As many do, I thought that I knew what the definition of mother, father, husband, friend, sister, brother, aunt, and uncle was. So, when they didn’t check the boxes that fell under the category of these roles, then I resented them–and did so for a very long time.
It wasn’t until the infant hours of one morning, while still in bed, keying my latest novel into Microsoft Word, that I realized the error in my expectations of these persons and their roles. Louisa, my main character, was being viciously berated by her oldest daughter, Doris. Since I created both characters, I overstood both sides of the argument.
Louisa wasn’t there. That resulted in Doris having to drop out of school to raise her four sisters. Decades later, when it was too late for anything to have been reversed, Doris still refused to forgive her mother. That’s because Louisa failed to live up to Doris’ expectations of what a mother’s role consisted of.
Again, I created Louisa; therefore, I know exactly what she went through as a child. She has a background of her own and becoming a mother didn’t erase that. However, Doris couldn’t see past her own past in order to see her mother’s. Here, my own character taught me a lesson.
Attaching expectations to one’s notion of others’ roles is a serious danger zone.
For me, such discoveries/lessons are the reason that I love writing so much. More than writing, I love me some writers. When I stumbled upon Shatealy Johnson, I had no choice but to bless my site with her truths regarding roles and the dangers of our expectations of them. She writes:
Last night, in the emergency room, I saw my mother for the very first time…
All my life I saw her as a pint-sized, Category 5 hurricane. Last night, she looked small and weakened because she was not feeling the best and, I think, afraid. She, to me, looked different. She looked different from the force we all knew her to be.
It hit me that my mother was only 17 years older than me. All that she was back then, the weight that she carried…How could she do all that? How could she live just being 17 years older than me? She was mean. She was stern. She was unfriendly. She raised us. How did she raise us? How did she make sure that my sisters and I started our education in private school as we lived in the projects? How did she work fast food in the mall, at Revco as a paraprofessional in the school system and take care of three girls?
We wore Rothschild coats and Buster Brown shoes. How did she sew our dresses with fabrics and McCall’s patterns from Piece Goods and Hancocks with little money to buy these things? How did she, as such a young mother with no consistent help from fathers, take care of us with so little?
Now, I can understand her anger.
I understand her frustration. I understand the personal hell she lived in day after day. I understand why sometimes she looked like she wanted to disappear. Life was too much at times. As I watched her try and rest in that hospital chair, I forgave her. I forgave her for mistreating me at times. I forgave her not being the ‘ideal mother’ I wished she would have been. I forgave her because last night I realized that she was mean; she was hard.
However, she was there.
She was there to teach me how to be a critical thinker. She made sure my creative ass went to dance class, voice lessons and writing camps. She attended PTA, Open Houses, chorus shows, dance shows teacher conferences and kept me active with performing arts in our city. She combed our hair every day. She hauled us to the laundry mat every week. Even when she couldn’t afford to buy us all the latest clothes, our clothes were always clean and pressed. She instilled morals, value and etiquette in us. She did it all.
She would TEAR SOME SHIT UP about my sisters and I. Nobody messed with her girls. Chile, you think Brown v. Board of Education was something….My mama versus the Chatham County Board of Education was on a whole ‘nother level. I have always heard my mama say she wanted to go to college. She wanted to pledge my sorority. She wanted to have a big career. She should be working at the Pentagon or CIA. My mother is smart and…
Follow Shatealy’s journey via her FB page, Shatealy’s Truth: Love, Life and Levees.
Comments
One response to “Roles and Expectations: Danger Zones”
I LOVE IT! Thank you so much for sharing me with the world.