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penfield"At the moment of commitment, the universe conspires to assist you"
- Dr. Wayne Dyer
Yesterday was Mother's Day. In accordance with federal, local and natural bylaws, I happily fulfilled my familial obligation with the usual tokens of appreciation: a gift, a card, a phone call.
(She cried a little bit, tears of joy. I know I ought to interpret the reaction as gratitude or validation, or at least acknowledge it as an reflexively emotional response, but it still evokes in me a deeply embedded, Pavlovian twinge of pain. There is no worse sound in my ears than that of my mother crying. It is a powerfully effective tactic that she really should have deployed more strategically during my adolescent years.)
In the card I had inscribed: "Mom: you still inspire me." She caught me off-guard, though, when she asked me over the phone what that meant, exactly. I honestly hadn't thought about how to explicate the sentiment beyond its plain self-evidence.
I suppose it has something to do with the saccharine, vaguely spiritual self-affirming platitudes that my mom seems to collect, like the one at the top of this journal entry. It currently serves as her e-mail signature, which I imagine as a metaphorical celebration of the "send" button.
But it is not the messages themselves that I find so inspirational, but rather the belief structure that supports them. My mother is not a religiously devout person, but is nonetheless a person of abiding faith -- in people, in institutions and in the universe. She is one of those people who sees the world as it ought to be, and is frequently disappointed.
It isn't optimism -- optimism is naive. And it isn't piety -- piety is judgmental. Like most teachers, my mother is simply a perfectionist. And she thinks I'm perfect. (Believers are prone to idolatry from time to time, to my benefit as well as the benefit of Oprah, et al.)
Obviously, I am not perfect. But I am inspired by her belief in me. I am inspired to be the man she thinks I am and the writer she thinks I can be. (This whole journal project, this new year's resolution, is mere "boot camp" for the novel she insists is inside me waiting to get out.)
There have been times, low times of defeated youth, when her belief in me sustained me, gave me the strength and determination to get up in the morning. And in good times, when I imagine a world worth changing, worth saving, worth loving, I am seeing the world through my mother's eyes -- tears notwithstanding.
On Mother's Day, I thank her, not only for being the one who brought me into the world 31 years ago, but for helping me to see the possibilities in every day since.
I love you, Mom.
"We are born believing. A man bears beliefs, as a tree bears apples."
- Ralph Waldo Emerson
- Dr. Wayne Dyer
Yesterday was Mother's Day. In accordance with federal, local and natural bylaws, I happily fulfilled my familial obligation with the usual tokens of appreciation: a gift, a card, a phone call.
(She cried a little bit, tears of joy. I know I ought to interpret the reaction as gratitude or validation, or at least acknowledge it as an reflexively emotional response, but it still evokes in me a deeply embedded, Pavlovian twinge of pain. There is no worse sound in my ears than that of my mother crying. It is a powerfully effective tactic that she really should have deployed more strategically during my adolescent years.)
In the card I had inscribed: "Mom: you still inspire me." She caught me off-guard, though, when she asked me over the phone what that meant, exactly. I honestly hadn't thought about how to explicate the sentiment beyond its plain self-evidence.
I suppose it has something to do with the saccharine, vaguely spiritual self-affirming platitudes that my mom seems to collect, like the one at the top of this journal entry. It currently serves as her e-mail signature, which I imagine as a metaphorical celebration of the "send" button.
But it is not the messages themselves that I find so inspirational, but rather the belief structure that supports them. My mother is not a religiously devout person, but is nonetheless a person of abiding faith -- in people, in institutions and in the universe. She is one of those people who sees the world as it ought to be, and is frequently disappointed.
It isn't optimism -- optimism is naive. And it isn't piety -- piety is judgmental. Like most teachers, my mother is simply a perfectionist. And she thinks I'm perfect. (Believers are prone to idolatry from time to time, to my benefit as well as the benefit of Oprah, et al.)
Obviously, I am not perfect. But I am inspired by her belief in me. I am inspired to be the man she thinks I am and the writer she thinks I can be. (This whole journal project, this new year's resolution, is mere "boot camp" for the novel she insists is inside me waiting to get out.)
There have been times, low times of defeated youth, when her belief in me sustained me, gave me the strength and determination to get up in the morning. And in good times, when I imagine a world worth changing, worth saving, worth loving, I am seeing the world through my mother's eyes -- tears notwithstanding.
On Mother's Day, I thank her, not only for being the one who brought me into the world 31 years ago, but for helping me to see the possibilities in every day since.
I love you, Mom.
"We are born believing. A man bears beliefs, as a tree bears apples."
- Ralph Waldo Emerson
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Date: 2008-05-14 02:31 pm (UTC)