DEAR MOM
Childhood; our roots
The legitimate foundation of the rest of lives—what does this mean for us?
Do we truly have control over who we are meant to become or do we become who we inevitably become because of some small moment in our adolescence that engendered a change in our psyche. A monumental one that we will never truly understand, or quite frankly ever remember.
Did the absence of a father create my inability to connect with another human being because I myself felt rejection at an impressionable age?
What would have changed if I knew the stability of a home, one filled with the love of two parents rather than inside the contemptuous vault of one?
Would I have grown any differently? Would I be the same person? Am I Inherently me, or did I become this version of myself because of circumstance?
Through the valley of darkness, and floods of water, new life emerges—once repressed, always breathing, the sun hits my skin, and I feel new. Not remembering what once was or what could have been.
Free of a love that contained me—I bloomed into who I truly think I am meant to be.
But, I can’t help but wonder if my mother’s love was nothing but a mockery of it’s true form—living in the likeness, a shadow, an outline—following a step-by-step guide on how to feed but never nourish.
Nourishment—beyond sustenance—beyond substance. Truly being fulfilled and taken care of in the unconditional form of love. Love that a mother should feel toward the being she grew inside of her own body. Giving part of herself for me to live, for me to breathe.
How do you watch what you created, what you brought to life die away, when the only thing they ever knew was you?
How do you turn your back on a child disguised as a man—a man who carries around the hurt that his physical childhood left on him?
A man who cannot help but feel as if neither one of his parents loved him, but only loved the attachment it permanently created between the two of them.
Forever the result of young love—I am the reminder of what modern day star-crossed lovers produce. A garden once bountiful, full of life becomes something no one but me can understand.
I am the scarecrow, and you both are crows, vying for the crops below me. One of you on either side of me. Picking away slowly, thinking that I don’t notice, but in all actuality, no one is there. The scarecrow is void of emotion. A standing image of a man. The scarecrow was nothing but a decoy, to keep two birds together but apart feeding in the same crops that I was meant To protect.
As the cold night rolls in, and the love, that was always one-sided, washes away, do we continue to hang on to what could have been, or do we relish in the light of what we did have?
I watch the life you brought to fruition come to an end in the form of a misunderstanding and a undying need to protect my family.
As the leaves fall back, and I begin to see the once veiled truth, I realize my place in your life. I see you for who you really are, but, through self-imposed blinders, you will never see who I really am. You’ll only see who I was told I couldn’t be and how I didn’t turn into who I was told to become. You’ll always remember the me that wanted to be loved so bad that he in fact became unloveable.
While you withered away and forgot about the culpability of your actions—the actions that brought me into this world—I became me. Abandoned. Left to die.
So selfishly, did you cast me aside when a new model arrived, and with each passing year I slowly turned my back on the only foundation I ever knew to create a fresh one.
By severing the umbilical cord that attached me to you, I replanted myself. Maybe one day you’ll see the fruits of my labor, but for now, I must focus on loving myself.
To grow.
To bloom.
To become.
Overcoming the barricades that were once firmly etched into the stones of my mind, I plant my roots and wait to see what I bring to life away from you.
JACOB C. SCOTT