older”. To this I pose a pondering quandry: what if a daughter is naught to resemble her own mother? What then?

I admit I have not given this phenomenon much thought. My Mother has mentioned on more than one occasion how she fails to see our physical resemblance and I have to agree. I gaze at the dark strands of my somewhat wavy hair, brown eyes, muscular build and ruddy skin (in comparison to my Mother’s (she has ALWAYS had the most beautiful bone-china skin-tone {to be envious of, no doubt}. IMAGE: Meryl Streep: high-set, round apple-like cheeks that dare you not to take a bite, skin stretched gracefully like delicate tissue encasing a precious gift). This is NOT a precious gift that I received in transference from Womb to Earth. No sir, ma’am sir. Now I’ve been staring shamelessly at mySelf in the mirror and I ask and ask again, Momma where ARE you?

I suppose it is true that while growing, I wanted to be nothing like my Mom. That is to say, being the little Libra Grrrl that I am, everything was a true, “I DO MYSELF” attitude. Mom said ‘do it like this’, so I in turn said, “NO, I will do it like THIS, thank you VERY much”. And so it went on and on, independent Christyn taking strange and enormous bites out of Life, sometimes for the simple sake of being determinedly un-like her Mother. I suppose it is also true that when one’s Parent falls ill, Life can become very confusing and entangled. To watch your own Mother fall helpless to the hands of her own fate is heartbreaking. On the right hand sits the desire to engulf her pain, carry it away from her, care for her and make a deal with the She-Devil to ensure she will be alright, even at the cost of one’s own health and life. There can be immense and inappropriate guilt that one has (potentially) a relatively happy, healthy life while the parent has had to suffer at the hands of illness. I’ve read and experienced that this can be true for many families (well, perhaps not specifically the binding contracts with a She-Devil piece, but certainly the furious drive to find a way, any way, to take a Parent’s Pain Away). A child’s blind and aching love for the Being whose job it was to birth her into this World, hold her tight and whisper words of wisdom can become just that: blind and unable to see the Light of the Truth. Conversely, in the left hand sits the desire to live free, happy, healthy, untangled and joyous on the winds of one’s own Life – to dash about in a sort of reverie at the marvels of what can be created in one’s unique World. So, here live these two opposing experiences, alive and burning in two separate hands…how does one reconcile them?

I have the pleasure of walking a golden retriever named Leo every weekday morning. My heart bursts just to see him, excited and happy, when I enter the doorway. He knows he will go to the sea and swim and smell things and pee on things. As we spend more time in each other’s presence, I genuinely feel that he misses me when I go away. We sit at the ocean side and he allows me to use him as a pillow. He dashes into the salty sea and emerges  a messy, smelly drowned rat of an old-boy and STILL I nestle my face in his fur and breathe his unconditional love. As I sneeze and remove dog-hairs from my face, it dawns on me that this is a sort of answer to my question above (the question of how do I reconcile wanting to bargain away my own life for my mother’s {that she may live forever in the unencumbered body of an enlightened yogini and never experience suffering again} competing against the fierce and totally unknown wonder of living my own selfish and self-directed version of Life as I see fit): unconditional love.

Yes, it has been discussed by many. Yes, it is a broad and also a very narrowed, simplistic, some-what impossible concept. Yes, I am about to share with you my discoveries. The dog made me do it. With the dog (and thereby all animals and plants {which inspire in me  feelings of gushing awe and loving kindness}), I just love. There is no here or there, no agenda or even desire. With the dog, there is only broad, lofty expansive love. Through the dog, I experience that place that must be the place inside that all the great sages speak so poetically of. To see no difference betwixt or between the “good” and the “bad” is to experience the World in Love.

And so it is that this unconditional love could extend to My Own Mother, whom I may not resemble in looks, but whose divine and dancing Spirit I see so clearly these days. An ethereal plume of energy that radiates to me in dreams and tells me how happy she is that I have a fulfilling and magical and healthy life. It calls loud and strong and commands that I simply love it as it is, heartbreaking fates and all. My Mother is so much more than her body (as we all are) and that Undying Spirit of hers is so playful, giddy, unrestrained and Loving that I can’t help but hope that as I grow older, I will experience the satisfaction of seeing mySelf become more and more like it…more like her.

For now I hold my Mother’s graceful spirit close in my heart and watch my own existence unfold before me like a delicate flower. An african violet whose aubergine petals sparkle with the sunlight and remind me that even the most tragic of happenings can birth such wonderous beauty. It also helps that my Mother still e-mails me advice which drives me CRAZY and sends me flying out the door (in backlash) with wild ideas and breathtaking confidence. The difference now is that I can regard her with loving kindness (knowing her Spirit cares greatly for her) and silently thank her for having such a divine and ironic hand in making me Who I Am. At the same time, I get whisked into the World, following my heart and declaring to all who would attempt to distract me otherwise,

“No thanks dear patrons of the world. No, I appreciate the concern but this time, I think,…I DO MYSELF”.