A Bad Decision?

My mother once told me she should never have had any of us.

‘You can’t say that!’ I said.

‘Yes, you’re right.’ she replied, eyes downcast.

At the time I thought she saw us, her children, as burdensome mistakes. Now I realise some part of her felt ashamed for having conceived and kept us. Her statement came from a place of low self worth.

“Step back in time; look closely at the child in the very arms of his mother…watch the first struggles which he has to undergo; only then will you comprehend … the passions which are to rule his life.”

Alexis de Tocqueville

We are all, arguably, products of our own upbringing. My mother’s led her to make decisions which in the eyes of society were deemed ‘bad’. But guess what? A bad decision makes a good story. This is my legacy.

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One could argue that the protagonist of the Netflix series MAID also made some bad decisions. But the truth is more complicated. She did not ask to be born of a selfish hippy mother and an abusive alcoholic father. She did choose to love and protect her daughter, against all the odds.

‘When’s home?’ her little one asks, sleepily from the backseat of the car. They seem to lurch from one disaster to another, desperately searching for somewhere affordable and safe.

It’s never the child’s fault.

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Here is a map of some of the stopping places and farms Mum travelled through when living on the road in the early sixties. For her and my eldest sister, roadside verges, apple orchards and hedgerows were home. Then she sold her horse and wagon and they lived in a caravan. Always searching, searching for warmth, family, aliveness, a tribe.

One could argue that she too lurched from one disaster to another. What she was looking for was something she never had as a child. Her own mother’s preoccupation with the expectations of her class: estate management, tea parties and the like meant Mum was raised by staff, then sent away to be educated in institutions run by uncaring strangers. The result? She became a rebel. Never one to be crushed, conform or comply, she joined forces with causes she held dear and fought. To witness this fight was exhausting.

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Now that she’s gone and I’m grown, I crave peace. Stories yes, but no more battles please. I want home to be now.

‘Your mum made some really bad decisions.’

‘I think your mum was mentally ill.’

It’s so easy to judge from the outside isn’t it? The truth is, she did her best. That’s all anyone can do.

1. Trauma, Abandonment and Privilege, Duffell and Basset, Routledge, 2016