Quinn Flores’s Family Journal
My feelings of closeness with my mom dissipated in my childhood. In fact, whenever anyone has asked me if I were close with my mom, I always answered, “No. Never.” I always felt that she loved her cat Toonces more than she loved me.
It was only when writing yesterday’s journal entry that I remembered those long-buried feelings of closeness with my mom. So I have a more nuanced answer the next time someone asks: “We were close in my infancy and early childhood, but our relationship became strained as I grew older.”
And I still feel she loved Toonces best.
I was lucky that my grandma Nicki was part of our home. Grandma Nicki was one of those rare individuals who love everyone the best, and that everyone included me.
She really stepped up to fill Mom’s role, when Mom wasn’t available or able to be there for me. It was Grandma Nicki who helped me with homework, encouraged me as I earned scouting badges, watched me experiment with the chemistry set, and listened to me.
My grandmas Nicki and Asuka married each other when I was in grade school, and they held the wedding in our back garden.
I still remember how magically storybook it seemed.
The garden filled with the scent of lavender, and a soft breeze blew up from the bay.
My grandmas were so tender with each other. I just soaked up the feelings. I didn’t imagine myself getting married one day, but I imagined being loved like that. I imagined that the way Dad loved me, the way my grandmas loved each other, and the way I loved all of them was enough–that this amount of love was enough to overcome anyone else who might not always be feeling loving to me.
As I write this now, I realize that I was suffering from my mom’s emotional abuse and neglect. At the time, I was just looking for something to fill the hole and ease the pain, and all this abundance of love around me seemed that it might hold the power to do that.
And maybe it even did. At least it let me feel that I was loved, even if not by my mom.
I remember that night that Mom seemed happy, though she turned away from the ceremony.
The cake was bigger than me, and the icing was so fancy. It was marsipan, and I snacked on it for days and days after. I remember these tiny gold leaves that I would peal off, like eating enchantments.
My mom was still in college, still captain of the gaming team, still practicing her violin every spare hour. I used to love to find my parents on their computers down in the great room. I’d hop on my little computer and play the spelling game or Arith-mo-tack, and I’d listen, all the while, for tiny openings where I might say something funny. My dad would always laugh, even when my jokes fell flat, but now and then, I’d sneak in a good one that even made Mom laugh, and at those times, I could pretend that we were a happy family.
And maybe sometimes we were. I remember one evening when Mom came home victorious from a gaming competition, and Dad had made hot veggie soup for supper, and while Grandma Nicki played the violin across the room, the three of us laughed over our meal. Those were happy times.
As soon as my mom finished eating, she went to her violin. Grandma Nicki stopped playing, of course, because Mom always took preeminence when it came to music. And for the rest of the evening, Mom was in her music. Sometimes, I felt that she was lost to us when she played, for the music absorbed all of her, every ounce of her essence. But other times, when I could settle myself to really listen, I discovered that we could move inside of her music, too. It wasn’t that she was communicating with us through that–for her music was always self-absorbed–but it was that we were allowed to come inside of it, to come in and share with the deepest parts of her. I wouldn’t say that I felt close to her when she played, but I would say that I felt awed, moved, and transported into realms I’ve never been able to access on my own.
I spent a lot of time alone, being the only kid in a home of four grown-ups. I remember that I loved writing. I had a journal that I filled with fairy tales that I made up.
Most of them involved a brave young prince or princess (that would be me) and a beautiful yet terrifying witch-queen (that would be my mom).
I’ve written about the good times, so far. But those are the rarer memories. More frequent, and carrying far greater weight, are the memories of how my mom would often interact with me. I try not to remember the words she would say, but I cannot erase the memory of her face as she would say those words.
It would always seem to come out of nowhere. Maybe I had just set the table. Maybe I had washed the dishes. Maybe I had finished my homework. I don’t remember ever doing anything bad–these attacks always came after I’d done something good, something a good kid was supposed to do. And sometimes they even came after times when we were starting to share feelings of closeness.
Then she would attack.
My grandma Nicki told me that she’d always been like that. And she was that way with Grandma Nicki and my dad, too. It used to break my heart when she would attack Dad like that because the look on his face after seemed so bereft. Grandma Nicki told me about Mom’s childhood, how she’d lost her whole family, even a twin sister, during a house fire. Grandma Nicki adopted her after that.
Grandma Nicki said that she noticed that whenever Mom would start to get very close to someone, she would lash out–a form of protection, Grandma Nicki said. I didn’t understand that as a kid.
All I understood was that it was best not to get too close to my mom. Don’t let her see me do anything that she might feel proud of. Don’t share anything with her. Don’t ask for affection, don’t express it, don’t expect it. Create a distance.
If you don’t get too close, maybe you won’t get hurt.
Cathy Tea's SimLit Anthology 