His Mother

"They think I'm his mother."

The thought blazes through my mind on a regular basis. Being out alone with my nephew always proves a joy and a nightmare. He is the definitive happy toddler, still young enough to be pleased with everything and not yet going through a shy phase.

Whether we are wandering through a hallway or waiting in the grocery store, they all think I'm his mother. Despite being mistaken for a teenager about fifty percent of the time walking around with a toddler ages me into a young mother. Strangers smile and wave, some ask his name, some shake his hand as he stretches it out to them in greeting; then, before they leave, each and every one looks into my eyes and smiles knowingly, happily, the smile one parent gives to another. It is the 'secret handshake' of parenthood.

While I'm smiling back and encouraging Benjamin to wave, my mind runs through every fantasy I never used to entertain. The joy of motherhood, the ecstacy of molding a small, new soul into a good person. While I'm holding my nephew, singing a soft song into his tiny ears, my mind revels in his unconditional love and the love I could give back if I had the chance. The everyday details make me so happy, the idea of putting him down for his nap, the idea of being the one he reaches for first, the chance to bake for him, to knit for him, to live for him.

Sitting in a quiet corner of a hotel he points at the lights, and I use as many Spanish phrases as I can, trying to impart the beautiful language into his understanding. It's a shock to realize how much he understands, given how few clear words he says. Bath, read, sing, sit, food, sleep, gentle, kiss; all concepts he understands well, though his words are more about sound and tone that true language. Now is the time when we start tiptoeing around our speech, censoring out the 'bad' words, emphasizing the good concepts, avoiding the word 'no.'

If they think I'm his mother, then why can't I act like one? There are so many answers to that tiny question. The gap between an aunt and a mother is too wide to cross and the way is barred to me. The closeness of two sisters will never go that far. My opinions will always be discounted, my suggestions will always be ignored, and my need to help will always be seen as overstepping my role.

But when we're alone they think I'm his mother, and we will always want what we can't have.

My body, unlike my sister's strong livegiving form, gives a half-usefullness that afflicts we who are broken. My body fills with toxins on a daily basis, a permanant basis, and refuses the simplest acts of standing and sitting upright. Once I prayed for infertility as a way to ease worry over unwanted pregnancy and a wish to be rid of the menstrual cycle. Now I pray for it again, wondering why Medicare doesn't allow me to be 'fixed' in order to avoid the costs of raising the child of a person who will never work again.

Instead they paid for my abortion and for the subsequent therapy sessions. Now the pain boils up when I remember that I am fertile, that I could have brought something beautiful into the world. The love that surrounds my nephew could have been doubled, and only two other people in my life know. Now when my nephew smiles, when he kisses my nose, when he snuggles up next to me and babbles his baby talk, I think primarily of the joy I will miss out on, the joy I will not have the chance to give, and all that I can not be.

They think I'm his mother; a mother, not just a maiden aunt slowing turning into an old maid aunt. I take it as a compliment - the idea that I could have such a beautiful, happy little boy.