My Mother’s Hands

I recently opened up my copy of Natalie Goldberg’s book Old Friend from Far Away (an excellent inspiration for memoir writing and full of freewriting prompts, btw) to a random page and was instructed to write about my mother’s hands. So I did.

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My mother’s hands gripped the sparkley seat of my pink Schwinn, my first bicycle passed down from my big sister.  She walked along beside me, then jogged, as I gained

My mom and me, 1977

my own balance in the Washington School parking lot and, for a moment, felt what it was like to glide on my own.

I fell then, the handlebars reaching into my stomach, the pain tear-jerking, breath-taking, soul-deep, like falling off a swing right when you mean to leap.

I cried and she held me,  then helped me back onto the bike and gripped the seat once again, jogging slowly alongside me until I achieved a steadiness I didn’t even know was my own until I felt the space between us widening with every pump of my legs.

This is parenting, I suppose.  Holding the seat of your kid’s bike until she can do it on her own, picking her up and kissing the parts that will bruise when she falls.  Opening your arms again and again for her return, no matter how far she wanders.

My mom is a master at this. This dance of holding and release. Her door is always open, her guest bed always made, chocolate and spare toothbrushes at its side.  We are always welcome. Welcome to stay for a day or six months. And we are always free. Invited by the soothing promise of her gentle grip to glide wherever our hearts my take us.

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