Mama's Help

Saturday, June 20, 2009 

Sometimes I make stupid choices.  Really really stupid choices.  Tonight would be one of those.  I thought I could divorce sex from love, could approach a relationship like a man does.  Get my needs met without the emotional entanglement I am prone to.  Turns out I was wrong.  Lesson learned.  Moving on.  Now patiently waiting for someone who deserves me.   I trudge up the hill to Mama’s shack.  Has it always been uphill or is it just my state of mind that makes it a climb in unbearable heat.  Puffing and sweating when I get there, she is out in the bean field her yellow head wrap glowing against a cloudless blue sky.  Mama waves me out to join her.  When I get there she looks at me, says not one word, no hug, just hands me a hoe and points to a row of beans overrun with weeds.  I nod and walk toward my assigned place.  It occurs to me that the bean plants are always about the same size – never smaller, never larger.  And I wonder are the beans a metaphor for something else?   I begin, catching the weeds with the blade of the hoe and tossing them into a pile taking extreme care not to uproot or chop off the beans in the process.  Soon I am puffing and sweating again.  I strip off my shirt to let my skin cool in the non-existant breeze.  Uncomfortable in the heat, but I labor on thru the weeds.  Are they multiplying?   I slip into a mindless rhythm of work.  Mama’s song swings in over my shoulder and annoys me like a horse fly biting me over and over.  That agitation grows into anger and frustration and soon I am beating my hoe into the earth mindless of where the blade falls or what destruction it causes.  Mama gently removes the hoe from my hands and I collapse into the field weeping.  My eyes fall on the rows and rows of uprooted and destroyed beans and I weep even harder.  What have I done?  Ashamed, head in hands I cry myself out.    When I look up I see Mama gently picking thru the displaced beans discarding some and tucking others back into the chaotically turned ground.  She turns to me and smiles like only Mama can.  A smile like that hot summer sun.  I smile back weakly.  I see myself for a moment thru her eyes – this forlorn woman-child sitting in the mud her tears have made.  Dirty. Rivers the sweat has cut thru the dirt that coats her face.  She comes over and sits down beside me there in the mud.    Now chile, take dees an finish what yo start.     She reaches for my blistered palm and pours into it a mound of seeds.  Closing the seeds tightly into my fist I make to get up, but Mama stops me.   Whachoo doin to dem seed?  Dey not be needin t be treated like dat.  You treat dem wit love chile or dey not grow fer you.   I relax my grip, get up and kneel at the beginning of my path of destruction.  I cup the seeds to my heart and whisper of love and gratitude, of compassion and kindness, of respect and honesty and I begin to send them home one by one as I continue a pilgrim on my knees before them seeking forgiveness.  I pat the last one gently into place and cannot help but feel better.    I return to where Mama is sitting still in the mud happily humming and squishing it between her hands.    Sit down chile.  Dis sum good mud heyah yo made.    As I take my place next to her, she pats my cheek lovingly with her muddy hand.  I laugh - a sound clear and full of joy.    Dat betta.  Mama like de heyah yo laugh.  It make Mama heart laugh.  So why you come vis’t Mama t’day?    Even though I know she knows, I tell her anyway.  She nods thru my entire story.  Not one whisper of judgment on her face throughout.    Good.  Now tell Mama.  How you feel about dat man when yo meet him?   That he was a good man.  Smart.  Funny.  Listened well.  Made good conversation.  Lots of interesting life experience.   What es?    I know from her look that she wants to hear the other things too.  So I continue   That he was selfish.  That there was no connection between us.  No spark.   Um hun…..den why you do dat?   I don’t know.   Mama’s eyes drill into my skull looking for the truth.  Wanting me to find that truth.  To speak it.   The words tumble out that hole….Because I was afraid.  Because I was alone again.  Because I lost my vision.  Because I doubted love.  Because I hurt.  And because I thought if I could do this, those things would go away.   An did dey?   No Mama they didn’t.    Dey nevah do chile.  Now come ova heyah an let Mama love on yo.    I crawl into her lap like the lost girl child I feel and let her rock me there down into the mud.    Yo know Mama talk de yo always.  Yeah?  I nod.    Did you heyah what Mama say ‘bout dis man and whachoo plannin on doin wit him?  I nod again.   Mebbe nex time yo trus Mama moah.  She see and know what bes for yo.  She love yo.  I nod.    Now, you member wha Mama tole yo ‘bout whos comin?   I nod.  I remember the vision of the shiny black wolf who is to be my companion.  Mama nods her head across the bean field and there he sits watching me.  Absolutely still.  My heart aches for him to be here now.   He wait fo yo too.  He always sniffin round Mama’s house lookin for yo.    An uncomfortable thought passes thru my head.  Mama does he know?   Yes chile.  He know.   I feel the blush of shame that he has seen my selfishness.  Mama senses the shift in me.   None of dat now.  ‘Magine dat yo waitin fo him.  Whachoo feel if yo sees him do what yo done?   I hurt for him.  I want to comfort him and make the pain go away.    Yup.  Dat how he feel too.   I look across the field again.  He is still watching me.  Is it my imagination or is there a sadness there that I didn’t see before.    Like yo he know how de f’give too.  Yo know when he comin an who he is cuz  Mama tell yo.  Same way she tell yo always.  Dis time yo lissen.  I nod. Yo done hoed up dat bad stuff.  Yo let dat go.  Mama save what she could.  Yo plant dem new seeds.  Dey need time de grow. Now, he been waitin’ fo yo all day.  Yo go over der and have fun.   I hug her and bound off morphing as I fly thru the bean field toward my mate forgiven and whole again.