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• Sunday, May 14, 2006 01:29 PM

  Happy Mother's Day (without the "carriage return")

  I will always fear my Mother's passing because I will either be the head of healthcare at that point (my brother's are completely inept and make no attempt to hide the fact) or play some disjointed supporting role wherein I do what anyone does who has never understood their mother, her habitual need to meddle and seek out conflict or create her own conflict when there was no legitimate tragedy to be found. I will still suffer regardless. My relationship with my Mother is in some ways very similar (in effect, at least) to the author and not so similar at all as I have no children and my Mother whom I suspect got pregnant every time her marriage at an early age seemed to be going South did not have to go to such great lengths to bare children. She has never changed, and although in one extraordinary moment while my sister's life was in great peril, she apologized to me about her abuse when we (including her) were children in a surreal twilight driveway experience, I will never be able to reconcile my relationship with her. I don't know if I dispatched her apology with "Mom, that is water under the bridge, we have all grown past that" in an attempt to diffuse a maelstrom of unpleasant memory, or secretly refute her genuine attempt at redemption for our haunted pasts or maybe even to deny her the pivotal moment in our relationship where things would be new and hopeful. Of course, now there is new drama and conflict and meddling to be done and that distant surreal moment is simply that, distant and surreal. I'll call her in a hour or two, slip into the only role I know how to play on the telephone (strikingly similar to herself with anti-Bush-isms and character assassinations, or evaluations of other family members who aren't playing by the rules, or maybe a brief mention of my little sister who hasn't made contact with my Mother in 12 years). Yes, Happy Mother's Day. I hope it's quick and tidy, with any luck, like her passing.

  —bilhelm Read bilhelm's other letters
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