A Mother's Love

My mother, God Bless her, is a wonderful woman. However there is one aspect of her personality that I had never quite understood until just recently. I rarely if ever have heard her say I love you.

Without question through out our lives she has shown us in every conceivable manner that she loves us. No matter the crisis she has always been there for my brother, sister and I. From broken down cars to letting us each move back home at least once. From helping us with the down payment on our first homes to bailing us out of every conceivable type of financial difficulty, no matter the problem she has been the sheltering port in each and every storm that we have faced.

This past weekend I was going through some of my grandmother's old papers looking for information that would help me with the family's genealogy. While doing so I came across a bundle of letters that my grandmother and grandfather had exchanged over a one month period in 1951 when she was visiting her family in Washington D.C.

Reading through the letters provided me with a remarkable window onto the past. What the kids (my mother and her brothers) were like. Names of relatives I have never met. Even what travel was like for people in the late forties and early fifties. Most importantly though in reading them I began to understand where my mothers difficulty with affection came from.

The letters my grandparents exchanged could have been mistaken for correspondence between casual friends. Nowhere in 99% of the letters would the reader have a clue to their relationship. Only in one letter does my grandfather say that he misses or loves my grandmother. She however does not mention love at all. Overall the writing was without emotion and very sterile.

After reading them I called my mother to tell her what I had found. I figured she would get a kick out of some of the stories mentioned within.

Once we finished reminiscing I off handedly mentioned that I was beginning to understand why she never said I love you or ever showed much affection.

She was briefly taken aback and in a very defensive manner explained that she showed us that she loved us all the time through her action.

I laughed and told her that her love for us was never in doubt it was just that I had always wondered why the words made her uncomfortable. I went on to explain about how impersonal I found her parents letters be.

Once she understood where I was coming from she explained that her parents especially her mother never said I love you and were never big on hugging and kissing. She said that her and her brothers were all the same when it came to emotions, that they all had a very hard time-sharing them.

Before hanging up I ensured her that we all knew that she loved us and that she was and continues to be a mother to be proud of.