Dear Kori Jane,
Being the mother of a published author fills me with immense pride and maybe just a tiny bit of fear of the stories you’ll tell about our crazy family! A few weeks ago, your little sister came home concerned about my reputation after being asked by a friend if your poems were about your own life or if they are all just fiction. Of course, this is the million dollar question. And the obvious answer….yes! You are keenly observant and process both what you live and what you see in words poured out on paper. Often the line between the two are blurred. In this case, your sister’s friend read one of your poems about your mother and was a bit confused. This poem seemed to say I was flawed and that there were times I wasn’t the mother I should’ve been. The thing is, Lacey’s friend knows me! And she needed Lacey to confirm this poem was surely not about the fun mom who doesn’t care about bad grades, excessive sugar, or spilled glitter. Of course, one day she’ll realize parents are people too, and even the best moms have lots of flaws and get lots of stuff wrong.
Christmas morning I was overcome with emotion when I opened my gift from you. A pair of tickets for the two of us to see Wicked on Broadway! None of your siblings understood the depth of meaning behind this gift or my excessively emotional display of gratitude. For starters, they were too young to remember your Nana’s love of musicals and how she’d put The Wizard of Oz and Sound of Music on repeat before you could even talk. And while your siblings all enjoy a good show, none of them grew up living Nana’s favorite musicals from center stage. After your Nana died, you and I always talked about going to a Broadway show together in her memory. I was right in the middle of planning a surprise NYC weekend getaway for us when Covid shut Broadway down indefinitely. Talk about a full circle moment as I realized our dream girls’ trip was coming true, but not on account of me surprising you. I was the one being seen, surprised, and spoiled by my child!
Of course, none of my children, including you, will ever fully appreciate how many of my most treasured and my most painful childhood memories are tied to New York. Or how rough the last several months have been for me following my Yankie father’s unexpected death back in September. But you’d clearly been listening when I told you of my desire to lay his memory to rest in his beloved home state of New York. What a gift you gave me- for more reasons than you will ever know!
The month leading up to our trip was full of messy anticipation for me. Flooded with grief and lost in lament, I was forced to come face to face with my love/hate relationship with all things New York.
You Nana became a mom much younger than she intended but was determined to do right by her two girls even if it meant she would be single forever. She was smart and beautiful, and she easily attracted suitors everywhere she went. But she always made it a point to tell her suitors right off about her two girls at home. Then she’d smile as they slunk away knowing they were not good enough for her girls. But the man from New York was different. This man welcomed challenges! After all, he had recently settled in Texas only after hitchhiking from New York to California with nothing but what he could carry. When my mom told him about her girls, he asked what time he should pick the three of us up for our date. New York showed up with three flowers and took all of us to the movies. This was the first time I’d ever been to a movie theatre! I was smitten!
There were lots of firsts once my Daddy became a part of our lives. My first time to sleep in a real bed! My first time in a swimming pool! My first Cabbage Patch Kid! My first time to play softball! My first time to make a Father’s Day card! And eventually my first visit to New York to meet my new grandparents! They threw some sort of party meant to make my parents courthouse marriage official. I did not really understand what needed to be official or how this party changed anything. By this point we were already a family, and he always made sure I knew I belonged to him. That week in New York, four decades ago, with my family of four, was the very best week of my life up to that point. My mind still struggles to comprehend that I’m the only one left. My older sister, my young Momma, and now my Daddy having all passed away.
My New York grandparents came to Houston a couple times after my baby sister was born, but I only returned to New York one last time for the baby sister’s baptism and subsequent party. I learned that grandchildren, big parties, and making things outwardly official were very important to my New York grandmother. And soon enough I also learned there was a huge difference between step grandchildren and official grandchildren. My Daddy talked often about his intention to officially adopt me, and he always made it crystal clear that blood made no difference to him. I may have never been his baby girl, but I was absolutely his little girl! Unfortunately, life was much harder for all of us than Daddy meant it to be. And while New York Grandma helped often, she only helped make things official or threw big parties for her own blood.
Then, New York only showed up in brown packages addressed to my younger sister. In the beginning, I’d get excited about the packages which always had new towels and a box of candy my parents could pretend were intended for me. Eventually, there was a letter to my mom demanding she teach her granddaughter to write proper thank you notes. She went on to cite our lack of appreciation as the reason for not sending gifts to my mom’s “other daughters.”
