Thursday – The Beautiful and the Damned
Sep. 27th, 2007 02:26 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ninanevermoreToday on my drive into work, I was thinking about the two words my mother often used to describe my three brothers and me. The first word was "beautiful."
"All of my children are beautiful," she would say. "It's one of my blessings."
The other word she used was "damn," half of her favorite phrase, "damn kids." We only got called beautiful once in awhile, but we were damned almost every day of our lives.
"This house would stay a lot cleaner, if it weren't for you damn kids."
"Will you damn kids turn off that TV and get in here? It's time for dinner!"
"If you damn kids don't keep it down, I'm going to come out there and make you be quite!"
Then there was my all time favorite, the response that I got when I asked her if maybe she and my father might make me a baby sister so I wouldn't be the only girl in the family any more:
"Sorry, I've got too many damn kids already. I need another kid about like I need a hole in my head."
I took this as a no.
The truth was, I'm not sure that we were any more beautiful or damnable than the children in any other family. I thought we were kind of averaged looking. In fact, when I was about 7 and she mentioned how beautiful we all were, I felt obliged to point out that Randy, my then 15-year-old eldest brother, was kind of funny looking. He was going through his awkward phase, where his nose and his feet had reached their adult proportions but the rest of him had yet to catch up.
"Oh, no he's not. He looks fine. He's beautiful. You all are."
This was when I first realized that love messes up the way you see people. I didn't love Randy as much as my mother did, and so I could see what she could not: Randy was unfortunate looking.
My mother was not unaware of her own bias, though. "Mothers always think their children are beautiful," my mom explained to me on that day, "Most of them do, anyway."
She then told me the story of Randy's birth, and of another mother she met at the hospital who didn't suffer from this blindness. At the time of his birth, she and my father were living in Benghazi, Libya, which was then under British rule. Randy was born in the Missionary Hospital there, where most westerns living in the region went for medical treatment. Randy's birth was difficult, in large part because he tried to come out face up instead of face down, like he was supposed to. The doctor used forceps to pull him out, which left bruises on his temples and gave his skull and even more squished look than most newborns have.
"But he was beautiful to me, as bruised up as he was," she said.
"There was a German girl in the bed next to me, and she had a baby girl, but she was upset because she had wanted a little boy, instead.
"This doctor was making the rounds, and he asked me how my baby was. I told him your brother was beautiful. Looking at pictures of him, I guess he looked pretty beat up at the time, but I thought he was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen.
"So then the doctor asks this other girl about her baby, and she said, 'She's ugly.' The doctor didn't say anything to her. I don't think he knew what to say. But I felt so bad for that baby girl, for her mother to feel that way about her."
"Was her baby ugly?" I asked.
"No, I didn't think so. I thought she looked precious. But her mother insisted she was ugly."
I thought about this for a moment.
"Do you think that if you had offered to trade Randy for her little girl, that she would have done it?"
"She really wanted a boy – I bet she would have."
"But you didn't ask her?"
"Of course not. I thought your brother was beautiful and I wanted to keep him."
I couldn't believe she let an opportunity like that pass. To think that instead of my goofy-looking brother, I could have had a perfectly precious looking sister, instead! I supposed her only excuse could be that she didn't yet know that she was going to have so many boys. Still, I was disappointed in her poor judgment, and I told her she should have made the trade.
She rolled her eyes at me. "That's an awful thing to say! I wouldn't trade any of you damn kids in for anything. I probably should, but I wouldn't."
My mother and the woman at the missionary hospital showed that love may be blind, but also that there are worse forms of blindness to have. It's better to be blinded so that you can't recognize homeliness, than to be blind in a way that you don't notice beauty. The other woman had a lovely baby, but she couldn't see her daughter's beauty through her own dissatisfaction over not getting a baby of the sex that she wanted. On the other hand, my mother had a bruised, pointy-headed infant who looked like a tractor had run over his head, and she thought he looked wonderful. It's a sweet story, I guess. Still, it took me years to get over my disappointment that if she hadn't been so blinded by love, she might have had the good taste to trade Randy in for a girl.
* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * # * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~
"All of my children are beautiful," she would say. "It's one of my blessings."
The other word she used was "damn," half of her favorite phrase, "damn kids." We only got called beautiful once in awhile, but we were damned almost every day of our lives.
"This house would stay a lot cleaner, if it weren't for you damn kids."
"Will you damn kids turn off that TV and get in here? It's time for dinner!"
"If you damn kids don't keep it down, I'm going to come out there and make you be quite!"
