? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? I moved out of my mother?s house for the first time a little over a year ago. I think most university-age people who have made this exodus out from under the family wing into the Big Scary World of Responsiblish Adults would agree that this puts you into a weird sort of twilight; you?re sorta kinda an ?adult? in the working sense of the word, but you still eat way too much Kraft Dinner, and clean your house far too little to consider yourself one. A real adult probably would have been able to do their taxes on their own, and would sign up for their own Safeway Club Card instead of punching in their parents? home phone number every time they bought the aforementioned KD. Still, this foray into semi-adulthood and permanent lack of parental supervision certainly made a few things obvious for myself, including (but not limited to) the fact that the mother I was so desperate to escape the clutches of was actually responsible for much of who I?ve become.
????????????????? After my parents divorced in the early 2000s, I lived primarily with my mum. I?m not going to sit here and pretend it was terrible. I had a happy childhood touched by very little conflict beyond the pubescent, hormone-fueled kind most of us have to grimly look back on with embarrassment.? You know, like the fights the occurred when your dad had to chaperone you and your best friends to a My Chemical Romance concert even though you knew your classmate was bringing her older, eyeliner-wearing brother and there was no way he was going to think you were cool with a parent lurking ten feet behind you. Was that just me? Maybe that was just me. ?Regardless, I look back now and realize most of the things that made my roll my eyes and stick the ?crazy? label on my mum have ultimately shaped the (obviously super cool) person I turned out to be.
Education? Yes, my mother had her entire hand in that pie. In a move with little meaning to my much younger self, my mother enrolled my younger sister and I in an ?alternative? (read: hippie) elementary school program, which emphasized the arts, self-directed learning, critical thinking, hands-on experiences, cultural diversity, and parental involvement. This meant we got to do a lot of cool stuff that was a little lost on me at the time: things like trips to the opera and ballet, and even meditation lessons were very common. (And also very cool in hindsight.) I would like to focus on the parental involvement aspect, because doesn?t every school-age kid love having their parents hang around their peer group? Parents were involved in lunchroom supervision, classroom activities, field trips, special events, and so forth. Hell, even my grandparents got involved. My Scottish grandparents once wore their kilts to my school to read my class traditional fairy tales during Reading Week. Yes, I was the girl with the grandfather in a skirt for a while afterwards.
My mother was very enthusiastically involved with a lot of our school programs. Most memorable of all was fourth grade, when my mother volunteered to teach a series of classes to the girls in my grade, as well as those in the fifth and sixth. Now what kind of class required a gender division? Yes, my mother indeed gave myself and all of my school friends some of our very first sex education lessons. My mum has worked for non-profit organizations that assist people with developmental disabilities for most of her life, and thus spent a certain amount of time teaching sex ed at these jobs. She had posters. She had charts. She had dolls with all the anatomical parts. And she showed them to my classmates. At the time, it was pretty mortifying.? Your mother may have been embarrassing, but I think it?s safe to assume she probably didn?t show up at your school to explain how condoms worked or what a tampon was for. But in hindsight, it was pretty damn cool that I had a mum open enough and willing to take time out of her full-time day job to teach a subject that makes most kids at that age giggle, blush, and/or cry. Oddly enough, my classmates actually thought my mum was pretty amazing. She can be quite funny and is good with people, to her credit. Most importantly, she stepped up to provide a really, really important set of knowledge for a group of kids who otherwise may never have learned it at home.
I, however, did plenty of learning at home thanks to my mother. We had, of course, many more sex talks over the years (which included timeless advice such as ?Don?t give blowjobs without getting something back! Even if they look like [insert name of current favourite band hottie here]!?). My mother instilled a very strong sense of health and wellness into her children, and beyond the sex talks this included physical health. I learned the importance of a healthy diet from this woman, enforced by years of home-cooked meals which I am so grateful for in a society bent on drowning their children in ?convenience? food. I helped cook quite often, and made my own lunches from the very first day of school. This left me with a lasting knowledge of food and nutrition I can safely say has carried me happily and healthily into adulthood (though no amount of whole wheat pasta or asparagus managed to carry me past 5 feet and an inch, unfortunately). Yes, the aforementioned Kraft Dinner is now a go-to hangover meal, despite the fact it was unseen in my house for many years growing up; however, I am perfectly capable of busting out a kickass dinner that includes all the food groups and a healthy dose of the green stuff (AKA spinach) for myself and my housemates on any given night. I like to think I?m the last stand between my boyfriend and scurvy.
Independence, especially financially, was something my mum has always emphasized. If my sister or I wanted something, we worked for it. I?ve had a huge range of jobs beginning from the time I was fourteen years-old for this reason, which have granted me skills from salesmanship to kitchen preparation to teaching English. When it came time for me to enroll at the University of Alberta, my mother steadfastly refused to pay for my education. Coming from Sherwood Park, this was almost unheard of amongst my peers. I was the only person I knew who was told they wouldn?t be outright handed the money for school. Instead, I was given a small school fund, and a promise for any money I needed at the time of tuition payment so long as I worked during the year to slowly pay them back in full. That sucked. I?ll admit I originally felt entitled to have my education paid for. But three years later I have a loan for school and financial independence from my parents, and I can honestly say I think I appreciate my education much, much more knowing it?s something I am working to earn for myself. Not to mention when I proudly accept my anthropology degree next year before scuttling off to my career as a barista/fry cook/trash lady, no one can claim I wasted my parents? money on a ?useless? education.
The trait I think I both cherish and credit my mother with most is my openness to others and to experience. My mum worked very hard to ensure we were raised in a home emphasizing the beauty and equality of every individual regardless of gender, sexuality, body type, race, ability, background, and all that good stuff. We?ve attended same-sex weddings. We?ve played respite family to children with developmental disabilities, both from loving homes and from the foster system. We attended culturally-diverse school programs from our preschool years, exposing us to the spectrum of backgrounds that Canadian children come from.? The combination of difference being so prevalent in our lives yet almost unacknowledged so as to make this diversity seem unworthy of questioning or conflict has culminated into two children with a stronger sense of worldliness and acceptance than I think even my mother has realized.
As I type this, my younger sister is texting me, bemoaning the kids in her high school social class and their apparent ignorance of First Nations history and current issues. That?s pretty cool! That?s a 17-year-old who has lived much of her life in a ?white bread? suburb of Edmonton which I know is notorious for breeding judgmental and blatantly racist mindsets amongst its children when it comes to minorities, and is willing to call out classmates on social inequity. I also feel this trait has brought me to my studies in anthropology. While it?s true that my emphasis lies in the osteological branch of this department, the backbone of any anthropological work is having an open and critical understanding of the culture in which the concept that you are studying comes from. And my friends, I can personally say I eat up this style of learning with a damn spoon. People everywhere are as fascinating as they are worthy of our acceptance and understanding, and my mother was the first one to show me that this is not an opinion but an absolute fact.
This Mother?s Day, I want you to go beyond your usual ?Gee Mum, thanks for changing my diapers and birthing me and all that!? shtick. I know they never let you forget it, but that?s boring. Give it a bit more thought, and come up with a couple ways your mother has indelibly marked the person you have become. Maybe you still live at home and your vision of this is clouded by having to go toe-to-toe with the woman over dirty dishes three times a week. Maybe you?re on your own and don?t visit your mum as much as nagging text messages say you should (guilty!). Maybe you never knew your mother, in which case feel free to apply this to whomever you intend to celebrate May 12th with. Whatever your relationship with yo? mama is, take the time (or 1700+ words if you?re feeling as verbose as I was) and remember that you?d be a little less awesome without her.
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