Master Story Weaver
“I am all of them, they are all of me...”
She would drive me batshit crazy. I had no sense of humor and even less patience for her embellishments. Why did my mom’s retelling of the events we both witnessed, have all these extra tidbits, no one else in the room saw?
‘Ma, that shit didn’t even happen.’
Despite my teenage proclamations to become more “ladylike”, i.e. less like my mother, I swore off swearing, but occasionally cussed if the situation warranted an expletive or two. My mother’s tall tales drew out the dormant profanity in me. Incessant, four-letter-word laced, youthful protests were a waste of both our time. My mama remains, to this day, her own unfettered self — sumptuously humorous with a bottomless handbag of obscenities and gussied-up family anecdotes.
As a grown woman, I respect her commitment to preserving and revealing her people’s narratives, however exaggerated they may be. What my adolescent self did not recognize was that I was living in the presence of a mighty alchemist — someone who could take the ordinary stuff of life and spin gold. My mother is a master story weaver. And her oral dramas, culled from personal biography, gave birth to the writer in me.
I’ve been collecting (and verifying) her accounts to produce a photobook series — a gathering of self-portraits and texts, including essays and memories, that rekindle our ancestry through the larger framework of African American history.
If you’re reading this mom, know that I heard every word, and hold each story sacred.
Happy Quarantined Mother’s Day!
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Written by Malika Ali Harding
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