When my mother handed me the notebook, my excitement soared. It was a precious relic from her journey to Omaha, Nebraska in the 1970s. Curiously enough, I had just embarked on the same trip, flying to New York City and then taking a Greyhound bus across the Midwest. My purpose? To delve into the evolution of women’s rights over the span of a generation, and to gain a deeper understanding of my mother in order to tell our collective story in a book. This notebook was a treasure trove of primary sources, preserving her private thoughts from nearly half a century ago.
However, as I held the thin yellow pad in my hands, I realized that something was amiss. Pages had been removed, meticulously torn away as if someone had purposefully redacted them. It felt like a document of utmost national security, reluctantly unveiled through a freedom of information request made by me, her daughter.
My quest to unearth the details of my mother’s life, paralleled by my own Greyhound bus journey across Middle America, began with a small square Polaroid. In my childhood, there was an old wooden desk in our living room, overflowing with family photographs in various forms of disarray. It was like diving into a sea of memories. As I sifted through the snapshots, hoping to find evidence of my father’s presence before he left us when I was a baby, I unexpectedly encountered a version of my mother I had never seen before.
In that particular photo, taken in 1974, she stood on the shores of Lake Michigan. She exuded youth and vitality, wearing denim hotpants and a cropped halter neck, with a smile as radiant as the glistening waters behind her. The tired single parent I had known was transformed into a hopeful young woman, brimming with potential and seemingly ready to conquer the world.
My goal was to uncover who this youthful version of my mother was and how she evolved into the steadfast and loving figure I cherished. The timing of our respective journeys was no coincidence either, as they coincided with pivotal moments in the struggle for abortion rights in America. My mother embarked on her trip the year after Roe v Wade, while I traversed the country on the cusp of its potential repeal, nearly half a century later. The hope that saturated the Polaroid undoubtedly permeated the air of that moment, which was alarmingly absent as I embarked on my own journey into an America still reeling from the effects of the Trump administration.
As I delved deeper into my mother’s notebook, I discovered the defiant removal of pages from her past. They had been excised as if to conceal secrets and protect them from prying eyes. Yet, as I traversed seven states, covering 1,300 miles and engaging in countless conversations with women fighting to preserve their freedoms, I began to comprehend that the clues to the young woman I sought were right in front of me all along.
My mother’s adventurous spirit, which had led her to Nebraska, guided our family on night train rides through the Alps and long drives to the southern regions of France during our childhood. Her determination to experience a world beyond her own manifested in her work, where she would collect my brother and me from our home in Surrey and drive us to Brixton, ensuring that we understood life beyond our comfortable bubble. Her unwavering belief in endless possibilities shone through as she encouraged both my brother and me to pursue our passions in higher education. I realized that life had not transformed her into someone else, as I had mistakenly assumed. Every aspect of that young woman in the Polaroid remained intrinsic to her character, and she had tried to pass on those qualities to us.
While my journey reaffirmed my understanding of my mother, it also became an opportunity for self-discovery. Unbeknownst to me, by questioning “Who are you?” as a daughter to my mother, I was also questioning “Who am I?” The trip transformed into a voyage of understanding my own potential and discovering a version of myself that I had doubted existed.
“You’re braver than you realize,” my partner told me as we bid farewell at Heathrow airport. And as the weeks unfolded, I began to believe him. I harnessed the hope and possibility embodied by the young woman in the photo and used it to propel myself into a series of exhilarating experiences: conversing with a blues band in a Chicago bar until the wee hours of the morning, engaging with seasoned individuals in dive bars in Indianapolis, having conversations with young girls at a pro-choice rally in St. Louis, and listening to stories on the porch of a septuagenarian who performed illegal abortions before Roe v Wade. It dawned on me that the most thrilling endeavor I had ever undertaken, and the most ambitious journalistic project I had ever pursued, was all due to my mother. In my pursuit of her, I had finally discovered the courage to chase my own dreams.
A few months after my return home, I received the incredible news that I was pregnant. Around the same time, my mother handed me the faded notebook from her journey, revealing the withheld state secrets. Initially, I felt taken aback and mildly offended. What was she hiding? Yet, with the passage of time and the challenges of new motherhood consuming my days, I began to see the redacted notebook in a new light.
I came to realize that there are certain stories I don’t want my son to know, not only because they serve no purpose or are too embarrassing and shameful, but also because they are mine. Amidst the chaos of caring for a newborn, I witnessed my sense of self dissipate, as if the constant tide of giving everything I had to keep my baby alive eroded the walls of my identity. In order to fortify ourselves, it is only natural to keep some things solely for our own existence. Our children cannot possibly know every facet of our being. My motherhood does not define every part of me, just as her motherhood doesn’t define all aspects of her. This realization made me question whether my journey into my mother’s past had come dangerously close to trespassing.
Gradually, I started seeing the notebook not as a symbol of absence, but as a fulfillment. As much as my mother’s journey had paved the way for me to become a braver and bolder version of myself, the notebook she handed me finally made me comprehend the limitations of the stories we can gather about ourselves when we seek them solely through the lens of our parents. Unexpectedly, this realization brought my journey to completion. The fact that she lives an independent life outside of her relationship with me proved that she is so much more than just my mother and that her existence encompasses a world far greater than my understanding of it. Finally, I began to recognize her as an individual, detached from her role as my mother. Perhaps this meant I had finally matured.
My expedition across the Midwest could only reveal so much about the woman behind the Polaroid, but thanks to that young woman’s influence, I ventured out into the world and had the adventure of a lifetime. I returned home with an unwavering conviction that adventures are not solely meant for others, but for me as well. Now, as a mother, I earnestly desire the same belief for my son. I want him to understand that he comes from a lineage of women who firmly believe in the vastness of the world and the imperative of exploration. Just like my mother and I embarked on our solo journeys on Greyhound buses, I hope he too will dare to embark on his own, whatever they may be.
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