Published: May 07, 2008 10:09 pm            

WHITE-WALKER: Ah salute, all mothers

Mothers, may your hearts be light and rejoice when you learn what I’ve just discovered. How lucky I am that I can decipher those letters on a page. It’s called reading, but I guess you know that, or you wouldn’t be following along, huh? Well, that’s exactly how I found out such thrilling news, by reading. I’m so relieved and excited that my fingers are practically dancing on this keyboard. Talk about an early Mother’s Day present. Actually, it’s about 43 years too late; wish it had come along four decades earlier when I was just a rookie on the motherhood scene. Oh, the anguish I would have been saved. Oh, the heartache you might have been spared if you knew what I’m about to disclose. You might want to sit down, pour yourself a glass of fine classy wine and gulp.

Now get this — a son’s perception of the world comes from his father, not his mother. Can you believe it? All these years we mothers have been blamed for almost everything that goes awry in this world, especially with our children, sometimes with our daughters, mainly with our sons. Just think of all those hang-ups that supposedly stems from mothers — the Peter Pan Syndrome, Narcissus and Oedipus Complexes. But now, thanks to my reading ability and passing on the good news, we’ve been vindicated — let the fathers know what it’s like to be laden with guilt. Men, it’s not fun. Guys, it will probably kill you. Men, you try living with the pressure of the old adage, “The hand that rocks the cradle rules the world.” Come to think of it, men would love that, ruling the world and all. Ok, ok, so there are a few women out there who would love it, too.

Naturally while parenthood is so precarious, the joys are incalculable. Just ask my mother who had the ‘privilege’ of raising me. Don’t ask her, because it will be from her side of the story and you know how mothers can misconstrue things.

She’s 84 now, this woman who isn’t afraid to call me her daughter, and who is as sharp as she ever was. She seems though to be shrinking in size, and not too long ago some killjoy said, “Ann, look at you, pretty soon there will be nothing left of you.” That’s what’s scaring the heck out of me — I want more of her, not less, but the years now feel like months, the months like days and the hours like mere minutes. There’s so little time left to share the good stuff.

It’s so darn much fun to be around mom because she has this impeccable timing for humor — just ask my dad. Wait. Don’t ask dad because after 65 years of marriage, who remembers them laughing much together? Not I — crying, yelling and throwing wedding rings across the room maybe, but laughing?

How would you like to have an electrifying personality that embraces all races and social standings — hence you teach your children that the word prejudice belongs in the garbage and buried in some land fill, never to be resurrected again? Well, that’s my mom. There are also no barriers in her world so she harbors no preconceived notions about people and so, she’s very receptive to their strife and successes. While growing up I didn’t have the vision to realize a rare mother when I saw one — forgive me, Mom. She also has that elusive quality to listen so intently so that when you’re talking to her she makes you feel like you’re the most important person in the world. But don’t think she didn’t make a couple of mistakes along the way, like being too hysterical and over-protective — I forgive you, mom.

I know a woman whose mother never makes an attempt to see her. “She wouldn’t recognize me in a line-up,” laughed the daughter. “But she’s my mother and I love her.”

Laughter can sometimes camouflage heartbreak, but love can ease the hurt. A little of this, a little of that, as mothers we can only pray that we correctly measure just the right amounts. It comes down to mothers and math — God help us.

Karen White-Walker is a Wilson resident.

        

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