“When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, “Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.”
Fred Rogers
Yesterday I stood and watch the classroom from my first year of primary school get demolished. It is ready for a new era in the life of my primary school.
However, it is no longer my school, it is now my children’s school and I wonder if the demolishing of the walls that contained my creativity over the duration of those seven years, unlocked some memories that released healing once again.
The moment was so stark as I stood there a Mum myself, suddenly realising that all the heart, creativity and hope instilled in my life from my own Mother, was now the way I felt about my own.
Dear Mum,
There are many times that we have missed each others intention and it seems like we are talking a different language but I am so grateful that you have always walked alongside.
Love
Me
Time catches me out sometimes and I realise that I am not five and she twenty-five anymore. Life seems to have caught up on us and we are in our forties and sixties, wrestling the same old narratives.
I’m not sure what happened, maybe healing and heart collided, but sometime in the last year, I have decided that it is not my role to try and change you. My only responsibility is to change myself.
So those days when we are speaking a different language and I am looking for help and you are looking for rest, I have decided to just stop fighting and allow you to walk alongside.
It puzzles me sometimes when I hear people saying their Mum is their best friend. I think in my independence I have not admitted that I sometimes need a Mother still and other times I need a friend.
The greatest gift my adult Mum has taught me is to be a helper. To come alongside and be there for people. It is the one thing that I have often not allowed her to do in my life, but I am learning that I too need help.
No matter how many degree’s I have, the house I own or the stages I walk upon, we all need a little help sometimes. So this year as I step into Mother’s Day and I honour all you have been in my life again. I am learning to ask for help and accept your help and most of all acknowledge how you have walked alongside.