My (M)other(‘s) Story

I have always wanted to write about my mother’s story, but it was not until November, 2014, when I was awarded a residency at Varuna that I considered it seriously. At the time, I examined my motivation for wanting to tell the story, and tried out several openings. I did this by hand, with a fountain pen. For some reason, I kept writing “my other” rather than “my mother”. Ultimately, I settled on My Other Story, and this is what I wrote:

There’s a scene in the Broadway musical A Chorus Line where a young dancer, under the heat of audition, starts to question his identity: “Who am I anyway/ am I my resume?” These questions would strike a chord with many people I know—academics who spend most of their lives building their CV. Writing about my mother’s life is an important project, but one that keeps looking more and more like a mess of tangled yarn. Can I weave my story about her life without confronting my own? Can I reveal her dreams without examining my own? Can I deal with the knots of guilt without unravelling the shame of my betrayal? Can I spin out my grief over her death without hitting the snags of my secret relief? Am I hiding from my ‘other’ story by focusing on my mother’s.

I am finally picking up this project in earnest, still shaky about where I’m heading, but determined to set out on this journey of discovery, as uncertain and painful as it will surely be.

An exhibition of artwork and poetry I have created as part of this project was shown in the exhibition Weaving Selves in June 2021 at the AIRspace Projects Gallery.