A Meditation on Mothers, Grandmothers, and Family

Jay Jay Jeffery
Aug 23, 2017 · 4 min read

At first I just take in the music. I close my eyes and take in the sun through my eyelids. I watch as the array of colors come together as one behind my eyes.

I get up to check the song. It’s good. And I think of the joy I find in music. The feelings it brings. The stream of memories it evokes. I think I should write more songs. And play more music myself. I lay back in my chair as Trill does in the grass and I imagine a symphony, not an old symphony but a new age symphony together with all the musicians I know jamming. Thinking of it connects me to Mozart or some other fantastic composer. I look into his mind for an instant and see the world from a perspective I’ve never seen it like the seeds on one of those dandelion wishy things.

The sun is intense on my back and I think I’m burning.

I need to get to work. But new ideas bombard my head. I try to focus. I finally move to the scattered shadow of a tree. It dapples my page.

The song sucks me back in. The lyrics feel like hearing myself write. BBQ by ALO.

But I digress again. I want to write out my list of things to do … instead I think of my mom. And I appreciate her. Truly appreciate her. My eyes well up kind of appreciation and I think of becoming a mother myself as 2 tears drop simultaneously from each eye, one hanging now on my chin the other meeting at my mouth with its salty fist. I breath and let it go and remind myself to love my mother and make sure I learn something from her. What does she have to share with me? I think of a chain of woman and one after another each passing on some bit of knowledge, something that grows with them, some idea. But has it ever been stated? The words stand out from my mother’s mother.

“Are you happy? As long as you’re happy.” And “Go for the gold.” There was something strong and independent about her.

For my daughters … I’m going to write my future daughters a letter, a manual in the form of a book.

Another idea bombards me. “Never use womanhood as a crutch.”

The example comes to my mind but I hold myself back from starting into it here. I have a dozen books to write.

What? Am I holding myself back from writing? This is for now I tell myself. “Do it now,” another chunk of advice. You get more done if you just do it now when you think of it. So I move to outline said guide … but instead I think of Angela. I should work on this guide with her. She’s probably the 1st person to help me realize I wanted to write. And if that’s the case then I should include other women and their mothers and my own.

Let’s shed some light from Crones and Mothers and Maidens and Virgins too, to our daughters in the future, the lines of women to come. And give them advice to guide them, to lead them to growth, to being better people, stronger, wiser, and more secure in our being.

I’m excited about where writing that book will lead. To someplace beautiful I’m sure.

Before the interviews with each woman I want to get them into a certain space. I’ll need to write up an interview mediation. And my mind falls off into images of the future, bringing them into a space looking down on earth. Seeing it and us wholly.

And then I think of my father’s mother and hers. Who was Lula? How did I never hear of my grandmother’s mother? What did my grandmother so recently a spirit never tell me of her mother? Nor her father? In fact the only part of her life that I know about is the parts I can personally remember. Her golfing. That condo that smelled of my grandfather’s tobacco. I don’t remember her cooking much. I do remember shopping with her. Going to buy school clothes, loving fashion. I must have gotten it from my mom. But my grandmother, what did I get from her? What did she teach me? I remember her attempts to teach me to sew fell on slightly deaf ears. I was really interested but got bored, I was a child of course.

Where did my dad learn to be who he is? From her? From my grandfather? I just don’t see it?

And now I think of you. Of what your parents and grandparents and family line has passed down. What important pieces of wisdom have you received from them? And what important pieces do you want to make sure to pass down through your own lineage?

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Jay Jay Jeffery
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