Just prior to this entry, I posted a few of my favorites from my mother's collection of poems, written in the early to mid 90s.
I didn't get it as a kid.
I had to listen to these poems again... and again... and again... and again... for what? Sheesh. What does this have to do with me, I used to ask myself as I'd roll my eyes and imagine I were at a house party or a church skating trip. I asked to do one but snuck to do the other. Anything to escape this droning on about love, relationships, and faith. Where's the remote?
Another thing I didn't quite "get" was my parent's divorce. I was socially slow, just a tad, but I wasn't an idiot. My dad lacked the ambition, commitment, spirituality, and ethic my mom had, and his actions and inactions had caused the family to suffer. It was like rowing a two-person raft where one person held one of the oars hostage. I got that part. What I didn't get was how hurtful it is to leave and be left, to have promises broken, to be the only one trying to row a boat with an added man-sized weight. Though you know it needs to happen, and you may be the one pulling the plug by filing the papers - it's devastating. "You mourn what you never got," she said.
I also failed to understand the ruins that this shockwave left in my life. I drank in secret. I took pills once. I experimented with hanging with people I probably shouldn't have. I fell in love - hard - had my heart broken, and fell for any boy who even looked my direction. In my downward spiral, I met a friend who also needed a shield. We became too romantically involved far too soon, and there were many times where I deliberately did things to push him away. I was regularly scrutinized by adults in my church and school communities. "Kids don't have trials, they ain't been through nothing" was the running sentiment of my elders. I wasn't talking with words - I was talking through risky behavior. For years, I passed it off as innocent teen experimentation. It wasn't until a reconciling discussion with my father some years ago, over Denny's breakfast, that I began to theorize this void. All this time, I had been searching for someone or something to soothe me, like a daddy's presence should. I never found it. I spent teenhood and some of adulthood "mourning what I never got." A couple times, I almost lost the best thing that ever happened to me - by expecting him to fill my father's empty shoes and being mad when he didn't.
Now that I'm a full grown woman, I find myself identifying with each and every poem that my mother wrote in her short collection "Spoken from the Heart." I sat on the couch the other day, read them, and said "Amen, girl," at the end of each one. So profound. So uplifting. So identifying, especially after you grow up and go through some foolishness of your own - yet come out polished and shiny. It was after rereading that I have the courage to publicly talk about this - my parent's divorce - for the first time, bravely, without turning it into a parody. I can look back and understand why she left, why she cried sometimes, why we went to church twice as much during that era, why this shaped my life, and why I had to listen to those poems... again... and again... and again...
Another thing I didn't quite "get" was my parent's divorce. I was socially slow, just a tad, but I wasn't an idiot. My dad lacked the ambition, commitment, spirituality, and ethic my mom had, and his actions and inactions had caused the family to suffer. It was like rowing a two-person raft where one person held one of the oars hostage. I got that part. What I didn't get was how hurtful it is to leave and be left, to have promises broken, to be the only one trying to row a boat with an added man-sized weight. Though you know it needs to happen, and you may be the one pulling the plug by filing the papers - it's devastating. "You mourn what you never got," she said.
I also failed to understand the ruins that this shockwave left in my life. I drank in secret. I took pills once. I experimented with hanging with people I probably shouldn't have. I fell in love - hard - had my heart broken, and fell for any boy who even looked my direction. In my downward spiral, I met a friend who also needed a shield. We became too romantically involved far too soon, and there were many times where I deliberately did things to push him away. I was regularly scrutinized by adults in my church and school communities. "Kids don't have trials, they ain't been through nothing" was the running sentiment of my elders. I wasn't talking with words - I was talking through risky behavior. For years, I passed it off as innocent teen experimentation. It wasn't until a reconciling discussion with my father some years ago, over Denny's breakfast, that I began to theorize this void. All this time, I had been searching for someone or something to soothe me, like a daddy's presence should. I never found it. I spent teenhood and some of adulthood "mourning what I never got." A couple times, I almost lost the best thing that ever happened to me - by expecting him to fill my father's empty shoes and being mad when he didn't.
Now that I'm a full grown woman, I find myself identifying with each and every poem that my mother wrote in her short collection "Spoken from the Heart." I sat on the couch the other day, read them, and said "Amen, girl," at the end of each one. So profound. So uplifting. So identifying, especially after you grow up and go through some foolishness of your own - yet come out polished and shiny. It was after rereading that I have the courage to publicly talk about this - my parent's divorce - for the first time, bravely, without turning it into a parody. I can look back and understand why she left, why she cried sometimes, why we went to church twice as much during that era, why this shaped my life, and why I had to listen to those poems... again... and again... and again...