Growing Up Hilt

I am becoming my mother. I can see her in me as clearly as I can recognize my children–clearer, really. I look at photographs of me taken when I think that I look just like me, and I see my mother smiling back. In church one day my son traces the veins on the back of my hand. The skin on my hands has begun to thin and the blue veins are showing through. When he does it, I see my mother’s hands, not mine. It’s my manicure and my jewelry on the end of my arms, but these are clearly my mother’s hands. I remember tracing the prominent blue veins on the back of my mother’s hands while sitting in church in my childhood.  

Becoming my mother used to scare me. I remember as a teenager thinking that my mother was awful. We called her “The Dragon Lady”—we did, I’m ashamed to admit. I always swore that I would never, ever be like my mother…no matter what! In many of the important ways I am not like my mother, yet I catch myself with a lot of her characteristics. 

Being Mother was not easy, I know now. Funny how much we figure out as we grow up and learn about life. I understand much about my mother that I never did. Now as I move through life with my mother by my side as often as we can be together, I know how blessed I am. I really like the woman that she has become. I am so proud she is my mother. I am also proud that I have become her in many ways. Often in my life I have felt like the adult in our relationship, and I do now as she has retired from major decisions and changes in her little, but important life.