Mama

It had all begun long before my little egg-let bumped, quite accidentally, into my little sperm pal.

We little eggs, we never understand the history.

We incubate, safe of sorts in an amniotic keg. We wait patiently for distillation, for fingers to count with, for ears to hear.

Most of us are lucky. We win the bingo, stamping all five of the senses with a magic genetic marker. Some are not so. But then I wonder. Would I give up one to heighten another? Have I already?

So, in essence this particular ‘sp-eg’ scenario worked out as well as could be expected in the luck department.

But little egg. And little embryo. And little human. There is so much of a story that came before you. A history you do not own.

Your whole damn life is a fucking meta narrative.

_____________

You were from the kind of place that binds you. The air, thick and heavy. It clung to the sky like congealed butter on stale afternoon scones.

You would never escape it.

Days were spent as girls must, helping mother in the kitchen. Baking. Cleaning. Doing what you were supposed to do. What you were expected to do. Your mother, with her soft belly, always apron-clad, and thin brown hair knotted into a bun at the bottom of her neck, was a picture of stereotypical Welsh womanhood. Homely you would say. Despite her motherly appearance, years of loving a God she didn’t care for, and a husband who cared for her less than he did God, had made her resentful, even cruel. She was exacting, harsh, and had little time for emotion or anything much really. Except what needed to be done.

You were not meant to enjoy life. You were meant to endure it.

Evenings were spent reading the only book you were allowed. The Bible. Sundays spent in the dingy, slanted back room of the chapel listening to tales of your own ungodliness. The damp, lingering acrid stench of life departing would cling to your clothes until Wednesday. Three days of respite.

Later, mandatory school. You counted numbers in your head. Learned letters easily. Before long, you were top of the class. Not that anyone noticed. At home, the floor still needed to be scrubbed. Your younger brothers still needed to be bathed. And the Bible still needed to be recited.

Your father would rap your knuckles with his ruler every time you made a mistake. You would start again and again until you got it right. The way it should be spoken. The way God would have liked to have heard it, if of course, he was listening, which mostly, you doubted. But your father was adamant. And, so you endured.

Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as it is fit in the Lord. Husbands, love your wives, and be not bitter against them. Children, obey your parents in all things: for this is well pleasing unto the Lord. Fathers, provoke not your children to anger, lest they be discouraged.

Colossians 3:18-21

Adolescence brought new trials.

Boys, pre-pubescent, in the midst of wet dreams and accidental hard-ons, learning to control the unholy urges they were taught they shouldn’t have. Each to each saying nothing, thinking only that God had cursed them with an affliction for their unspoken sins.

At 16, a boy spoke to you for the first time—the boy you would later marry.

More to escape the cloying air than any real connection. Let alone love.

You would endure as you must.

Men would become what you craved most in the world. They would devour you.

And you would thank them for it.