I
don't know how to begin this properly or say this perfectly, but then
again, one of the most important messages you've tried to impart to me
is to do things without regard to trivial matters such as perfection...
Mom, you've been by my side whether I've been in the bleakest or the brightest of times, glad to offer your advice and experience whenever I've wanted it and, more often than not, I'm afraid, when I didn't want it but still needed it.
You've helped me grow tremendously, no small feat considering that I've watched you grow as a person (albeit with less awareness as I was a little kid), as well. You learned and became keenly attuned to the negative traditions plaguing both sides of my family tree, including many of the values with which you grew up, and, like Batman's spinal column on Bane's knee, you soundly broke them. You instituted a much newer, much healthier paradigm into our family that continues to hold, and demonstrated how to properly defy familial authority - the most daunting authority up against one can stand - when said authority was backward, manipulative, oppressive and decrepit.
You saw that there was a bridge leading to Hell, so you picked up the sledgehammer on your own, destroyed it, and built another one leading in a better direction in its wake. For you, for Dad, for my brother, for me, and for any future humans that will be able to count you as a forebear, you made a damn difficult but damn wise choice.
You have taught me more about civil disobedience through your loud-speaking actions than Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr., Cesar Chavez, or Aung San Suu Kyi ever could.
You taught me more about the true ethos of punk, heavy metal, and rock 'n roll more than Metallica or the Clash ever could.
When I sing and dance, I do for both of us. Mom, despite our many disagreements and frustrations of the past and certainly into the future, the phrase "I love you" is too concise for what I have to say. I hope the above will suffice.
Happy Mothers' Day, everyone!
Mom, you've been by my side whether I've been in the bleakest or the brightest of times, glad to offer your advice and experience whenever I've wanted it and, more often than not, I'm afraid, when I didn't want it but still needed it.
You've helped me grow tremendously, no small feat considering that I've watched you grow as a person (albeit with less awareness as I was a little kid), as well. You learned and became keenly attuned to the negative traditions plaguing both sides of my family tree, including many of the values with which you grew up, and, like Batman's spinal column on Bane's knee, you soundly broke them. You instituted a much newer, much healthier paradigm into our family that continues to hold, and demonstrated how to properly defy familial authority - the most daunting authority up against one can stand - when said authority was backward, manipulative, oppressive and decrepit.
You saw that there was a bridge leading to Hell, so you picked up the sledgehammer on your own, destroyed it, and built another one leading in a better direction in its wake. For you, for Dad, for my brother, for me, and for any future humans that will be able to count you as a forebear, you made a damn difficult but damn wise choice.
You have taught me more about civil disobedience through your loud-speaking actions than Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr., Cesar Chavez, or Aung San Suu Kyi ever could.
You taught me more about the true ethos of punk, heavy metal, and rock 'n roll more than Metallica or the Clash ever could.
When I sing and dance, I do for both of us. Mom, despite our many disagreements and frustrations of the past and certainly into the future, the phrase "I love you" is too concise for what I have to say. I hope the above will suffice.
Happy Mothers' Day, everyone!
