The Extraordinary Act of Mothering In These Times
It is a strange thing to look at your child and feel your heart expand and ache at once. To be a mother in these times which we are bearing witness to is an extraordinary undertaking.
I watch my son in moments of unadulterated joy like this one and my heart is a tender achy mix of gratitude and grief, joy and pain.
For in him I see every Palestinian child.
Three seasons of this ugly unjust war and our footsteps have fallen on deaf ears; our calls have remained unanswered; our outrage unmet.
All of this and the world is left to see Palestinian children being starved of life before our very eyes.
And in the shadows of unthinkable atrocities, mothers pleading, desperately waiting and wondering with anxious, vexed spirits if their beloved will ever come back.
I know very well that I am not alone in my struggle. Bess Kalb’s writing has lifted my heavy heart with her empathetic, humorous writing. Connie Chiu writes stunningly about her experience dredging through these days in search of community. My own beloved mother-friends help keep my weary spirit standing. There are so many others.
I am only one in a sea of mothers of many races, faiths, creeds and convictions caught in this treacherous space between care and condemnation.
One day I will tell my son this story. I do not look forward to that day and I do not know what to say or even how it ends.
I will tell him that my country failed me, my leaders disappointed me, but every day ordinary people helped carry me forward. And though it has been said, the world did not turn its back on Palestine.
But what are we to do until then but carry on each day and continue to mother our children?
We do our best to build a world around them that is gentle and sheltering, even though the one we live in is often not.