Then there was my all time favorite, the response that I got when I asked her if maybe she and my father might make me a baby sister so I wouldn't be the only girl in the family any more:
"Sorry, I've got too many damn kids already. I need another kid about like I need a hole in my head."
I took this as a no.
The truth was, I'm not sure that we were any more beautiful or damnable than the children in any other family. I thought we were kind of averaged looking. In fact, when I was about 7 and she mentioned how beautiful we all were, I felt obliged to point out that Randy, my then 15-year-old eldest brother, was kind of funny looking. He was going through his awkward phase, where his nose and his feet had reached their adult proportions but the rest of him had yet to catch up.
"Oh, no he's not. He looks fine. He's beautiful. You all are."
This was when I first realized that love messes up the way you see people. I didn't love Randy as much as my mother did, and so I could see what she could not: Randy was unfortunate looking.
My mother was not unaware of her own bias, though. "Mothers always think their children are beautiful," my mom explained to me on that day, "Most of them do, anyway."
She then told me the story of Randy's birth, and of another mother she met at the hospital who didn't suffer from this blindness. At the time of his birth, she and my father were living in Benghazi, Libya, which was then under British rule. Randy was born in the Missionary Hospital there, where most westerns living in the region went for medical treatment. Randy's birth was difficult, in large part because he tried to come out face up instead of face down, like he was supposed to. The doctor used forceps to pull him out, which left bruises on his temples and gave his skull and even more squished look than most newborns have.
"But he was beautiful to me, as bruised up as he was," she said.
"There was a German girl in the bed next to me, and she had a baby girl, but she was upset because she had wanted a little boy, instead.
"This doctor was making the rounds, and he asked me how my baby was. I told him your brother was beautiful. Looking at pictures of him, I guess he looked pretty beat up at the time, but I thought he was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen.
"So then the doctor asks this other girl about her baby, and she said, 'She's ugly.' The doctor didn't say anything to her. I don't think he knew what to say. But I felt so bad for that baby girl, for her mother to feel that way about her."
"Was her baby ugly?" I asked.
"No, I didn't think so. I thought she looked precious. But her mother insisted she was ugly."
I thought about this for a moment.
"Do you think that if you had offered to trade Randy for her little girl, that she would have done it?"
"She really wanted a boy – I bet she would have."
"But you didn't ask her?"
"Of course not. I thought your brother was beautiful and I wanted to keep him."
I couldn't believe she let an opportunity like that pass. To think that instead of my goofy-looking brother, I could have had a perfectly precious looking sister, instead! I supposed her only excuse could be that she didn't yet know that she was going to have so many boys. Still, I was disappointed in her poor judgment, and I told her she should have made the trade.
She rolled her eyes at me. "That's an awful thing to say! I wouldn't trade any of you damn kids in for anything. I probably should, but I wouldn't."
My mother and the woman at the missionary hospital showed that love may be blind, but also that there are worse forms of blindness to have. It's better to be blinded so that you can't recognize homeliness, than to be blind in a way that you don't notice beauty. The other woman had a lovely baby, but she couldn't see her daughter's beauty through her own dissatisfaction over not getting a baby of the sex that she wanted. On the other hand, my mother had a bruised, pointy-headed infant who looked like a tractor had run over his head, and she thought he looked wonderful. It's a sweet story, I guess. Still, it took me years to get over my disappointment that if she hadn't been so blinded by love, she might have had the good taste to trade Randy in for a girl.
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no subject
Date: 2007-09-27 07:55 pm (UTC)And yeah, my mum used that "damn" often enough too!
no subject
Date: 2007-09-28 04:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-09-28 06:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-09-27 09:31 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-09-28 04:32 pm (UTC)From:
To:
Hows that for a makeover?
no subject
Date: 2007-09-27 10:46 pm (UTC)I wonder what that little girl's life turned out like, if her mother continued to be indifferent or eventually warmed to her.
no subject
Date: 2007-09-28 04:35 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-09-28 01:42 pm (UTC)But I do the same thing. I think my kids are the most beautiful in the world. They're the smartest in their class. They're the most artistic kids ever. So am I living in illusion-land or am I right? :P Though it's been confirmed that my kids are at the top of their classes. And I'm always told how beautiful my kids are. That must mean something, right?
^^
*HUGS*
no subject
Date: 2007-09-28 04:37 pm (UTC)It's those other patents with the ugly kids (and we all know who they are) who are delusional...
no subject
Date: 2007-09-28 05:54 pm (UTC)Thanks Nina!! You're so sweet!! *HUGS*
no subject
Date: 2007-10-09 07:06 pm (UTC)hehehe great line!
no subject
Date: 2007-10-09 09:55 pm (UTC)