A valuable lesson

 One of my favorite things about learning to write fiction is how much writing has taught me.  I am not a fan of first-person narrative, so my books are all written in third-person.

To effectively write a third-person narrative I have to immerse myself in the character I am writing about.  I have to understand what motivates them, what makes them happy, what makes them sad, what frustrates them, and what angers them.

I was still very early in my writing vocation when I realized that my characters were so strongly formed in my mind that they would not let me write a story line that did not 'fit' with their character.  I have reworked story lines and scenes because it feels like my character told me they would never react or act in a certain way.

Where is the valuable lesson in this?  Learning to see the world through my character's eyes and mind has allowed me to see that my perspective is not the only one.  In the real world, that has slowed my emotional reaction time.  I find myself wondering why a person behaved in a certain way before reacting to their behavior.  I'm certainly not perfect, and I don't remember to take that step back all the time.  But the more I write, and the more I try to see all sides of a scene in a book to make it realistic, the more able I seem to be to see all the sides in the scenes in my own life.

Even more than in the present, the work on seeing all sides has allowed me to look back over my life and see my past differently.  I have so much less angst about the past than I used to.  I am able to run the scenes in my life through a different filter, one that has developed as a byproduct of my writing.

Everyone is unique.  Everyone is experiencing every situation from their own perspective, with their own life experience influencing how they are seeing the same thing you are seeing.  When I can remember to step back and realize that, and allow that knowledge to inform my reactions, I am much less likely to do unintended harm to the people in my world.

And anything that I have learned that can allow me to do less harm is a valuable lesson indeed.

Mother's Day

 At one moment or another in almost any given day, I miss my mother.  On Mother's Day, it is impossible not to miss her more poignantly.

I was blessed and lucky to have a wonderful mother.  Harriet was human and flawed, like all of us.  But she loved deeply and truly, and tried her very best to take care of everyone she loved.

While I was growing up, like most women with their mothers, I had some rough times with Harriet.  I didn't fight with her a lot, but I seemed to have an incredible ability to make her cry, and I never wanted to do that.  She and I didn't see eye-to-eye on how to raise my daughter, and with the perspective of maturity, I wish I would have listened more and resisted less.

Harriet loved my father, George, with an astounding devotion.  When I think of the care she gave him throughout his decline into dementia with Alzheimer's, I am humbled by her ability to love so generously as her husband disappeared a piece at a time.

As I tried to be a good mother to my daughter, and as I struggled and failed at times, my admiration for Harriet grew.  She had four children, not one, and she had grandchildren before she had finished raising her own children.  The lives she pictured for her children weren't the lives we chose.  But she loved us, and spoiled us anyway.

When I look back at my life through the lens of adulthood, I see things differently than I did in the moment.  I see so much more strength and fortitude than I saw as events were unfolding.

Of all the things I admire and respect and love about my mother, I think the single biggest thing is how her ability to be kind, to be gentle, to extend interest and compassion to everyone never went away.

Even as she lost her own battle with dementia, she was kind and gentle.  I remember more and more as I age how nice she always was to the cashier in the store, to the waiter or waitress, to the bus driver, to the housekeeper in a hotel.

Harriet believed in the goodness of people, and she allowed everyone to show her that goodness, and most people obliged.  

That is what I miss and what I treasure.  A mother who showed in her everyday encounters that everyone was deserving of dignity and respect.

As I miss her this Mother's Day, I pray that she is celebrating in Heaven with Daddy and all the aunts and uncles and grandparents.  And I remember to thank God for blessing me with such a wonderful mother.