You Poor Little Thing
“My mother has died.” . . .
“Sacred Jesus.” Marie-Joseph crossed herself before taking Catherine’s hand in both hers. “You poor little thing.” Forty-nine years old, and that was exactly how Catherine felt.
36 years old and I feel the same way as Catherine, the protagonist from Rosy Thornton’s novel The Tapestry of Love. I keep thinking I should not be this blown over. I am an adult woman who has lived away from home for almost 20 years. I have owned a house, lived all over the country, been married, been divorced. And yet still, I miss my mommy.
Maybe it’s that I didn’t have kids while she was alive and so wanted to see her as a grandmother and have her teach me what it is to be a mother. Maybe it’s that life – as she once told me – seems to be “full of waiting” still. Maybe it’s that I’m here in her house at Christmas. Maybe . . .
Or maybe it’s that she was the single most important woman in my life, the person who taught me how to live in a world that is sometimes bitterly cruel and sometimes stunningly beautiful.
So I think I must learn to let myself feel like a “poor little thing” for a little while. I need to just let myself miss my mommy.
