10:14 p.m. | 2005-12-10 Origins. I come from MyMother. Sure, MyDad helped to create me, but MyMother carried me, and predominately, cared for me. Honestly, MyDad just checked in once in a while. He was busy working and well, staying away as much as he could. I don�t blame him as our house was never comfortable. Likewise, my relationship with MyMother was strained from the get-go. I never really liked her and she never really liked me. She resented the fact that MyDad favored me and I resented the fact that she resented me. It�s always been an uneasy relationship. Interestingly, you learn how to have a relationship with your same-sex parent from their relationship with their same-sex parent. In other words, your mother�s relationship with her mother sets the tone for your relationship with your mother. Oy vey. MyMother always hated her mother. Not surprisingly, she loved her father. Or more properly, she idolized her father. Her mother could do no right and her father could do no wrong. She handed that legacy down to me just as easily as she handed down Aunt Ola�s doilies. Which is why I�ve always been surprised that MyMother hasn�t a clue why we�ve never gotten along. Needless to say, our relationship has been punctuated with undesirable exchanges. Like the time she told me, at the ripe old age of five, that I needed �professional help�. I, frankly, didn�t know what �professional help� was but I knew better. I quickly told her that I was not the one with the problem. Again at ten, we had a stand down. She told me to go to my room � she was sick of seeing my face � and I did, initially. Then I crept down the stairs and sat within her line of vision. I made like I was stone and refused to move no matter what she said to me. She grounded me, took away all privileges and made me responsible for six months of chores. I cared not. She had claimed that she was being �fair� and she wasn�t. I declared �foul� and stood by my principles. (I still have principles, but my word, when I was young? Good lord, I had principles. Never backed off either. Just ask MyMother.) I was quite inflexible when I was young. Much like LittleNephew. Fortunately or unfortunately, he seems to have inherited that same gene. He�s a favorite of mine, of course. He mumbles like me too, which I find delightful. Well, and rather useful when you engage in such standoffs. If you�re a quick thinker, you can rearrange words straight away. That�s a handy skill and being a mumbler facilitates such things. Anyway. MyMother. In life, you only come from two parents. You can have more than that, of course, but only two people are responsible for bringing you into the world. Because MyDad is deceased, there is only one person left in this whole wide world who created me. I respect that. I�ve never had a child. I�m in no position to understand what it means to bring a child into this world. I think it�s the biggest thing a person could ever do, but I have no first-hand knowledge about it. So, as I�ve aged, I�ve been more forgiving of MyMother. She was very, very young when she brought four children into the world. I now understand that she really had no clue about what she was doing. I can relate. Not to the children part but to the having no clue part. Tomorrow, I�m going to MyMother�s house to help her trim her Christmas tree. The last time I went to a home of MyMother�s was about ten years ago and she wasn�t even there. She was in a coma in a hospital. Maybe five years before that I visited her in her own home. Tentatively, we�ve started a new relationship. Between us. MyDad�s gone and my siblings are all scattered. It�s just gonna be MyMother and me. I hope we like each other a little more now. your thoughts? seed flower