As I was sitting in the passenger seat of my mother’s car, each of us wearing a blouse, hers making her look smarter than ever and mine making me look like a little boy. Concentrating on our phones (yes, I really never got to figure out how mother could drive without ever actually looking at where she’s going, or sometimes, possibly crashing into), her phone and my phone beeping a song from the messages we were receiving, the sun from the east effortlessly peaked through the side of my mother’s silhouette. The wrinkle on her forehead. When did it appear? It’s like living in a beautiful home and one day, an extra window appeared on the wall. It bothers you. But it is there. That was when a million thoughts crashed into me like an unforgiving rush of the ocean’s waves.
Swallowed in my thoughts, I thought of the first time I ever saw my mother’s face. Of course that was when I was born, but I dug back into the first time I could ever remember seeing her face. It was when I was four years old, sitting on my bed. It’s weird. It is actually the first ever memory of mine. Even back then, I knew that it was my first. I don’t know, all I know is when the memory box of my brain decided to open up and let in each and every second of my life since then, my first thought was, “I love this woman.”
To be honest with you, it isn’t as heartwarming as it sounds. It was just a thought. A thought that sadly didn’t convert into a true feeling until I turned 18. Growing up, I never loved my mother. Pause, inhale. Yes, I said that. I never loved my own mother for the first 18 years of my life. For the whole first 18 years of my existence. My childhood, my teenage years, my most cherished years.
It was only 1 year since my first ever thought that I had to move out of Vietnam and to America to unite with my father. I don’t even remember the moment I left my mother and little brother. In my memory, one moment I was in Vietnam, the next moment, I was running into my father’s arms. The best father in the world. The best pair of arms in the world.
When my mother came, 3 or so years later, I was very excited. Father spent many nights looking through albums and albums of her. She is so beautiful that the both of us looked at them long enough for the window’s sunlight to eat the colors out of the pictures. Which to me, makes her even more beautiful. Sadly, I don’t remember the first time I saw her again when I was 7 years old. I don’t remember what she was wearing, how she looked, or if I ever even gave her a hug. Sadly.
Mom failed her road test five times before she succeeded the sixth time through a stroke of luck being that the examiner was best friends with her driving instructor who tagged along. Mom didn’t know how to cook, and still doesn’t. Mom was always clumsy. Mom messed up my school uniform many times. Mom always pick me up from school. Without a car. We’d have to walk. Mom was always nagging at dad. I was annoyed by mom. I was more annoyed by her than anyone else in the world. Mom didn’t keep the Mother’s Day cards I made her in grade school and mom got me gifts I hated for my birthdays. I felt no sense of connection with her and I wonder if she even cared about me. She was always in her own little world and sometimes, you have to step in it too, and you wouldn’t like it.
Looking at her wrinkle, I wondered how’d it get there. The more I looked at it, the heavier my heart began to feel. What has she been doing for the first 18 years of my life? I can’t seem to remember a thing. Where are we going again? Ahh, we are going for dinner. Thai food that night. She skipped work, and I ditched everyone (that was why our phones were going off) just so that we could spend some time together. Matter of fact, we have been doing this more than often. How did we get so close?
18 years old, I was living away from my family. I basically left them without a word and was selfishly on a pursuit of happiness in a place far, far away. I got into a car accident and that was when I realized something. I’m one lousy driver. I can’t cook if my life depended on it. I fucked up many of my work clothes in the wash. I lose greeting cards and even gifts. I never listen when people talk. And when I realized I couldn’t find a single soul who would want to walk around with me in this crappy city of Orlando, I realized how much I miss my mom. I realized how much of her is in me. I missed her so much that I’d hug the sweater she got for me and cry at night. I hated that sweater. I wear it all the time now, even if it has “PINK” on it and people think of me as a bum for always wearing it. It’s my favorite. But anyway, that is not the point.
The night I came back home, on my bed was a wrapped box and sticky note on it saying “Welcome back and Happy Birthday.” From who, I already knew. Who else would be lousy enough to leave a sticky note as a welcome back/happy birthday greeting to their beloved daughter. Only my mother.
Those were my thoughts when they came crashing at me at the speed of a million (whatever you use to measure thoughts) per second… Just like dreams, thoughts are also very unpredictable. So this was how the thought process went after that:
There are a lot of things that only my mother would do. Sticky notes as greeting cards. Shutting out the world for days at a time every time she reaches a self proclaimed epiphany. Stealing her husband’s cellphone, not to scope out his secrets, but to reset his Tetris score because she was jealous that he beat her. Using a McDonald’s cup to hold the roses that she received on Valentine’s day. Spontaneously bleach her hair one day and then dye it back to black the next because she felt like it was a way of cleansing her soul. Beating up another lady and got arrested because someone called her son a dumbass. Goes clubbing with her daughter and claiming to be her sister. Kept a journal and had nothing in it but “Today I am happy.” on every page.
The more I thought about it, the crazier she seemed to me. What am I even thinking. I gave a little shake to my head and looked out my window where the sun wasn’t shining. I caught a glimpse of myself in the side mirror. I have her eyes, her nose, her lips, her everything. Then I looked at myself in another way that no mirrors in the world will be able to show me. I closed my eyes and looked inside of me and everything I’ve ever done and everything that I am… It collided perfectly with the person that my mother is and it collided perfectly with every memory I have of her. I am so glad I have her as a mother. “I love this woman.” I really do.
I looked back at the wrinkle. How did it get there? I regret all the times I ever neglected her. Judged her… Not loved her. If I had been less selfish, I would have been able to see that wrinkle form, and maybe it wouldn’t have bothered me as much. Like watching the sunset, if you sit there and watch it trade places with the moon, the darkness becomes more welcoming than terrifying. Just then, her wrinkle disappeared. When we entered the Thai restaurant, I realized that it was just a strand of her hair that had found comfort resting on her forehead. I brushed it off of her and saw a little reflection of myself in her eyes.

“I love this woman.”