Two Words

There is a famous argument in the world of psychology best known as the nature versus nurture debate. The nurture side of this debate never fit me. I was raised by a single mother that I would like to think did the best that she could, but the best was neglect. In those moments, I was not seen. I was not heard. I stopped existing and in truth, I much preferred that. The eggshells I had to walk upon didn’t crack as loud if I stepped wrongly. The fierce correction to my words or my behaviors didn’t change on the whim of the unknown. In those precious moments of neglect, I could almost breathe. However, we are not talking about the nurture of this argument or we would have to debate if who was raising who in my childhood. It is another demon to unpack on another day, so until then we just place it where it belongs in the no jar of the mind.

As the debate exists from nature, you can see part of my DNA was not the best. It was not the worst either. Perhaps growing up in a neglectful and abusive childhood is what was meant about times being the best and worst. I could make a case for my optimism coming from the rose hued paintbrush I had to put across everything to survive. Surely, that came from nature? I was born that way. There are things that I admit I was born with that made my personality who I am.

If you have ever been around a baby that grows to a toddler and then again to a child and hopefully on wards; you will realize some parts of our personality just exist with our first cries and carry us through to our last. I always talked too much when I shouldn’t and not enough when I should. My eyes were (and still are) blue. My hair was a shade of blonde that wasn’t quite blonde and a shade of brown that really wasn’t brown. My hair was not pin straight like my sibling (perhaps I should say half sibling) nor was it curly. I was blessed and cursed with being shorter than average, but not so short it was medically concerning. My nature always had me a little too much or a little too little, never a happy place and never a place to fit in.

I spent a lot of time staring at my face as I grew up. I spent a lot of time watching the changes in my body as it developed too early compared to my peers. I studied the shade of my eyes. I studied the shape of my lips. I was transfixed with the color of my hair and the curves of my body. I questioned my hobbies. My natural longing and understanding for the power of words. Was this because I had witnessed so many lies, that I knew how much pain they could cause? Or is it that I learned that same lesson with truth? I know that I spent hours and years pouring over music to analyze the words that would reach me. In everything that I did growing up, I looked for a difference. Was it different from my siblings? Was it different from my mother?

It was not that I wanted to be separate, not exactly. In a world where all I wanted to do was feel like I belonged and wanted; there is always going to be a part of me that wants to match them. I want to match the people I spend time with. This again, will become an issue later that we might touch on. For now, I was searching out differences because I wanted to find HIM. No, this isn’t the spiritual awakening that some might have. I do not find opposition with them finding it, but that isn’t my story. No, I wanted to see something in the mirror or my personality that came from the other side of nature; my father.

This was a story that was NOT to be spoken in my family and in my world. A few times over the years, I had brought up the topic. It was either dismissed or merely told it wasn’t any of my business. Years later, as I became an adult, I would always wonder why my own DNA would not be my business. It was an answer I would never receive. My mother never wanted to talk about it and if others knew, they were not telling me. My siblings were teenagers when I was born, so I would imagine they might know. However, I knew that I could not ask them. I knew the question would only bring out my mother’s fury and that was something no one wanted to see. As I said, the neglect was the good side; her fury was another. I could tell about the time she cut off all my hair when I was a child in my sleep for allowing it to get tangled. This is not that story. Or when she told me she wished it was me that had died. Again, not this story. In fact, those are just stepping stones to this tale today.

I used to make up fantasies about him. I hear this is common for children that have a parent not in the picture. I would think him an actor because I once wanted to be one. I would think him a spy and why he couldn’t be with me. When I was hungry, or the lights were shut off, or the abuse was so bad that I would curl up and cry — I would think him my savior. Somewhere out there he was looking for me. These were the thoughts of a child going through what I did, but then I became a teenager. Then I started having different questions that come with knowledge to the world around us. I would think him an abuser that she had left. I would think him a rapist that she hated. Perhaps he was a man that had broken her heart. Perhaps he was a one-night stand. Perhaps. So many perhaps.

As I grew older in my adolescence and came closer to my adulthood, my mother and I had settled into an uneasy routine. I would not bring people over. I would not require her for much. I would make sure I was fed and at school. I would drop everything I was doing to come see her when she called. This bellowing could be to change a station on the television, to rub her sore feet, or to get her the drink of tea that was just out of her reach in the same room as her. We slowly started to learn each other’s patterns. I would start to realize when we were in a good trend of time. When she raised her hand it was to smooth back my hair from my face instead of brand me with her discontent. When she would tell me she would love me and I didn’t want to vomit from the feel of the lies she spoke. These were the times when she would put me first in small little ways. I could pick the meal and not be condemned for picking wrong. I could have the last of something I enjoyed. She would pick up the shampoo I liked the smell of. She would perhaps buy me an outfit or new shoes. She would want to hear the poems that I wrote alone in my room and not mock them. They didn’t last, but they were good phases. I wish that I could say I built my views of love and relationships in the future on these interactions, but I did not. I built them on the others. The lack of trust. The spewed hatred. The ways I had to earn love and affection. The moments she told me she should have aborted me and I owed her my very breath. These were how my mother showed love, but even these moments I had almost become cold to. I had learned when to distance myself; or so I thought.

When I was seventeen (a strangely pivotal year for most), I was sitting in the car with my mother. The mood between us had been good. She had said she loved me all week. I had allowed myself to believe this was the moment. You know, those moments where we feel like it is now or never, that we have to jump or let it pass us by. We were coming home from dinner with my grandmother. I was sitting in the front seat of the car. The radio was on her oldies channel playing a song I thought I was too cool to know. I had on my white school jacket. Not the heavy Letterman one, but the one for fall and spring. The businesses on the corners were closed and I watched my mother’s face. I studied every line to read her. She was smiling and drumming her fingers in tune with the music. I felt sick and elated all at the same time. I was going to ask. This was my moment. I was going to ask about my father and she was in the mood that she was going to tell me something. Not everything, but something.

I remember calling her name softly (well I said Mom) and her turning to look over at me for a moment and then back to the road. There was a smile. It was still good. Then I said, “What did I get from my father?” I could taste the bile when I said it, but her mood did not change. She did not still like she normally did before she would strike. So I started to feel the hope in my heart. Would she say my talents? The fullness of my lips? The color of my eyes? I felt like the world had paused in that moment in my barely seventeen years of life; I knew this was pivotal. She smiled softly to herself before looking over at me and uttered two words that I shall never forget. No matter how much time has passed. No matter what anyone else has said to me. These two words that showed me the depth of my mother’s love and understanding.

“Your selfishness.”

The feelings of that moment are hard to explain or put to words. In fact, as much as I love words, I’m not sure the exact one has been crafted yet. I do not believe I could do it justice. It was most definitely betrayal. I remember feeling both hot and ice cold at the same time. I remember every second that lasted in that car. I remember how she casually turned back to the road and continued like nothing had happened. I remember being so angry at myself for letting me believe that this time could be different. I remember all of that. What I remember most and still brings tears to my eyes now is that I didn’t cry then. I didn’t shed even one tear even though I had never been hurt as deeply as this moment (and trust me I had been HURT by this point in life). I felt something in me, so deep, so resounding it just broke completely. It didn’t just crack, but shattered into a million soundless pieces. It forever altered me. It forever changed how I viewed myself, how I viewed love, and life around me. I’m not sure that I will ever be over that moment nor will I ever stop wanting to cry for the hopeful child that got hurt.


Word Count: 1965