You were 7 when you had to watch your beloved grandmother slowly die in your home. I wasn’t much older when I slowly began to realize I did not belong to my living grandmother. I do not pretend to know or understand the choices she made, the suffering she endured, or the intentions of her heart. And I don’t assume for a second that my own unjust judgements have not hurt others in the same way she hurt me. Regardless, so began a lifetime of me trying to figure out, if not New York, where exactly do I belong.
Well, my precious Kori Jane, our big New York adventure came and went earlier this month. You found us the cutest apartment on 44th Street. We watched breakdancers and indulged in hotdogs under the light of Times Square. We figured out the subway, took the ferry to Brooklyn, made stops at Central Park, Chinatown, and the Empire State Building. We went shopping in Rockefeller Center and came face to face with Stary Night at the MOMA.
We splurged on great food even though the best meals by far happened at the Taco Bell Cantina where they spike Baha Blasts and then at Joe’s Pizzeria. The pizza there was exactly like the pizza I grew up on here in Houston. I’ll never forget the thin greasy goodness Daddy brought home every week once he’d discovered this authentic New York Pizzeria in a random mall food court across town.
Of course, the highlight for me was seeing my first Broadway show. In fact, the first thing we did when Wicked ended was buy tickets to see Hamilton the following night.
I fully expected my childhood memories of New York to spill all over our trip. However, I was way too busy treasuring new memories to shed many tears. Alas, there were two moments when the past and present seemed to collide, and I knew why I needed this trip to New York in order to fully understand a couple lessons my parent’s lives were meant to teach me.
The first moment was on that rainy Thursday morning while we were getting dressed and rushing out the door to meet your agent. So far out of my element, I rummaged through my suitcase to try and find something suitable for this occasion. I settled on the same thing I wear everyday, which also happens to be the same outfit my mom typically wore every time she left the house. A black top with blue jeans. I believe it’s the perfect outfit for those of us prone to feeling like they don’t belong since some variation can work for most any occasion. You wore an oversized boldly patterned wool sweater, an adorable black miniskirt, tights, lots of gold jewelry, and kitten heel boots. But since you never accounted for the rain, you had no suitable coat to complete your outfit.
Thankfully I brought my mother’s 20-year-old long black waterproof jacket. One of the buttons is missing and there is a small tear in the pocket, but no one would ever notice. We stopped to buy an umbrella from the first street vender we saw, and then you raced off towards the subway once again leaving me in your dust. Suddenly I could not breathe. But this time it was not because I was trying to keep up with you. This time it was because I missed my mom. I needed her to be a part of this moment. I needed her to see her coat on her granddaughter who was galivanting through NYC in the rain, on her way to have breakfast with some big-time literary agent. Her granddaughter’s big-time literary agent!
My grandma was wrong. New York is not too good for me and my people. But your Nana, my mom, was wrong too. She believed the lie that we were not good enough, and in turn convinced me there are places people like us will never belong. That morning walking to the subway, I understood for the first time that belonging is just not quite as simple as we want it to be. Blood is certainly not the most important measure for determining where we belong. Sometimes belonging looks like showing up even when it’s hard and messy, and even though sometimes you feel like you are not welcome. But always, belonging looks like knowing other people’s stories and welcoming other messy people into your own messy stories.
The second moment was on our final night, when the curtain closed one last time on Hamilton. You asked me what I thought, but again, I was rendered speechless as both my parents stories flashed before me. If there is one thing we both know about good stories, there always has to be a bad guy. And I couldn’t help notice that in both Wicked and Hamilton, there were no bad guys. Or rather, everyone’s flaws were on display and to some degree everyone was a bad guy. The difference that separated one bad guy from another was that some of the bad guys did some really good things. It’s just that matters of life, death, love, friendship, and family (like belonging) are much more complex than we want them to be. Perhaps Hamilton says it best when he says, “you have no control who lives, who dies, who tells your story…who remembers your name?” Like your Momma, my own Mom and Dad had their flaws. But they were the kind of bad guys who did some really good things in their lives. They lived, they died, and what a treasure that it’s your words telling our families stories with so much honesty, beauty, and grace. Even if it is sometimes a little uncomfortable.
It’s a really good thing your sister’s friend did not see this poem you shared a couple years ago, or she’d have even more questions! For me this poem is a reminder of just how complex, precious, and unique the mother-daughter relationship is, and how brokenness can become beauty in the hands of artists, musicians, and poets.
I love you,
Mom