At a very tense Mother’s Day gathering in 2016, I learned that my niece’s graduation was less than four weeks away and on the same night as a concert I had already committed to. The tickets had been a Valentine’s Day gift and the plans had been in place for months. It wasn’t that I chose a concert over her graduation. I simply already had plans by the time I was given the date.
Later, my mother told me that while they were at the graduation, plans began for a birthday gathering for my son that would intentionally exclude me.
Whatever was happening between the adults, I had directly and repeatedly asked that it stay there, and that we do the work of repair.
Something in the fabric of my universe was torn beyond repair.
Whatever else may be true, this also happened.
I’ve been accused of being negative- always imagining the worst. Maybe I was never imagining the worst. Maybe I’m recognizing and recalling what I have lived.
Have you ever been called negative for noticing a pattern that later proved real?
