Mama sent me money through Zelle as a Mama’s Day gift, then told me to get up.
”Come on, let's go look at some plants.”
I groaned and rolled over. Half of my body on fire from pain and the other half still sleep after a long flight delay that got me in around 2am. But mama knows what standing in a field of flowers, whether on the side of the road or in a garden center, does to my spirit.
I once wrote, “my mother didn’t give me scars, she gave me a garden.” and it is true.
She knows me.
Made me.
Poiesis.
Her body,
Weaved together skin and bone
Blood and water
With my vibrant spirit that existed beyond time.
Mama made magic with me.
She knows me.
So we went.
Got lost in the aisles of a Lowes garden center. Gushing over all the depth of colors and my favorite hibiscus and hydrangeas and wondering where I could place them on the patio outside my office. I noticed my breath with each flower. The slow gait I found peaceful rhythm with. I was in another world, one made just for me. Mama did that. She knows me. Gives me gardens.
I came upon a purple arrangement reminding me of grandma.
Purple was Grandma’s favorite color. I picked it up immediately and held it to my chest. Eyes closed, breathing in and smiling. “Hi, Grandma,” I said. Then I asked the plant if it wanted to come home and live with us. “You’ll have lots of siblings and I will love you as long as you are here.” Receiving confirmation in spirit, I headed to the register to check out.
“I will love you as long as you are here.” here in our home, here in my spirit, here in this world. A love given freely with ease.
“I love this way cause I got it as a kid, with so much to give from it, I never hid” -Common
I was born into a legacy of love. Folks talk a lot about generational wealth and often leave out the spiritual and emotional wealth. What good is the money when the love ain’t big? When the hugs aren’t plenty and the laughter loud? The understanding deep and the tears always wiped? We know love. I was born into a lineage of women who loved one another well. Men who loved well too. Activated emotional intelligence and courage to grow, to heal, to move in the direction of their greatest good. Where they would be loved well for all the loving they created and gave.
I was born into a legacy of love. Mama loves me the way she does because of how Grandma loved her. Two women willing to learn, to apologize to their young and adult children without hesitation, to evolve, to love without condition, women I witnessed sit at each others feet. Women who sit at mine and love beyond recognition.
Grandma had no in house model. She actually made it up. Her mother died during childbirth and as Grandma grew, she loved more and more with an open heart. Grandma is my model of heart purification work. She knew that an open heart was the way forward in all things, especially to mother, not just the 10 children she raised, but the community. Grandma mothered communities. Mama did/does too, thousands of children and adults throughout her career and in her personal life. Always adopting my friends and partners, no questions asked.
That will also be my own legacy: I mother communities. Generations will call me blessed.
A sister friend called today and left me a message saying, “Happy Mother’s Day sis for the love you give to Toni and because you are a mother to a villages of people, you teach people how to care well.”
Which has me thinking a lot about what feminist ethicists have said on mothering and on care, which will have to be a podcast episode after while :-) There is something to be said about those of us who naturally offer a particular kind of love. Got me thinking about what it means to be an “other mother” and the time a friend thanked me for being the grandmother she never had. What space is created for those who need mamas? Ones who were not born into a legacy of love?
I have wanted to adopt an older child for at least 15 years now. A deep desire that I know is a God thing and something I am getting closer to as the years pass and my life settles into a beautiful order. I’ve had men ask me over the years why I didn’t want my “own child” like that child wouldn’t be mine. I respond every time that there are people who need mamas, people who need families, people who need love, no matter how old they are or who they were born to. Can you identify spaces in your life where you are offering up big love and deep nurturing to those who do not have the traditional relationships and spaces to provide it?
I do not know when that child will come into my life, but one day we will meet and they will ask me if they can call me mama. I will say yes, “You’ll have lots of plant and animal siblings and I will love you as long as you are here in this world and beyond.”
The rest of Mother’s Day Weekend, I got to spend with my godparents several hours away. While driving to see them, I asked my mama why she did something and she responded,
“Joselyn, you know me. You have studied me. You know your mother.”
It surprised me.
Mama said I know her because I have studied her. She believes I have taken the time to understand her from the moment my limbs rested against the inside of her body to the present moment of sitting 6 feet away in solidarity with remaining safe after me traveling through multiple airports (we still in a pandemic, baby).
Mama knows me because she made me. I know her because I have studied. I’d like to say, she knows me now because she studies me, and I know her now because my existence in her world has made her the version of mama she is. A weaving back and forth of who I’ve become and how the world unfolds. Poieisis.
As this year is my first Mother’s Day with Toni, we started talking about my mothering journey and the way that I am a different mom to Toni than I was to Nyia. I said, “I am very aware of how different it is, because they are different types of daughters and I am a different woman today than I was 15 years ago.”
Mama said grandma used to say the same often. A woman with 10 children, having to be a different mother to each, delighting in being the kind of mother each child needed for their own needs. Although I am her only child, Mama, had to be a different mother to me in each season of my life + her life, too.
There is abundance there in the expansiveness. Then I see mothering as this act of being and becoming. A radical expression of love and care that is ongoing. It is indeed active even after transition. Like how Grandma’s prayers are still allowing my flowers to bloom.
Mama gave me a garden, grandma gave her one too and with our love, we keep on adding new blooms.
May I always do the same, for each living being I care for.
Happy Mother’s Day to all the living beings doing the act of mothering in traditional and non-traditional ways (by the way, who decides what is traditional?!). Your gift of nurturing, seeing, healing, taking care of business, showing up, professing, sacrificing, and protecting, impacts our entire world and I am grateful.
Grace and peace be with you always.
Thank you for reading.