In William Faulkner’s “As I Lay Dying,” an entire chapter is composed of only five words: My mother is a fish.
“My mother is a fish,” said Vardaman Bundren of the decomposing corpse in her pretty box which slipped and slid through the water. “My mother is a horse,” said her bastard son of the voiceless, voiceless adulteress. I am sure some brilliant literary figure could tell you what these statements mean, but I could not say other than that they clearly do not know who their mothers are or they are searching for a mother that they do not have any longer.
My mother is a blonde, blue-eyed, daughter of Americans. When I told my professor this in week four of my first semester of college, she told me the woman I described is not my mother. She stared at me like I had told her a lie. Samantha Futerman’s mother said the social worker was lying to her and her child did not exist. It seems rather foolish to say that you never had any kids when in actuality you had two of them and somehow the fact that they were twins fell through all the cracks on the reports, but shame makes people do incomprehensible things.
I imagine my mother would do the same. Rachel Rostad’s mother will not speak to her. I think these are some of the reasons why I have not attempted speaking to mine. The same professor told me that if I wanted to really go somewhere and ever succeed and find myself, I had better figure out where I came from.
I was case number 99604 from a woman who walked away. My mother was an office worker, she had a mother, she had five siblings, she knew her horoscope, she drank 500cc of beer several times a month, she had no father, not of her own or for her child, she shares my blood. My mother was, but no longer is.
Jodi Picoult questions, “If you have a sister and she dies, do you stop saying you have one? Or are you always a sister, even when the other half of the equation is gone?” Does a relationship continue, even if what makes it complete is no more?
If you have a daughter and then say she is a lie, are you still a mother?
She could walk by me on the streets. She could read my name. She could see my face. But she would not know it was me. Here is what she knows about me: Nothing. To her, I am as lifeless as a coffin-contained corpse. She is the same to me.
My mother is a blonde, blue-eyed, daughter of Americans. Her favorite color is blue, she grew up in a bakery, she does not share my blood, she did not walk away. She was not, but now she is.
And to my professor who believed me to be delusional? My utmost contempt to you.
