It's My Mom's Birthday

My mom and I do not have a simple relationship. I’m not sure if any mother-daughter dynamic can be quite categorized as simple, but our complexities run deep; several generations deep, spanning multiple cities and continents, traversing different cultures and languages. Who we are to each other is defined by the women of our bloodline who have come before us, the products of the decisions they have made that have ultimately brought us to this timeline. My mother and I do not have a simple relationship, but I would not be the woman I am today without understanding how to navigate this sort of rapport.

I ask my mom every year what she wants for her birthday. She always replies with the same answer: “I want to spend time with you, with your sister, with my family. I have all that I need.” And she’ll always throw in the occasional ask for me to play my violin one more time for her. It’s a seemingly simple ask, but somehow it still becomes a tricky situation for me to figure out. As an avid physical gift-giver, my presence as a present never seems enough to me. She deserves more. But that’s the thing; she knows that. Of course, she does. As a mother, you can give her the whole world, all the stars in the sky, you can try to take away the burden of motherhood, but still, it will never be enough to repay all that she has sacrificed to mold her children into standup citizens. 

I see myself in my mom. Sometimes as the maternal figure in my life. She comes out in me when I arrive places ten minutes early. I see myself in her when I bring grapes to my friend's houses because you never show up anywhere empty-handed. She’s in the noodles at my birthday party, the candle wax dripping down empty wine bottles, and the stacks of plastic cups and utensils and refreshments because my mom is anything but a damn good hostess. She is my alarm clock for all of my early mornings, instilling a sense of self-discipline, that relying on motivation is not sustainable. She makes me believe that I can do hard things. 

I see myself in my mom, but not always as the woman she is today. I see myself in her when she was just a little girl, the person who had yet to experience the world she lives in today. I see her tenacity in myself, channeling her passion whenever I am faced with a challenge. She never backs down from a fight. Even when she may struggle to find the right words to clearly communicate her thoughts in a language other than her native tongue, she will never give up. As many times as she is told to lower her voice, she demands to be heard. She tells us the story of her fighting someone when they stole her seat at a movie screening, and I catch glimpses of myself in that little girl. 

I am not always the woman my mother hopes I am. We are both hard-headed, quick to emotions, and sensitive about everything. My mother may just be the person I am most comfortable around, but that also means I tend to take my anger out on her, snippy and sharp-tongued around her, even when I don’t mean it. I recognize it at the moment, I realize as I’m doing it, yet I can never seem to bring myself to apologize, guilt clamping my lips shut. But she always knows. She knows how I feel before I even do, and she forgives me even when I don’t apologize. I hope that as I grow older, I will become half the woman that she is today. 

My mom and I do not have a simple relationship. I would not say that we are best friends. No, that is not quite how we coexist. As a child, a teenager, I pushed her away, refused her love, struggled to come to terms with our relationship. These conflicts, rooted in my immaturity but also generational trauma and the inability to communicate across cultures, almost created an estranged tie for me to my mother. Growing up, I did not ever think I would ever come to peace with my mother, believing that we would forever clash in our opinions and beliefs. But my mom always knew. She showed me grace, she was patient, she was kind. She gave me room to grow without ever feeling like I couldn’t reach out to her when I needed it. I can not fathom the hardships, the emotional turmoil she endured by raising me with empathy and altruism when I was anything but that. I will forever regret not reciprocating the love and benevolence she continuously expressed to me.

My mother is my guiding light, my mentor, my confidant. I may not be religious anymore, but I will continue to pray to God to make sure the world is not too harsh on her. I hope that life will once again treat her not as the toughened tiger mom she is, but as a little girl once again, that each day is filled with devotion and joy, a tender purity. 

Happy Birthday, Mom.