’til Death do us Part

My mother is coming to DC next week to visit me.
For four days.
FOUR WHOLE, COMPLETE AND TOTAL DAYS.

I really don’t know what to do with that. I’m less than excited. She’s on this whole “let’s be friends, I wanna be included in your life” thing and I’m just, ugh. I can’t take it. She has the worst timing of any human being I’ve ever known. It’s the last two weeks of the semester, universally known to all college students as the time of the year when you try desperately to make up for being a horribly lazy student all semester by doing crazy amounts of work on 2 hours of sleep and 30 pounds of coffee without killing yourself.
Or at least for me.

So in the middle of all that I have to play hostess? TO MY MOTHER?!? Just… Sigh.

I am doing a production of Chicago next week (no you may not come) and she’s coming to see me in it. Why, I have no idea. I can’t take her here. As a matter of fact, the mere thought of it just completely erased all rational thought from my brain. Gimme a minute to regain my composure…
…..
………
…………………………………

Oh yes!!!

Til death do us part…

The impending arrival has got me wondering… We are all aware of the transient and non-permanent nature of relationships of this world. What if our relationships with our parents are truly the only non-breakable ones, the only ones that truly are until death do us part?

I’ll give you a minute. I know that was a lot to take.

So that means that deadbeat dad that you hate… he’s with you for life. That overbearing mother you (I) can’t stand… she’s going nowhere. You can’t change them. God knows that. So what do you do when the people you MUST live with FOREVER are the very people you can’t stand and have vowed to never be a thing like?

Well, I guess like any vow taken, you must learn to deal. You must take the good with the bad. And you must learn to accept people BECAUSE of their faults, not DESPITE of them. That is real and unconditional love. And can you really be 100% guaranteed that from any other source other than the people that helped raise you? I guess, you must also be objective. In actuality, are your parents as bad as they seem? Or they really ALL bad? Or has your anger, bitterness and hurt distorted the image a bit? Even I, in my rare moments of maturity and clarity, can admit that my mother isn’t so bad. Other people seem to like her just fine. And she’s not all bad. The bad is actually just a small margin. But it’s just that the bad is SO BAD…

Wait, I’m getting off track.

So maybe our parents are really the only people we are truly destined to have in our lives forever. And think about it; who shapes who you are more than your parents and the relationship you have with them? So maybe that father you lost track of and haven’t bothered to find, maybe you should look for him. Even if its just to say, “You know what, I hate the way you half ass parented me.” Maybe your mom who you can’t stand except for major Hallmark holidays you should call up, just because, and endure as much as you can possibly stand of her for as long as you can stomach it. It’ll probably make her day. And besides, how many people have you had walk in and out of your life? Now how many of those can you say gave birth to you?

As for me, I’m gonna call my mama and try to tell her about my day without being as patronizing as possible. I’m even gonna listen to her complain, try to run my life from afar and give me bad advice. I’m going to talk to her because she is my mother, because she is my ’til death do we part, because she loves me, and, underneath it all, just wants me to be her daughter. And when she gets here, I will smile and I will give my mama a hug because I haven’t seen her in seven months and I will spend time with her, not hiding behind my job or school as an excuse because I know it will make her happy.

Because really, because of my faults, she still loves me more than any person in this world. And I think I can try to give her the same.