Beauty and My Mother

 My mother left this world behind 16 years ago, but I began this day solidly in her presence. She was here with me while I sat and talked with my husband about the day ahead of us and about our children. Her smiling, enraptured presence stayed by my side as we enjoyed Patricia Ballentine’s presentation, “The History and Magical Practice of Beauty.”

In the last months of her life, mom seemed to open herself to seeking beauty and expressing her interest in it as she never had before. Of course, I must acknowledge that she may have been like that at other times in her life that I didn’t recognize or see. When I was a small child she loved purple, and she loved cranberry glass. I remember her pastel pink jewelry box and the lipstick she wore when she was going to meetings or a party. Later, she loved oil lamps and making crafts with my dad. But towards the end, the search for beauty was more personal and more of what she wanted for herself.

I first noticed this with her deep interest in the television show “How I Met Your Mother.”
What really held her attention were the wardrobe choices for Alyson Hannigan’s character. Mom spent all of her life buying inexpensive clothes, most of which could double as work clothes. She chose tee-shirt style tops; casual, loose-fitting elastic waist pants with pockets; and simple jersey dresses with pockets as well. But all of a sudden, she was interested in fashion, and commented about how she would like this or that piece that “Lily” was wearing, and didn’t Alyson look beautiful in that outfit?

While I recognized that I was seeing something different in my mother, it took me years to understand that she had been expressing pieces of her own healing journey even as she knew she was moving closer to dying. Perhaps it was that knowledge of imminent freedom that released her from the childhood and lifetime hurts that caused her to stifle her sense of self-expression and her longing for beauty.

I would give nearly anything to have more time with her, and I am grateful for the effort she makes to share herself with me now.

There were not enough yesterdays held dearly in the there and then. Jean Marie Hill Barker, b. December 25, 1938, d. March 9, 2008.

At various times during my life, I thought my mother didn't love me; I couldn't stand her; she was my best friend; she was annoying, funny, cute, and horrible, but I needed her, and she needed me.

For most of our lives together, we did not understand each other because we did not know how to communicate. We never really fixed the communication part, but during the last 27 weeks of her life, we somehow began to understand each other. What a gift.

Hey Bean. I see you now with my heart instead of my eyes, and these years later, oh how you shine with true beauty! I miss you as much as ever, more than ever, and not at all because I carry you with me.

Photo: my mom with her mother in a photo booth at Sylvan Beach, mid-to-late 1950s. Jeannie and June.