Michael Wayne Black
and
Elizabeth Ashely Black
These two made me a mother and they hold my heart in very different ways, but the pride I feel for each is great and the admiration for the braveness of spirit in which they each live their life is, at times, overwhelming.
Michael came into this world almost two months early, kicking and screaming his rage at being taken from his warm cocoon so abruptly. He fought the machines as they helped him breath, he screamed with outrage as the doctors and nurses did those things necessary for his survival.
It's in the name, really, Michael was, after all, the archangel of war.
He cried and raged for three months, then one spring morning he woke as sunny as the day. It was as if a switch had been thrown. He was the happiest baby and toddler I've ever seen. I big grin always gracing is little face, but the tenacity of spirit he displayed at birth has always been a core part of who he is and it has both served him well, and worked against him.
Nothing has come easily for this boy of mine. He struggled with speech early on, uttering a language uniquely is own and only fully understood by his sister and I. School came hard for him as he struggled with three different learning disabilities, he grew up feeling less than and stupid, never realizing just how smart he really is. His dad and I separated when he was twelve and it fell on him extra hard and so he raged again, this time the raging would last six years, then, just as when he was a baby, a switch was thrown and he decided the road he was on ended nowhere and he wanted better, deserved better, and, just like that, he determined to change is life.
Today he is a high school graduate. He is free of all that once held him so tightly in its grip. He will, himself, become a father at the end of this month. He joined the Navy and scored the top marks on all his tests, thus proving what I have always know, and is this morning on a ship heading towards foreign lands, but more importantly, a bright and promising future.
Elizabeth has always been the girl sitting back quietly taking everything in. Nothing escapes her notice. Where her baby brother is charismatic and impulsive, she is introspective and disciplined. She lives her life with a strength that is deceptive in its quietness, for there is a rod of pure determination at her core.
Perceptive beyond her years from the time she was small, she has always dreamed of bigger worlds than the ones I've known and determined young she wanted a taste of the entire world, and found a way to get those things on her own and for herself.
She graduated in the top ten of her class of more than five hundred and won for herself a scholarship to PATT Institute in Brooklyn, New York where she graduated top of her class with a writing degree.
These are wonderful things of which to be proud of a daughter, incredible accomplishments, but it is her spirit, displayed in an article she wrote for her school paper, of which I am most proud, an article that cost her a seat on the stage at her high school graduation, in which she stated,
"I am honored to be in the top ten academic, and even more honored to have been chosen as one of the top ten teacher picks, but I will not be attending the awards ceremonies or banquets, for studies come easily to me and I am fully aware of how much harder others, like my brother, struggle to make their C's than I will ever work for my A's. So, if you want to honor me, honor me because I am kind when it is easier to be cruel. Honor me because I stand up for what is right when no one around me will. Honor me for being willing to speak the hard truths and stay silent when it would be easier but less kind to speak my mind. For ten years from now, no one will remember nor care where I ranked in high school, but the courage to speak truths, to stand up for those who are no longer able to stand for their self, the ability to show kindness, these things will withstand the test of time."
She now lives in Korea where she teaches English as a second language, and just for the record, she is kind and she does stand up for those who stand in need. She has an incredible ability to see through the fog and go straight to the heart of people and situations and is brave enough, strong enough to tell the hard truths, even to herself about herself.
I stand amazed that two such incredible humans were ever a part of me. That I have anything whatever to do with such amazing people being here on planet Earth both astounds and humbles me.
I know on Mother's Day, it is the tradition to say thank you to our mothers, but it is I who am grateful to have had the privilege of being a part of my children's world. That I am allowed to be their mother simply amazes me.
Michael came into this world almost two months early, kicking and screaming his rage at being taken from his warm cocoon so abruptly. He fought the machines as they helped him breath, he screamed with outrage as the doctors and nurses did those things necessary for his survival.
It's in the name, really, Michael was, after all, the archangel of war.
