I’m homesick today. And I don’t know how to write about it with
some emotive voice that makes this blog post sound cohesive and retrospective.
The fact is, it’s Mother’s Day, and I have been mothered by a lot of amazing
women in my life. Women who have treated me like their own. Laughed with me.
Cried with me. Given me advice. Sternly suggested I take a different path.
Reassured me when I thought I had no options. Throughout life, I’ve been taken
under the wing on countless occasions by my grandmothers, my friends’ mothers,
my teachers, aunts, and host mothers from two different countries. They have
all, in some part, helped to raise me into the woman I am today. The part that
has me so baffled as I sit here typing, is that upon reflection, I realize that
each cared for me intrinsically. What sort of social capital could I, as a
4-year old, have provided in return for Mrs. Armstrong’s lessons of love for
your brother when some kid in class was mean to me? What other than the purest
of intentions urged my Eej from Orkhon to lovingly wash my hair for me? And my
second mothers: those of my friends’ whom I have visited even when their kids
aren’t home. We weren’t of any blood relation. What made them so invested in
me? I just don’t know what I could ever do for these women, all of my mothers,
that would repay anything they have done for me. And I realize that love
doesn’t work in that reciprocal
gift-giving sort of way. So I am just going to try and say thank you. To every
woman who has mothered me, in however insignificant a moment it may have seemed.
I am overwhelmed by your selflessness.
And to my own mother: I can only hope to be half the woman
you are. Everyone who knows you can attest to your strength and heart. I don’t
know how you can love so intensely, but I hope to learn. Thank you for raising
me with courage, and for letting me stretch your heart across an ocean. When I
was younger, I thought things changed between a kid and her mom once she became
an adult. I’m glad I was wrong. I guess that’s why that dumb children’s book
makes me so emotional these days. It’s true: “I’ll like you forever, I’ll love
you for always. As long as I’m living, my mommy you’ll be.”
