All of us know about the Cinderella whose genes made it possible for her to be like her mother to be able to wear her mom's cool clothes and the much coveted shoe! And she did not have to live with a kind she wanted to grow up to be like!
But what about those mere mortals who forever live in the shadow of their super-woman moms. Who possess no apparent legacy to stand a chance of measuring up to "the" original. Who forever try and finally give up the eventuality of never being able to go one up. Now in all fairness most of the moms never do quite take kindly to their daughters being less than perfect (read the best versions of themselves!) but there are those that actually do not expect you to be their size. They want you to spead your own wings look for your own pastures and do your own flying and navigating while u are at it. It is those one who make it so difficult to resent them cos well they are as up there as the up itself can afford to be without being giddy!
That ladies and gentlemen, how my mom is. Imagine my plight to have had to live with such a person all the initial formative years of my life. Mind you before I became aware of the living up tothingie, I was more than blissful, as ignorants are made out to be. But slowly and slowly when I realized the super powers of my mother, I very brashly and promptly tried resisting and rebelling (job profile of a teenager) against her sense of order and discipline (for lack of a better word!) and each time I was met with a cool reassuring and even understanding a smile, as if she knew what my struggle with myself was about. It was infuriating to say the least, I could not shake her resolve to love me and continue to show me the light. You know how mothers can be when it comes to their own child. Well she was unarguably the best kind. After all my teenage years of rebel and guerilla warfare tactics, I finally decided to give up trying to be better (who am I kidding) rather as good as her. That gave me the freedom to appreciate the person I was sharing my life with without the pressure of being like her. And that really did set me free from a lot of baggage but not all. I still tried to keep at it not in terms of a competition but more as a gold standard in life.
Many years after making my peace with the thought I happened to closely observed my own mother being under the wing of her mother. And I saw the little girl in my self assured mother striving to make food the way my nani can or rather does. I saw my mother looking for approval, striving for that internal measure-up to her mother.And somehow this wisdom dawned on me that the years and the effort that I spend in making myself better is all that matters and how continuous this whole exercise is or at least should be and how long am I going to be at it.....
Apparently all my life J
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