Revisiting Ruby
A few weeks ago, my Snopes.com newsletter offered the following: (I've provided two links, one or the other should get you there.)
Click here: snopes.com: Dolores Aguilar Obituary
http://www.snopes.com/media/iftrue/obituary.asp
I read it and naturally tho't, "How sad." And it made me remember my own mother and wonder about Dolores Aguilar. Since yesterday would have been my mother's 83rd birthday and tomorrow would have been her 62nd wedding anniversary, today seems like a good day to blog.
My mother was complex. But I guess we all are. To quote Bro. Tyler Walea, 'I object to the term 'dysfunctional' to refer to people or families, because it implies that somewhere, someone is fully functional." That is true. We are all 'dysfunctional' by SOMEONE'S standards, and that is what makes us normal, I suspect.
I frequently recommend the movie "The Joy Luck Club" to people. Women, especially!, can probably 'get it', when they watch it. It centers around four Chinese women who end up living and raising their daughters in San Francisco. It is a constant flip-flop between the struggles and conflicts these women have with their grown daughters, scenes of those daughters' childhood experiences, and more importantly, glimpses of the mothers' own tumultuous childhood.
It was riveting to me because it made me stop to realize that I judged my conflicts with my own mother at face value and only from my limited perspective -- never contemplating what events in HER life, might have led her to push me this way or that, hold me at arms length when I so desperately wanted to be held, discipline me when my heart cried out for affection and yet -- at the same time -- love me fiercely.
Perhaps if I had seen it earlier -- or read the book -- The Joy Luck Club might've helped mend some of the strife in our relationship. But sadly, by the time I saw it I was so busy raising my four children and my mother, who was in another state, was already slipping into dementia.
We did not have enough time.
My mother was nearly 38 when I was born. Almost seventeen DIFFICULT years later, I married and moved 500 miles away. So the years I lived with her, I was as self-obsessed and ego-centric as any other child. Quickly I went from being a child in my mother's house to being a wife and then a mother. There was not a lot of time to work on our relationship and logistically it just wasn't possible.
Of course, like most people...I'd carefully analyzed ALL the 'mistakes' my mother made in parenting and carefully plotted how to not make ANY of them -- or any others, for that matter.
(Cue the laughter.)
Funny how there is nothing to show you how little you know about being a parent like BECOMING one. Over the next 20 years my children taught me just how inept and unprepared I was. Don't get me wrong. I know I did a pretty good job of raising them. They are all fine people today. But I made plenty of mistakes along the way. Not too many of the same ones my mother made, but more than my share, nonetheless.
This reminds me of a favorite quote: "When I was a boy of fourteen, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be twenty-one, I was astonished at how much he had learned in seven years." - Mark Twain
I could rewrite it thusly, "When I was a girl of 15, my mother was so despicable to me, the simple fact that she was consuming oxygen on MY planet drove me insane. But by the time "I" was the mother of a 15 year old girl, I was humbled to realize how hard it must have been to do the best she knew how each day, never knowing what I would say or do next."
The Joy Luck Club, lots of Oprah and Phil Donohue, stacks of magazines and books and several years of therapy later I could finally appreciate how some of the traumatic and tragic events of my mother's early life had shaped and molded her into the mother she became. And I was mature enough to realize it wasn't all about me. Just as I hope my children -- my girls, most especially! -- will realize that its not their fault I made mistakes, and its not entirely mine. But we are each shaped by many hands, over many years.
Which brings me back to Dolores Aguilar. I wonder -- What happened in her life...? What were HER parents like...? Her siblings....? What traumatic experiences altered her character and impacted her behavior...? And -- would knowing any of those details help her children understand her any better. A part of me grieves for them, because I know what it is like for your mother to die with unfinished business between you.
And I am blessed that with God's help, I am able to forgive her any shortcomings or any transgressions because I know she DID love me and she DID do the best she knew how.
Click here: snopes.com: Dolores Aguilar Obituary
http://www.snopes.com/media/iftrue/obituary.asp
I read it and naturally tho't, "How sad." And it made me remember my own mother and wonder about Dolores Aguilar. Since yesterday would have been my mother's 83rd birthday and tomorrow would have been her 62nd wedding anniversary, today seems like a good day to blog.
My mother was complex. But I guess we all are. To quote Bro. Tyler Walea, 'I object to the term 'dysfunctional' to refer to people or families, because it implies that somewhere, someone is fully functional." That is true. We are all 'dysfunctional' by SOMEONE'S standards, and that is what makes us normal, I suspect.
I frequently recommend the movie "The Joy Luck Club" to people. Women, especially!, can probably 'get it', when they watch it. It centers around four Chinese women who end up living and raising their daughters in San Francisco. It is a constant flip-flop between the struggles and conflicts these women have with their grown daughters, scenes of those daughters' childhood experiences, and more importantly, glimpses of the mothers' own tumultuous childhood.
It was riveting to me because it made me stop to realize that I judged my conflicts with my own mother at face value and only from my limited perspective -- never contemplating what events in HER life, might have led her to push me this way or that, hold me at arms length when I so desperately wanted to be held, discipline me when my heart cried out for affection and yet -- at the same time -- love me fiercely.
Perhaps if I had seen it earlier -- or read the book -- The Joy Luck Club might've helped mend some of the strife in our relationship. But sadly, by the time I saw it I was so busy raising my four children and my mother, who was in another state, was already slipping into dementia.
We did not have enough time.
My mother was nearly 38 when I was born. Almost seventeen DIFFICULT years later, I married and moved 500 miles away. So the years I lived with her, I was as self-obsessed and ego-centric as any other child. Quickly I went from being a child in my mother's house to being a wife and then a mother. There was not a lot of time to work on our relationship and logistically it just wasn't possible.
Of course, like most people...I'd carefully analyzed ALL the 'mistakes' my mother made in parenting and carefully plotted how to not make ANY of them -- or any others, for that matter.
(Cue the laughter.)
Funny how there is nothing to show you how little you know about being a parent like BECOMING one. Over the next 20 years my children taught me just how inept and unprepared I was. Don't get me wrong. I know I did a pretty good job of raising them. They are all fine people today. But I made plenty of mistakes along the way. Not too many of the same ones my mother made, but more than my share, nonetheless.
This reminds me of a favorite quote: "When I was a boy of fourteen, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be twenty-one, I was astonished at how much he had learned in seven years." - Mark Twain
I could rewrite it thusly, "When I was a girl of 15, my mother was so despicable to me, the simple fact that she was consuming oxygen on MY planet drove me insane. But by the time "I" was the mother of a 15 year old girl, I was humbled to realize how hard it must have been to do the best she knew how each day, never knowing what I would say or do next."
The Joy Luck Club, lots of Oprah and Phil Donohue, stacks of magazines and books and several years of therapy later I could finally appreciate how some of the traumatic and tragic events of my mother's early life had shaped and molded her into the mother she became. And I was mature enough to realize it wasn't all about me. Just as I hope my children -- my girls, most especially! -- will realize that its not their fault I made mistakes, and its not entirely mine. But we are each shaped by many hands, over many years.
Which brings me back to Dolores Aguilar. I wonder -- What happened in her life...? What were HER parents like...? Her siblings....? What traumatic experiences altered her character and impacted her behavior...? And -- would knowing any of those details help her children understand her any better. A part of me grieves for them, because I know what it is like for your mother to die with unfinished business between you.
And I am blessed that with God's help, I am able to forgive her any shortcomings or any transgressions because I know she DID love me and she DID do the best she knew how.
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