11-15-08 mom's service

this is what i read at my mom's service today:

To my mom,
I have known you for 30 years. That is a lot of time to cover and there is so much that’s happened, I can’t do it all justice here but I want to say some things to you in your passing.

There is a reason the first tattoo I got was a ‘mom’ tattoo.
It started out as a joke---I’d always liked the iconic tattoos—the anchors, etc—and joked around about getting a ‘mom’ tattoo like like I’d seen on the arms of men in photos or movies.
But the more I talked about it, and thought about it, the more it made perfect sense to me to have one.

‘I really love my mom’ I told my friends
‘she is one person I know I’m going to love forever—I won’t ever regret having her name permanently on my body’
but it was more than this—more than how much I loved you in the expected way a kid would love their mom. Even more than liking you as a person, which the older I got the more you became a friend to me.
It was the sense of connection I shared with you.

That’s something I have always felt extremely lucky for , and proud of, and I know not every kid feels with their mom. over my life you have been there for everything, much more than you wanted to at times, I’m sure. Every challenge in school, every break up, every major life decision I have trusted your judgement, your level headedness, your patience with me to help me feel like I was moving in the direction I was supposed to. It is really hard to imagine being without your guidance as you were always the person whose opionin I trusted most of all.

I know I was not an easy kid at all. I can understand why you didn’t have any others after me. And you didn’t have it easy while you were raising me. There were many years it was just us, and you worked full time—keeping other people on track and being the person to answer all the questions—while working on your phd and taking care of everything at home. And you barely had any help. Your family all far away, you really did it all yourself. you were more than just a mom—you mananged to fill in for other family who couldn’t be around for me.

One of the amazing things about you is that you just dealt with it. You took the situation as it was, and took me as I was, as difficult as I feel like that must have all been you never stopped or felt sorry for yourself.

With all the things we struggled with and ways it felt like we didn’t understand each other, thinking of it all now, I feel like you were the perfect mom for me to have in this lifetime.
I want to tell you why:

You never judged me. I brought to you all kinds of situations other parents would never have touched and you took it in.

When I told you , in high school, that I might be queer, you didn’t react harshly to me.
When I decidced I’d like to go to an art college, you stood behind me, even though I had no real plan of what I was doing or how I would support myself. You never doubted me. For all the calls to you during that time where I just wanted to drop out and didn’t know why I was even there, you just told me to keep going. I have spent my whole life doubting my abilities, my place in the world, my feelings, but you never have. You thought I could do anything, maybe even things you weren’t sure you could do. I don’t know where all this faith came from, but I am very lucky to know someone in my life has had that much belief in me.

When, about 5 years ago, I told you I might be transgender, and I was panicked about what that could mean, the first thing you said to me was ‘you don’t have to figure it all out today’

I know people whose parents don’t talk to them, don’t accept and don’t try to understand their kids for being so different from how they want them to be.
I asked you one time how it was you could be the way you were
And you said something like ‘I guess a lot of parents have these ideas of how their kids are going to turn out—getting married, having kids, things like that—and I just never had that with you’

your capacity to accept and love someone for who they were is amazing. I know it wasn’t just to me, your child, but it was your way with much of the world. All my friends I brought home for a holiday or just randomly, unexpected, no matter how much of an outsider they might have been otherwise they were treated the same way. You’d send them home with food and act like they had been around forever. You tried very much to understand me on all levels- you never tried to tell me how I should be in the world. You encouraged me to explore who I was and made it safe to do so.

I wish I could ask you what it was that made you want to have a child and how you managed to be able to let me be so much myself in the process. while the world has given me messages that art is not important or legitimate, you signed us up for art classes together. While I felt like I didn’t belong because of my sexuality you gave me magazine articles about gay kids in public schools. When I was struggling to accept myself as being transgender in a society where a lot of people don’t even know what that word means, you were coming with me to the trans health conference to learn more. You never made me feel guilty or wrong for how I was, even when I was down on myself. I’m not sure how it is you could love so openly but I am lucky to have experienced such an example first hand. And I know it extended beyond me, beyond my friends, to your friends, your co-workers, even people you barely knew. Your acceptance and your almost obsessive desire to give to people-time, energy, money, presents, whatever was needed, without wanting anything in return, are things I admire so much about you and feel awed by. I am really proud that I have had such a great example to follow. I know I have thanked you over the years for all you’ve done for me, but the feeling has always been beyond what I’ve been able to show you. i hope, in my lifetime, I can do half of what you have done for me and others in the 30 years I have been lucky enough to be your child.