The Particle

The Particle
Carol St. Ann

Blog City Prompt: March 5: You get to spend one hour with any person you choose – living or dead. Who is it? What do you talk about? What do you hope to learn from them?

I have to acknowledge the answer to this question changes with what is in my mind and heart at any given moment in time. My typical answers oscillate between Buddha, Muhammad, Jesus of Nazareth, so I may learn; and my mother, who plucked me from the system and adopted me when no one else wanted me, because I will never stop missing her.

I dream of telling her how much she meant to me. How often I think of her, and, now that I have a teenager who’s so much like me, how sorry I am for my teenage transgressions and antics. I’d tell her how I miss her smile and how I close my eyes every now and then, just to see it in my mind’s eye.

I’d thank her for teaching me responsibility by insisting chores and homework come before play. For giving me an allowance to teach me finances and the satisfaction of achievement and working for what I want, thus showing the value of time to decide if what I wanted was really worth wanting. For showing kindness and generosity to everyone, so I could learn by watching her. For never hiding tears or laughter, so none of us would ever feel left out and the lessons of compassion and sharing could take their rightful place within our own lifetimes. For her wisdom in knowing everything is a lesson to be taught to small ones and that, as a momma bird, it would one day be her duty to kick us out of the nest and watch us fly. I’d tell her I know, now, that because she put so much into being all she could be as a mother, her children soar. And before I let her go, I dream of telling her once again I love her, I’ve always loved her, and I know God intended, all along, for me to be her child even though He chose, for some unknown reason, to send me through a different vessel. I thank Him every day for her.

On another day, that would be my answer. But today, my answer to this question is:

I'd like to meet my birth mother. I'd like to know what she's like. I'd like to lay eyes on her, just once, and watch for any resemblance, any hint of similarity or familiarity. I'd like to know if she ever thought of me, wondered whatever happened to me.

I'd like to get to know her in that hour, and just before she leaves me forever again, I'd like to tell her I forgive her. Because I do. But there is that one teensy, microscopic particle of anger that stays with me, and still makes me feel small. Not small, like a child; small like insignificant, disposable. If I could look into her eyes, no matter what's there, and say the words, "I forgive you," I know that seemingly cliché gesture would expunge the black particle forever. And this time, when I bury the hatchet, I won't put up a grave marker.

--Carol St. Ann
2014