My mother and I had a long talk tonight. She told me the story of her graduation speaker at Cedar Crest College. “Bad me,” she said, “I don’t even remember the woman’s name. But she talked about the woman who said ‘I Do’. ‘I Do’ is not a statement made just once to a commitment, whether it be to a marriage, to a child, to a job, to a friend. It is one made every day. A decision does not just happen on the day it is made, it is made again and again, whenever times are tough”.
I paraphrase, for my memory for the spoken word is, regrettably, not as accurate as it should be. My mother told me of the many times she has say “I Do”. Her point was that once we make a commitment, we must re-make that commitment every day, especially when things are not going our way. “The day I most remember having to say ‘I Do’,” she told me, “was when you were a child.” I was a gifted student, but did not respond well to pressure. I bombed some big standardized test, and the school was ready to kick me out of whatever special class I was in. My teachers were calling shenanigans and insisting I be left where I was, my father was ready to beat the principal to a pulp, and my mother… well.. she was saying “I Do”.
“Being a mother is sometimes the loneliest, ugliest job in the world,” she told me. “Because I had to be your mom. Rather than joining the fray, I had to be there for you. To make sure your confidence was still up. I had to make sure you were still okay.” I don’t understand why this incident, in particular, was so hard for them. My mother said for her, it was traumatizing. I can think of other, harsher, more traumatic examples of what our family has been through, but for her, this incident stuck out. Whether or not I understand why, I do understand what she said next.
“There are days when I’m not the smartest, or the strongest, or the best candidate for the job. There are days when it’s too hard and too frightening. Those are the days when I say “I do’.”
I wish I could record exactly what my mother said to me, and I’m afraid I’ve botched her more than eloquent phrasing, but I will remember the woman who said “I Do” because she has been with me through every step of the way. Life is not always easy and it does not always turn out the way we want it to, but we cannot run from it. Once a commitment is made, it should not be easily broken. It should not be something to be put aside because it is so difficult. The essence of commitment is the understanding that it will not always be easy or fun, but that we will still be there when things get hard.
“I don’t even remember the fucking woman’s name,” she cried, her arms above her head. “But, I remember what it means to say “I Do”. And so will I.
