Where to start?
I officiated my mother’s funeral. Ten years ago. And while I’ve lost my eulogy, there is one part that has stuck with me. Forgive my paraphrasing:
And that was her name. Mom. Mom Gosling, so as not to be confused with Mom Mueller, Mom Brody, or Mom Renon.
Starting in late middle school, my friends and I dropped the respective term Mrs. from our mothers’ names, and began referring to everyone as Mom. And then last names to differentiate. It worked. And into adulthood, we still call every woman Mom.
Daily, I use more words than necessary to refer to Ryan’s mom. Your mom. Your mother. Ryan’s mom. Ryan’s mother. It’s awkward and clumsy in my mouth. And after while, I feel ridiculous saying it. (She lives a mile away, so the phrase falls from my mouth fairly often.) And using her first name sounds both oddly formal and emotionally removed; no one else here refers to her as Beth. It’s like in her name alone I’ve separated myself from everyone that’s close to me.
While we were on vacation this summer, I tried dropping the distancing possessive ‘your’. It was small, and dammit it felt great. But what really bothers me is why could I easily do it when I was young, but now I hesitate when calling someone else Mom? There is one obvious difference between now and then: the physical lack of my mother. Did her presence make it okay to toss her title around?
Determining what my hang-up was has been a solid meditation for me the last couple of months. I’m still no closer to figuring out what it is.
And last month, we crested a decade since I last spoke to Mom (my mother). At least in a conversation where she spoke back to me. Mother’s Day, her birthday, my birthday, Christmas Eve, and what we call Mom’s Day are some of my least favorite (holi)days of the year. The culture of family related advertisements really just cause me to feel left out. And at times, broken.
On Mother’s Day, I posted to facebook a new outlook I’ve been trying to incorporate into my thought process. Rather than focusing on what I don’t have, I would be grateful for what I do have: a pretty solid group of ladies who want good things for me. Who would stand up and try to fill the space left by Mom. Most of them are her friends. One is my best friend’s mother–a woman I adore while she still scares the bejeezus outta me (impressions from a flippant teenager). Another is my mother-in-law.
I hate to sound cliche (and that in itself is cliche), but no one is going to be my mom. No one is going to interact with the world the same way she would.
But sometimes, I watch how Beth (my MIL) talks to her kids, how she always has a task list when we come to her house, how her children are her babies… And I see flashes of my mom.
In the weeks since I started this mess of a post, I’ve converted completely to calling Beth Mom. And while I don’t think she has noticed, I know that Ryan has. He’s dropped the possessive my, and I’ve let go of the distancing your. She’s just Mom now.
And I’m good with that.