PostPoems Be Artistic. Be Creative. Be Inspired!

My mother used to say that I had my "head buried in the sand" because I didn't watch the news or read about news or care about politics or worldly affairs or what the neighbors were doing or show any concern for whatever local, national or global drama she was currently caught up in. What was her interest in my level of disinterest? Misery loves company? My father was not the sort of person who voiced opinions overtly though he was very attached to news outlets & politics (and still is). It wasn't until my mother died that he became vocal on such matters, though not nearly as passionate as she was. She would get so wound up (dad called it "in a tizzy") that she would eventually land in bed for a few days, then start the process all over again. When she was diagnosed terminal, I asked her to come live with me away from the world in the peace & quiet of the outback. She said "No way, you don't have TV." 

Such was her addiction to turmoil. Her attachment to "the way things should be" kept her from accepting the way things are. That needlepoint rendering of the Serenity Prayer hanging in the recroom was more affectation than a call to practice. When I think about it now I realize my mother couldn't look past her judgements to see that it wasn't that I didn't care, it was that I cared too much and the reports of life on planet Earth and of how humans treated each other stuck to me like glue and stayed with me far too long, sending me into despair. My abstention was actually self-preservation.  

Of course none of this is relevant anymore but that it serves to witness. It isn't for me to speculate what my mother's ego motivations were, only what, provided by her example, I do not want to be.