Learning To Love Marigolds

I always hated marigolds. They were a perennial favorite of my mother’s, and she planted them in the flower beds of our little home every year, without fail. It was a small rectangular bed, carved out of the yard, next to the worn gravel driveway, and edged with railroad ties. Yellow and orange, and sometimes trimmed with red. I think they made her happy, the bright colors. A beacon of hope in an otherwise humdrum existence. But as for me, I hated them. I wanted the pretty reds, and purples, and pinks of other flowers like lilies, irises, or even begonias. Or sweet smelling roses. Basically, anything that my grandmother, my father’s mother, grew. Yellow and orange were, after all, basic and ugly colors. And marigolds smelled bad.

And it was my job to plant them. My little sister needed do nothing that might soil her perfect hands. But, me, I was the workhorse. The strong one. “Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated” and all that. I’d read that line once in a book. Not the actual Holy Bible, mind you, although I understand that it came from a biblical parable. But I read it in a novel. And, oh, how it hit home. I was the hated one. For. Reasons. Reasons? I wasn’t really sure.

Through the years my mother and I tried our best to get along. Well, I did, anyway. I can’t speak for her. After all, she was, and is, a narcissist, and behaves in every way that comes along with that. She’s not the super destructive, malignant type. But she’s toxic, nonetheless. My father was a very flawed man, and an addict to boot. But my mother’s behavior is what drove him to that. Of that I’m sure.

Nothing I ever did - or, really, nothing anyone every did - was ever good enough. I was Valedictorian of my high school class. Well, that’s nice, but you got an A- in this class. Why? A star athlete in tennis? Well, it didn’t get you a scholarship, did it now… Oh. Engineering as a career path? You really need to consider Medicine, that means money. That person you’re dating? Hmmmm….. Why don’t you go for someone with wealth and status? My sister, well, she was the golden child who could do no wrong, no matter how wrong she actually did.

Uggh. But nothing I ever did was good enough. Fortunately I graduated from high school at the age of seventeen and was able to escape. To college. To new experiences. To a new life outside of the tiny little town with the poor school and and the poor ugly house with the ugly, stinky marigolds, and away from the constant fear that I was never going to be good enough.

I would spend the next twenty years trying to move forward from the pain that she caused me. Trying to find my own self worth. To find my way in the world, without the benefit of a wealthy parent or benefactor, but only on my own hard work and merits, and with all that baggage.

And I did it. I ended up finishing college with a Bachelor of Science in Engineering. But, then, my self doubts hit again when I began working a full-time professional job. And, so, in terror I retreated back to school, and ended up with a legal degree. Of course, my chosen legal path was never good enough for my mother either, as my grades were not sufficient to garner the eye-popping salaries afforded by “big” firms. And so I settled somewhere “less.”’ Somewhere I felt comfortable. Maybe it didn’t meet my wildest hopes and expectations, but it was an honest living, and a place where I was happy. But never, ever, good enough.

Then, I met him. Gabriel. Funny, I’d always thought to name my son that, should I be fortunate enough to have one. But, adult Gabriel was funny in an off-the-wall sort of way. He came from a background similar to mine, that is to say, lower middle class. And we understood each other. Like me, he had big dreams, even if he didn’t know how to achieve them just yet. We got married rather quickly, within a year of meeting. But we knew it was just right. And so we took the plunge, on a beach, with only close family present. My mother, of course, told me what an awful mistake I was making, and spoke poorly of my new husband. Just like me, and perhaps even more so, he would never be quite up to par. I defended him always, and she finally gave up, even as our interactions were reduced by me, for my own self-preservation, to little more than quick calls on holidays.

After five years of marriage, we had our first child. My little boy named Gabriel. He was perfect in every way. And, of course, my mother claimed him as “hers.” She asked “how’s my boy,” and “helpfully” counseled my on every aspect of parenting. Never mind that she’d raised only girls, and poorly, at that. But, again, she knew best, of course. In her own narcissistic mind she was far superior in all ways and had lots of useful knowledge to impart. And, so, out of more self-preservation, I listened. And then i just did whatever I wanted to do anyway.

Then the second child came, a little girl named Beatrice. By that point, my mother had largely realized that she would have to stop with her nonsense if she wanted to continue to forge any sort of relationship with her grandchildren. And, as she calmed, I noticed that I did as well. Rather than being on the defensive all of the time, I was able to start to acknowledge her for her efforts. We had some great talks then. Of course, the stories I heard from her were only ever half-truths, as the narcissist is always careful not to divulge anything too vulnerable. But I was able to read between the lines just enough to get it. Just as she’d damaged me in my childhood, she’d been deeply, thoroughly damaged by her parents and other family in her life. Funny, isn’t it, how the cycle continues?

Finally, at the start of my fourth decade here on this planet I was able to understand her. And to let her into the lives of my children in controlled ways that would allow and even promote relationships, without giving an opportunity for harm. And, it was largely successful. She died before my kids were old enough to see through her facade and to understand what she really was. My children were, after all, six and eight when she passed. The drinking and the smoking took a toll on her body, and she died at the young age of 64. But, at least, my children got the chance to know her, and to see her as a good human being. Flawed, for sure, but infinitely more mellow and absent the (what I later realized to be unintentional) cruelty that had existed throughout my childhood.

She was found on the floor of her kitchen by her next door neighbor. Apparently she had needed baking soda to make some damn banana bread, and the neighbor knocked on the door, only to see a foot and call emergency services.

The funeral was rainy. Of course it would be….. But I stood there, alongside my sister and the rest of my family. I made a eulogy and surprised myself with the love that came out of it. And, as she was lowered into her final resting place, I threw down her favorite, a marigold flower. Yellow, like the sun, for happiness on a dark day. In some ways, we had only just started to get to know one another and to become friends. In others, I was afraid that we were the same person. But, at the end, I felt at peace, for the first time in a long time, and I knew that she would be ok wherever she was, and that I would be ok, too.