Mothers and Daughters on Father's Day
The wife has unresolved childhood issues with her mother.Her parents were divorced when she was about 11 and her sister was 8. It was the mother's fault. A betrayal.
When it all hit the fan, the wife briefly covered for her mother, not really knowing what was going on. For this, she has been eternally guilt-ridden. What else is an 11 year old girl to do when she is alone, afraid, and unsure where her mother is, ...only marginally understanding what was really going on? What else was she to say when her father asked over the phone to speak with her mother who was absent?
"She's in the shower."
And a lifetime of self-criticism begins.
She apparently had much closer contact with her mother over the years, ...living with her or near her. At 18 her mother moved out with her new boyfriend and left the wife to take care of her sister in the house alone.
The mother came over everyday, ...but it couldn't be the same. At 18 the wife had to raise a teenager, ...cook, clean, and comfort her sister.
In many ways they were better for it. Both of them are now beautiful, strong, independent, and responsible people.
Add resentful to that list.
Decades later the mother is visiting the daughter and her husband in the US. The daughter is watching divorce court and translating for her mother. One person is divorcing another because of infidelity.
The mother makes an ill-advised comment about how "mistakes" happen, it happens to "everyone", it's "no big deal", and you should not break up a family over it. The words were delivered as if they were a sermon out of the "good book". You could almost hear the book snapping shut as an exclamation point.
The daughter bites her tongue.
The break down happens later while relaying the conversation to her husband.
23 years of tears soak into my chest as my newborn daughter sleeps silently nearby.
Remind to never cheat and never get divorced.
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