The worst thing I heard from my mother

As I've mentioned before, my mother lived with depression for a great deal of her life before realizing she had a problem. One of her biggest issues was dealing with my brother Loyd as a baby. She probably spent the first two years of his life wondering why he couldn't be more like me and saying this out loud.

More than 35 years later, my mother would express regret that she was not able to enjoy Loyd for the child that he was instead of mourning for the child he could not be.

Now, even though my mother says that she was never able to enjoy Loyd, I think there was some level that she had some idea what he had to offer as a child. This was realized in what I consider the worst thing my mother ever said to me.

In our town, there was a clothing store called Main Place. (I would wind up working there one day, but that's WAY down the line.) They sold women's shoes under the "Personality" brand. When my mom was getting dressed once, I saw a Personality shoe box. "Personality" was a word that I'd heard before, but wasn't certain of what it meant. I asked my mother what personality was.

"It's something that Loyd has that you don't."

I was absolutlely stunned by this response. I was asking for a simple definition, not an attack on my lack of character or confirmation that Loyd had some. So I asked her why Loyd had something that I didn't and I asked her what she meant. I asked her what I needed to do to get it. I guess Mom figured out she had plain said the wrong thing to me and ignored my requests for more details. I know I kept asking for at least ten more minutes before I finally gave up on getting an answer.

Now, the reason I say this is the worst thing she ever said to me is because I remembered it up to the point that I finally learned what personality was. I looked back and recalled this incident and discovered that it was a very cruel thing for a mother to tell a child. Even worse is that she offered no explanation and no apology for what she said.

But, like I say, her acknowledgement of his personality and me not having any does demonstrate that there was some joy in her heart that was created for her by Loyd. It's too bad that she doesn't really remember ever feeling that way about him.