The Mighty Viking

My Mother
did not give birth to me.
She arrived 18 months late for my birth.

She did not carry my developing body around in front of her – to the grocery store, to the park, the library, to work.  To the bathroom, to bed.  She did not lie in pain on the edge of a chair, waiting for me to get out.

 I did not drain her body of nourishment.

We did not share that battle of gestation together, that epic struggle that bonds mother and son together, that makes a mother nurturing, or fiercer than any living being when the need arises.  No, all that stuff was already in her.

She was sent when I needed her, when the one who had gone through all that could not continue. She took on a battle with no shield.  With no sword.  She took on the world for me.

She took on me.

There are easy things to love, and easy ways to do it.  Its fragrance is light and delicate, like the delicate garden flowers.

And then there is the love whose scent is of courage.

It takes courage to be someone‘s mother, when you have not given birth to him.  It takes the deepest bravery to look inside, and find the very best of yourself, and give that to your child – when he is not your child.

The things she looked inside for were yet unknown.  The love she committed to required experience she did not have.  And yet, she stepped in, and called me her own.  She gave me everything she had.  She somehow gave me more than everything she had.

She loved and endured this wild boy who could not stop.
She loved me all the way through that awful, petulant day when I tantrumed, “You‘re not my real mom!”
She guided me, prayed for me, taught me how to BE.
She loved me enough to let me BE, eventually, what I grew up to be.

My mother did not give birth to me.

She arrived when God sent her, right on time.