I had to update my CV recently. I added a reference to an essay published in Dr. Struthers’s essay collection titled Alice Munro Everlasting: Essays on her works. It’s published by Guernica Press and came out a few years ago. Dr. Struthers asked me to draft a response to Ms Munro’s story, “My Mother’s Dreams,” and I did not want to do it.
Here’s the first paragraph of my contribution.
I didn’t want to read this story, or write about it. Motherhood is fraught. Everybody knows that. We spend money talking to professionals about the damage our mothers caused, about the damage we cause as mothers, about the damage our daughters cause us. Wreckage all around. When I think of my mother, I wonder whether she had any dreams for herself. About these, I never got to find out. I know she was sent to work in a factory at age 12 with a robust grade six education. I know … she was married in the month of May in a silk satin gown with an empire waist and not a moment too soon… She bore five children, three of whom lived. I was last born and soonest orphaned. What are mothers’ dreams to me?
As I age, that question of dreams keeps cropping up. What are you dreaming of, you mothers? May you be swaddled in turtlenecks and cradling hot tea on this blustery October day.