I should make a poll, but I am just so lazy.

[constance]

I've been kind of quiet lately because I've been working on a Mother's Day present for my sentimental mother. It is a homemade project, a biggish one, which I am calling "One Hundred Letters." I've bought a photo album, the kind with plastic pockets for photos, and in each pocket I will put one letter, a story of us. I think my mother will love it, but I am having a moment of crisis because I can't decide on something, and I want you to help me.

So these letters, they are memories and impressions of my childhood and adulthood from the daughter perspective of a mother-daughter relationship. I was lucky to have had a engaged and committed parents, so I have tons of stories--more than enough to make it to a hundred, no matter what--but I'm not sure whether to include good stories and uncomfortable ones, or only stick to the good ones.

Now, I'm not talking about traumas, or family skeletons. I know that a mother's day present is not the place to talk about the worst moments of either of our lives. And I wouldn't include anything uncomfortable that didn't have something of redeeming value in it; I'm only talking about the things that might not reflect one or another of us--or either of us--in the rosiest light. The time I threw a candle at my mother. The time she forgot my brother at a gas station (BEFORE YOU CALL THE POLICE THERE IS A GOOD EXPLANATION FOR THIS I PROMISE YOU).

So that's the crisis of indecision. Should I include the not-so-good stuff with the good? What do you think?

Comments

[tofty.livejournal.com]

My mother is the sort to savor, I think. She will read them slowly, so she can take them all in, and in order, because she never does things out of order.

One day, I shall tell you the gas station story. I warn you: though it contains no actual ill intent, it is not a story that reflects well on the passengers in that van (me, my mother, and my brother).