Something my father told me often but my mother never did.
But it still sounded like it came with an unspoken clarifier
For a daughter. I’m proud of you for a daughter.
As if the bar wasn’t that high anyway, for silly little girls.
There was no prodigal son – though my mother always puffed him up to be.
Every small thing he did was somehow better than anything I’d ever done or could do.
I was her daughter after all – so I was competition.
Not that I had any desire to be.
I’ll never forget when my father told my husband, not knowing I could overhear, in a conversation about me “She’s probably just on her period. You know how women are when they’re on their periods”.
I believe my husband when he says he is proud of me.
We’ve got a long way to go – but we have come a long way too, together.
Laughs and Lobotomies 