MARCH 20, 2000

     It's the first day of spring.  It is also the day, 47 years ago, that my mother and father married.  That fact was the first thing i thought of this morning while waking up.  i was stretched out on my back with Master's hand resting on the upper inner edge of my thigh, His arm across my belly.  i was hyper-aware of the skin contact, especially on my stomach, and because of the day, my mind drifted to the fact that my mother had been 3 months pregnant all those years ago. 

     i imagined how it must have felt for her, waking up and lying quietly in her bed, knowing that there was a baby growing inside her, and that before the day was over she would be married to its father.  And how it must have felt given that she had turned 16 only two months before.  A very socially unacceptable position to be in, back in 1953.  

     At 3:00 p.m. she stood in front of a very disgruntled priest in the office of what i refer to as the "priest's house"*, in a dark blue calf length dress.  As He breezed quickly through the necessary vows, she listened to the sounds of her friends as they visited in the yard of the Catholic schoolyard next door.  A school she had belonged to only a week before.  

     What must that have felt like?  Was she happy because she believed she was in love with my father?  Was she afraid?  Or was she doing "the right thing" because she thought she had to?  i asked her, long ago, these questions, but her answers always focused on the fact that she could hear her friends next door.  i think she had regrets.

     i think i need to unpack the photo album that holds the picture of her, all those year ago.  

     i have such ambivalent feelings about that woman.

shadoe 

*(i can't think of the proper name!)