The Potty Mouth Granny

Yesterday was a day she would tuck carefully into the folds of memory. It was the birthday of her oldest child thirty-eight years now and the weight of that number pressed gently against her chest and her soul. She could hardly believe it. Time, that quiet magician, had slipped by while she wasn’t looking. It seemed only yesterday she had clutched her daughter’s small
hand, walking to the elementary school to register for pre-K, the leaves of fall 1990 swirling around gently in a warm, fall breeze. That little girl with bright eyes and endless questions was now a middle aged woman (according to the social media), full of her own stories.

She had grown up alongside her daughter, not figuratively, but really. She was just fifteen when she carried her, sixteen when she first saw her face. They were, in many ways, two girls discovering the world together. Over the years, they built a life thread by thread: late nights filled with whispered dreams, tiny apartments that smelled of the soul food cooked by her mother and hope, scraped knees and mended hearts, laughter that echoed off walls filled pictures of family, and quiet nights of wondering if love alone could carry them through.

There were days when fear sat heavy on her shoulders. Fear of failing, of not being enough, of giving her daughter and later, her two siblings a life too small for the size of their spirits. Along with the fear was also shame, the shame of being a young mother, of being stereotyped by the dominant culture and her own people. She hid her pregnancy for a few months, thinking she was fooling her mother, not realizing that her mother knew she was pregnant immediately because of no bloody sheets, and requests for feminine products. But that’s what happens when teenage girls have children before their brain develops fully.

Somehow though, they kept moving forward, hand in hand. Seasons changed. Hardships softened. Dreams, once shelved, found new life. Her daughter graduated valedictorian of her grade school, stayed in the top ten while in high school, and won several scholarships when she graduated and went to college. And she kept on striving for excellence.

She started off in the call center of a major loan company here in Chicago, and eventually became the youngest manager in the company’s history. She got tired of dealing with people directly so she transferred to the work management part of the company. She worked in that department for a few years when she decided to become an accountant and applied for a position. She got the position and a master’s degree in accounting too.

When she thinks about her daughter, her heart fills with love, pride, and amazement. Love for the little girl who once clutched her hand so tightly, trusting her with everything. Pride for the woman her daughter had become, strong, wise, and tender in all the ways that mattered. And amazement, endless amazement that she gave birth to this marvelous person. She marvels at the way her daughter maneuvers herself through the world, a quiet force of resilience and grace, a living testament to every whispered prayer, every hard decision, and every leap of faith taken when the ground beneath them was unsteady and at times, raggedy. It was as if, in raising her daughter, she had also raised herself, shaping each other with invisible hands, bound by a love that no hardship could unravel. Was their relationship perfect? Not at all and there are times when they argue like two alley cats but no matter what, they manage to make a truce and find themselves back to each other, cackling like two old hens.

A few days ago, while thinking about the significance of her daughter’s upcoming birthday, she remembered a song she used to play all the time named “Thanks for My Child” by Cheryl Pepsii Riley. It came out in 1988, a year after she had her daughter, and it truly captured how she felt about being a mother.  The song is about a woman singing about the love she had for her child and even though the relationship between her and the child’s father did not work out, she still loved her baby. It is an old school saying called “mama’s baby, papa’s maybe” and for the longest time, she believed that it was about paternity but she grew to realize that it’s not. It is about a mother’s obligation to the child she brought forth in the world. Marriages and relationships sometimes do not work out, and in a patriarchal society, the bulk of parenting will be placed on the mother whether she likes it or not.

She didn’t see her daughter in person yesterday but they FaceTimed each other periodically all day long like they normally do and she marveled at the beauty of her daughter’s face, still wondering after almost forty years how did this goddess come from her loins. This beautiful, accomplished woman. There were nights when she stayed awake long after the world had gone to sleep, wondering if she was enough, if she could raise a daughter who would believe in herself even when the world didn’t. The same world that had given up on her from the moment she became a teenage baby mama. But time, with its strange mercy, carried them forward. And look her now.

Thanks for My Child – Cheryl Pepsii Riley

You came into my life, You just made everything right.
And even though my man has left me behind,
I don’t regret a thing for having you.

Thanks for my child,
I’m really thanking you, the man above
Thanks for my child
You brought me so much joy
This bundle of love
Thanks for my child
And though your father, He ran away free.

The love I have for you baby, Is the love I have in me
I’ll stay and watch you grow, Yes I will!
I’ll raise you by myself, A one woman show.

You make life worth singing a song
You make life worth singing a song’
With you right here with me,
I ‘ll have the strength to go on.

Thanks for my child
Here we are to today, the years have gone by
Thanks for my child
You grew before my eyes, time after time
Thanks for my child
I’ll hold you in my arms, I hold you close to me

Rock a bye my baby, I’ll rock you to sleep
I understand your language, Your baby talk
You forgot to crawl, Before you walked
There you are just looking so beautiful
And all the while, you are wrapped in blankets
You are my love child.

Thanks for my child
I really thanking you, The man above
Thanks for my child
You brought me so much joy, This bundle of love
Thanks for my child
And though your daddy, He ran away free
The love I have for you baby
Is the love I have in me, Inside of me
The love I have in me
I just know, I’ll never let you go, no, no
No, no, no, oh yeh
Cause you’re my sweet baby

Papa can’t preach, Papa was a rolling stone because
He left his beautiful, Cause he left, us alone
But that’s OK cause I’m you mother baby
I carried you for 9 months, And I’m gonna carry you
Until you can carry yourself On your own
I love you sweetheart, (child) I love you too mommy!