Don't call me 'Junior'!

 

-I can remember the last time we had a drink together. I had a milkshake. but, we didn't talk, we've never talked. Only if you were a regular dad just like the other boy's dad, this would be different. 

-I was a wonderful father. Did I ever tell you to eat up, go to bed, wash your ears, do your homework? No, I respected your privacy and I taught you self reliance. 

After going through my past blog posts, I noticed that I talked a lot about my dad and my sister but not so much about my mom. My mom and I are quite similar: we're both determined, we're both intelligent, and we're both the incredibly spoiled first born children of our parents. So we would yell at each other a lot as you always dislike personality traits of yourself when you see them in others. Because she yelled at me a lot more than she did my sister, I assumed she didn't like me. As a child, I assumed that she and I weren't close at all as we didn't have the sort of relationship I had with my Dad. 

Though my dad was free and loose with his affection towards me and always being supportive, my mother was very reserved with her affection. 

I apparently look scarily a lot like her.

My mom believes in me but she wanted me to be able to go it alone if I had to. She was the safe point from which I could explore the world. When I had to present a poem I wrote to a huge audience at my school's assembly, my mom sat in the front row. As I motored through that 10 line poem, I finished and ran into the arms of my mom who just smiled and held me, knowing how nervous I was. When she was affectionate, it mattered to me. And she never doubted me. When I was worried that I'd never get into law school and later found out I got into 3 of the 5 I applied to, she laughed and said, "Was there ever any doubt?" 

However, my mom, not my dad, was the planter of the seeds for my love of films. All of my childhood favourites were put into our VCR by her. While my dad wanted me to watch movies like  A Little Mermaid, my mom would let me watch Batman, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, and all the Indiana Jones movies. The latter being the reason I got so interested in traveling (though I never really went anywhere until I was 16 and even then that was only to Vancouver).

My mother is also the only parent I have that understands my depression because she has gone through it too. As a teen, she went through the same difficult time I did. She told me recently that thoughts like that never really go away. It's always been a fear of mine that I will never get better. Robin Williams' death just unsettled me because he was 60 and couldn't beat it his shadows. I'm almost 30 and feel so tired thinking of another 50 or so years fighting mine.

I look at my mother though and see the strength she needs to deal with her trips to dialysis. Her strength to deal with an affliction that makes walking difficult. The strength to be tired all the time but still do what she needs to do. My mom has survived on nothing but her own determination and I look to her to see the kind of person I want to be. I want to be as strong as her.

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You left, just as you were becoming interesting. 

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I think my moving away from home was what brought my mother and I closer together. With the distance, we annoy each other less and enjoy each other's company more. Our relationship is never going to be the stereotypical mother and daughter thing but I like the way we are. We're like Drs Henry Jones Sr and Jr with me as the Indiana. Our relationship is better as a heartfelt action adventure than a sappy drama.

-They're trying to kill us!
-I KNOW, DAD