for the past two years, i have been directing a documentary that celebrates those who have chosen to stand up to the myriad challenges of life, who take each difficulty and turn it into an opportunity...people who walk the path of a hero. my mother is one of the interviewees. she was chosen, not because she is the director’s mother, but because she is, by any application of the definition, a hero in her own life.
she was third of nine in a working class white southern family, whose father was only home long enough to procreate and punish, whose mother loved and spanked with equal conviction, whose oldest sister patiently shared the responsibility of raising 8 willful children.
she dreamed of leaving the tiny carolina town, of living in a place that could hold her defiant energy, of singing, of finding her light. in her travels, she met her famous mate, and they moved to the biggest city in the world, where she lived in his light and, years later, brought me in to live there, too.
he took her around the world and to the white house. we reveled in the rarefied air of celebrity, and swirled in the dark and drunken world of underappreciated genius. the three of us, with all our love and good humor, were an easy match for the glamour, but not for the dysfunction. they loved and fought and loved and wept. was this the drama of which she’d dreamed?
she ran with him, me in tow, from metropolis to mountain, from mountain to prairie, and back to the start, stopping only to lick wounds and locate the joy amidst the madness. it took years, and one more move, to rebuild lives that had been pummeled by choice and circumstance.
she never left, though she threatened. she made mistakes, no more or less than any good human being. but she loved as unconditionally as a woman can love, and when he died at too young an age, at the shimmering edge of hard-earned peace and fresh promise, she crumbled before she could find her way on her own.
through the constant challenges, with the hidden blessings of illness and loss, in conscious surrender to prevailing forces, she accessed her original strength, tapped into a will forged in the fires of this relentless life, and she has found her own brilliant light.
so, she is a hero, though she will not accept the laurel. she is my hero. i am ever grateful to have joined her on this journey, and ever proud to be her daughter.
she was third of nine in a working class white southern family, whose father was only home long enough to procreate and punish, whose mother loved and spanked with equal conviction, whose oldest sister patiently shared the responsibility of raising 8 willful children.
she dreamed of leaving the tiny carolina town, of living in a place that could hold her defiant energy, of singing, of finding her light. in her travels, she met her famous mate, and they moved to the biggest city in the world, where she lived in his light and, years later, brought me in to live there, too.
he took her around the world and to the white house. we reveled in the rarefied air of celebrity, and swirled in the dark and drunken world of underappreciated genius. the three of us, with all our love and good humor, were an easy match for the glamour, but not for the dysfunction. they loved and fought and loved and wept. was this the drama of which she’d dreamed?
she ran with him, me in tow, from metropolis to mountain, from mountain to prairie, and back to the start, stopping only to lick wounds and locate the joy amidst the madness. it took years, and one more move, to rebuild lives that had been pummeled by choice and circumstance.
she never left, though she threatened. she made mistakes, no more or less than any good human being. but she loved as unconditionally as a woman can love, and when he died at too young an age, at the shimmering edge of hard-earned peace and fresh promise, she crumbled before she could find her way on her own.
through the constant challenges, with the hidden blessings of illness and loss, in conscious surrender to prevailing forces, she accessed her original strength, tapped into a will forged in the fires of this relentless life, and she has found her own brilliant light.
so, she is a hero, though she will not accept the laurel. she is my hero. i am ever grateful to have joined her on this journey, and ever proud to be her daughter.
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