He cried and raged for three months, then one spring morning he woke as sunny as the day. It was as if a switch had been thrown. He was the happiest baby and toddler I've ever seen. I big grin always gracing is little face, but the tenacity of spirit he displayed at birth has always been a core part of who he is and it has both served him well, and worked against him.
Nothing has come easily for this boy of mine. He struggled with speech early on, uttering a language uniquely is own and only fully understood by his sister and I. School came hard for him as he struggled with three different learning disabilities, he grew up feeling less than and stupid, never realizing just how smart he really is. His dad and I separated when he was twelve and it fell on him extra hard and so he raged again, this time the raging would last six years, then, just as when he was a baby, a switch was thrown and he decided the road he was on ended nowhere and he wanted better, deserved better, and, just like that, he determined to change is life.
Today he is a high school graduate. He is free of all that once held him so tightly in its grip. He will, himself, become a father at the end of this month. He joined the Navy and scored the top marks on all his tests, thus proving what I have always know, and is this morning on a ship heading towards foreign lands, but more importantly, a bright and promising future.
Elizabeth has always been the girl sitting back quietly taking everything in. Nothing escapes her notice. Where her baby brother is charismatic and impulsive, she is introspective and disciplined. She lives her life with a strength that is deceptive in its quietness, for there is a rod of pure determination at her core.
Perceptive beyond her years from the time she was small, she has always dreamed of bigger worlds than the ones I've known and determined young she wanted a taste of the entire world, and found a way to get those things on her own and for herself.
She graduated in the top ten of her class of more than five hundred and won for herself a scholarship to PATT Institute in Brooklyn, New York where she graduated top of her class with a writing degree.
These are wonderful things of which to be proud of a daughter, incredible accomplishments, but it is her spirit, displayed in an article she wrote for her school paper, of which I am most proud, an article that cost her a seat on the stage at her high school graduation, in which she stated,
"I am honored to be in the top ten academic, and even more honored to have been chosen as one of the top ten teacher picks, but I will not be attending the awards ceremonies or banquets, for studies come easily to me and I am fully aware of how much harder others, like my brother, struggle to make their C's than I will ever work for my A's. So, if you want to honor me, honor me because I am kind when it is easier to be cruel. Honor me because I stand up for what is right when no one around me will. Honor me for being willing to speak the hard truths and stay silent when it would be easier but less kind to speak my mind. For ten years from now, no one will remember nor care where I ranked in high school, but the courage to speak truths, to stand up for those who are no longer able to stand for their self, the ability to show kindness, these things will withstand the test of time."
She now lives in Korea where she teaches English as a second language, and just for the record, she is kind and she does stand up for those who stand in need. She has an incredible ability to see through the fog and go straight to the heart of people and situations and is brave enough, strong enough to tell the hard truths, even to herself about herself.
I stand amazed that two such incredible humans were ever a part of me. That I have anything whatever to do with such amazing people being here on planet Earth both astounds and humbles me.
I know on Mother's Day, it is the tradition to say thank you to our mothers, but it is I who am grateful to have had the privilege of being a part of my children's world. That I am allowed to be their mother simply amazes me.
amazing children. you are blessed.
ReplyDeleteYeah, they are, and I most certainly have been blessed by their presence in my life.
ReplyDeleteYou know, when I hit those low spots, you know the ones I mean, the really,really low ones where that voice inside my head is screaming how worthless I am, how unworthy of love I am, what a complete waste of a person I am, I know that is not the truth because of my children.
Whatever else I may or may not be, however little value my life may carry with it, I am not nothing because, to quote the song, nothing comes from nothing, nothing always will, so somewhere in my life I had to have done something right because there they are, my Michael and my Elizabeth.
PB
even if you were not with children my new friend, your life would be valuable. You have been an encouragement to me. Being there for others, especially ones you don't even really know is a great gift to them. Thank you so much. I pray those voices you mentioned above will begin to fade away. You are so not deserving of them. Take care PB. Sincerely
ReplyDelete