Safe.
I was always safe with her. In the home she made, the food she made, the life she made for me. Gave me everything I needed, including space to become me. And including scarcity. Sometimes people need scarcity. I could come home and be safe, and I was pushed to go outside. I knew she loved me no matter what, and she told me without her voice I needed to show effort.
Safe doesn’t mean unchallenged. In fact, I’d say safe means a place where you can accept challenges freely, knowing that what you truly need in life is provided and will be provided. Food, clothing, shelter, health, love–these things were free and as abundant. We didn’t live in a big house but we had a huge home. We didn’t eat like kings but had all we needed. We didn’t have expensive clothes but they were clean and fresh and somehow always laundered. I was safe in the best way possible–I knew I could leap into things and survive the fall if I missed the opposite ledge, because my mother had made me able. And she’d be there to patch me up, then put her hand gently but firmly on my back and say, “now, try again, Son.”
I’m sorry for you, Reader, because you didn’t have my mom.
Knowing what I know now about parenting, I know that when my mensch of a brother and I were playing outside–usually something moderately to extremely dangerous (it usually worked out that Jeff was the test pilot and I was the engineer designing the vehicle: he was the Alan Shepherd to my Werner von Braun) my mother was either watching or preparing the Band-Aids for when we almost inevitably needed them after a failed test run of the wagon that really should have worked. She made the home a place we could come to, regroup, refuel, and then bang outside again to try a new trajectory.
I was a reader when I was young–I still am. Some of you are also readers: not people who read, but a reader. People who can walk and read simultaneously. People who leave books around the house so that they are never more than a few steps away from a story. When I was young, I would read after my bedtime, breathlessly turning the pages of Ivanhoe to see how Rebecca was going to escape Front de Boeuf’s castle. My parents (sometimes Dad, sometimes Mom) would knock on the door and say, “lights out, time for bed.” And I would turn off the light only to grab a flashlight and read under the covers. As a kid, I thought this was impenetrable. No one would suspect I was still awake, reading!
Of course Mom knew. I always wondered if Mom and Dad talked about it, had little debates if they were going to stop me again, and if so, which one would do it. Sometimes they would tell me an hour later, in firmer tones, “Go to bed!” but often, they didn’t.
They made sure I had change and a few dollar bills when it was Scholastic Book Fair time at school.
When I started writing (way, way back in primary school) they indulged me in it. Another memory I have of Mom is from 1978 when I was 10 years old. I was already a science fiction maniac, even at that time (reruns of syndicated shows like The Twilight Zone or Star Trek, or even when I was desperate, Lost in Space were my main fare) and when a brand-new TV show called Battlestar Galactica debuted right as school was starting up in September of that year, Mom made a special point of showing it to me. She was so excited that she could bring me this exciting new show and indulge my love of sci-fi.
Mom, I suppose this may be too late, but that show was…not great. I watched it mostly because you showed it to me and I wanted to honor you. But my God with the Cylons and the single red scanner eye and especially with Muffit the daggit and the robot replacement and Boxey…
You passed away just before your 78th birthday. You’re dead but not gone, Mom. You’ll never be gone. You’re in your grandchildren. You’re in the turning of a dog-eared copy of Ivanhoe at 11:30 at night on a schoolday. You’re in spaghetti sauce that’s so good I could and did eat it without pasta. You’re in the feeling of a home, of being safe.
You’re in my brother.
You’re in me.
I miss you, Mom. Even though you’re still here.
I was always safe with her. In the home she made, the food she made, the life she made for me. Gave me everything I needed, including space to become me. And including scarcity. Sometimes people need scarcity. I could come home and be safe, and I was pushed to go outside. I knew she loved me no matter what, and she told me without her voice I needed to show effort.
Safe doesn’t mean unchallenged. In fact, I’d say safe means a place where you can accept challenges freely, knowing that what you truly need in life is provided and will be provided. Food, clothing, shelter, health, love–these things were free and as abundant. We didn’t live in a big house but we had a huge home. We didn’t eat like kings but had all we needed. We didn’t have expensive clothes but they were clean and fresh and somehow always laundered. I was safe in the best way possible–I knew I could leap into things and survive the fall if I missed the opposite ledge, because my mother had made me able. And she’d be there to patch me up, then put her hand gently but firmly on my back and say, “now, try again, Son.”
I’m sorry for you, Reader, because you didn’t have my mom.
Knowing what I know now about parenting, I know that when my mensch of a brother and I were playing outside–usually something moderately to extremely dangerous (it usually worked out that Jeff was the test pilot and I was the engineer designing the vehicle: he was the Alan Shepherd to my Werner von Braun) my mother was either watching or preparing the Band-Aids for when we almost inevitably needed them after a failed test run of the wagon that really should have worked. She made the home a place we could come to, regroup, refuel, and then bang outside again to try a new trajectory.
I was a reader when I was young–I still am. Some of you are also readers: not people who read, but a reader. People who can walk and read simultaneously. People who leave books around the house so that they are never more than a few steps away from a story. When I was young, I would read after my bedtime, breathlessly turning the pages of Ivanhoe to see how Rebecca was going to escape Front de Boeuf’s castle. My parents (sometimes Dad, sometimes Mom) would knock on the door and say, “lights out, time for bed.” And I would turn off the light only to grab a flashlight and read under the covers. As a kid, I thought this was impenetrable. No one would suspect I was still awake, reading!
Of course Mom knew. I always wondered if Mom and Dad talked about it, had little debates if they were going to stop me again, and if so, which one would do it. Sometimes they would tell me an hour later, in firmer tones, “Go to bed!” but often, they didn’t.
They made sure I had change and a few dollar bills when it was Scholastic Book Fair time at school.
When I started writing (way, way back in primary school) they indulged me in it. Another memory I have of Mom is from 1978 when I was 10 years old. I was already a science fiction maniac, even at that time (reruns of syndicated shows like The Twilight Zone or Star Trek, or even when I was desperate, Lost in Space were my main fare) and when a brand-new TV show called Battlestar Galactica debuted right as school was starting up in September of that year, Mom made a special point of showing it to me. She was so excited that she could bring me this exciting new show and indulge my love of sci-fi.
Mom, I suppose this may be too late, but that show was…not great. I watched it mostly because you showed it to me and I wanted to honor you. But my God with the Cylons and the single red scanner eye and especially with Muffit the daggit and the robot replacement and Boxey…
You passed away just before your 78th birthday. You’re dead but not gone, Mom. You’ll never be gone. You’re in your grandchildren. You’re in the turning of a dog-eared copy of Ivanhoe at 11:30 at night on a schoolday. You’re in spaghetti sauce that’s so good I could and did eat it without pasta. You’re in the feeling of a home, of being safe.
You’re in my brother.
You’re in me.
I miss you, Mom. Even though you’re still here.
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