Mother

So ask me who my girlhood heroine is? I thought that it would be a simple answer, but there were so many! As a young Pacific island female there are no shortages of strong female role models. But I think you can never get past the first female that you will meet in your life. They have written books about this you know, and they are not hakunamatata bambi warm and fuzzies. Here is to my heroine! (And I bet Freud’s too!)

TO WARTS AND ALL!

Mothers are a paradox, she is the bane of my existence yet the due of my very existence is one half hers — and she knows it.

My mother is bipolar, she has brought up 5 children, she is the grandmother of 7 grandchildren, and great-grandmother of 6.

She has maintained her passion for art and as an artist has always been wise enough to know herself apart from being a daughter, wife, mother, grandmother and great-grandmother.

She has shamed me, nursed me, pained me, held me, hurt me, and of course loved me. But hers has never been an unconditional love, her love comes with conditions; it was to be hard, original, and exceptional nothing else will do.

Who was my childhood heroine?
Who has taught me?
How can the bane of my existence be my heroine?
I think I just answered my own question.

-Solema T.

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