[MrsHoot]

The way it was supposed to be....the way it should have always been...I have always denied being your Mother because that’s what I was brainwashed into doing....it was supposed to be the best thing for you...you are not my child....you BELONG to them...NO!!! YOU ARE NOT A POSSESSION...you should have never been treated as one...today you were where you were supposed to be....today you sat with your family...the ones that should have been part of your life....your being there does not diminish their place in my life...it sets things right.

I think back now at how much I thought I knew back then...I was always so much older than my years...yeah right – what did that get me....knocked up by a teenaged boyfriend who to this very day denies being her Father...well, why not – I denied being her Mother...I still am...I pretending to be this friend...trying not to cross this line...but all I want to do is say “Honey, you were finally where you were supposed to be!”...I AM your MOTHER...YOU ARE MY DAUGHTER...she was one of us...undeniably one of us!

As I sat at the table looking around in amazement...at my three “generations” of daughters...all more than eight years apart for the other...I could see each one in the other...I could see what each one was, is and who she could grow to be...I saw myself in each one...they should have been together all along!

I saw the threads that bind them together...I am more than a DNA factory...they are more than just me...they are each other too...we are bigger than our own bits and pieces...together we form something beautiful...today I saw the magnificent quilt that is my family.

I also morn the loss of my family that will never be...the one that should have been...it will never be the way it was supposed to be...it can only happen in the future...but all those years together, growing up...all those years will be forever lost...it will always separate them...it will always prevent them from being the way it should have been.

Tattered and worn in corners...shiny and new in others...seems showing...a few unmendable tears ...wrinkles sent in by time... the magnificent quilt that is my family.