Some years ago, I was complaining to a friend about my mother’s unutterably irritating habit of — well, I don’t recall what the habit was or why it irked me so, but I do remember embarking on a florid explanation of my grievance because of how abruptly it ended. There I was, getting warmed up, when my friend raised a hand.
“Nope,” she said, “Not another word.”
“But she — she –”
Her eyes brightened. “I can’t listen to you gripe about your mother,” she said. “Don’t take it personally. I can’t listen to anyone gripe about anyone’s mother.”
She went on: “My mother died ten years ago. I would give anything – anything — to have the luxury of complaining about her again. So please, say only nice things about your mother, okay?”
The rebuke brought me up short, I’ll tell you. I wish I could say that it cured me of the daughterly tendency to find fault, but my own bad habit was too well entrenched for an instant fix. Yet the incident has had a slow-release effect: I’ve never forgotten it, and with each passing Mother’s Day I am definitely a step farther from my old grumbly practices.
It is easy to see other people’s flaws. It is even easier to find those flaws maddening. And it can be maliciously satisfying to accumulate lists of “And then she saids!” and engage in what our family calls “feasting” on other people’s shortcomings.
But it’s wrong. It’s wrong not because other people (especially relatives) don’t have flaws, and not even wrong because logic dictates that we ourselves, being relatives, must also have maddening flaws.
It’s wrong because, except in the most egregious cases, focusing on a person’s flaws gives only the most distorted and unfair picture of who that person is. And it means that you risk missing the truth period. For a failing, when turned on its head, can look an awful lot like a virtue. But you have to make the effort; like love itself, noticing other people’s good qualities sometimes takes an act of will.
For every woman exasperated by her “nosy” mother, there’s another who grieves because her mother isn’t really that interested in her life. For every man who chafes at his father’s hero-worship, there’s another who still yearns for his father’s approval. Those embarrassing grandparents who show up for every little darn thing — what a loving counterpoint to a couple I heard about this week who, to their daughter’s pain, chose to go on a cruise rather than attend their grandson’s graduation.
So, nope, not another word. It’s Mother’s Day. Please, say only nice things about your mother, okay?
Meghan Cox Gurdon’s column appears on Sunday and Thursday. She can be contacted at [email protected].
