She has lots of different ways to remind me to breathe. These still my thoughts, and remind me that I’m loved in a way that weighs as much as whatever heartbreak, stress or exhaustion I’m experiencing
M
y favourite photograph of my mother, Linda, and I was taken at my wedding. I’m not sure we realised we were being photographed. Two artist friends were walking around with film cameras, shooting the kind of things they knew that Hiraki, my husband, and I would like. My mother and I are standing shoulder to shoulder, under a young tree. I love how the shapes of our necklines are like a sartorial call and response, how our smiles are so peaceful, how we are both looking outwards.
It’s not that this picture captures a specific moment. Rather, it taps into a certain quality of my mother’s love that is timeless, unbound by circumstance or context. She has always loved my sister and I exactly like this: gently, spaciously and alongside.
Because I’ve lived in a different country from her for longer than we lived together, her voice on the phone and the way she says things are a massive part of how I have experienced that love throughout my adult life. She has several phrases she always says, which feel like facets of the same well-polished gem. She tells me to keep short accounts – that is, to forgive easily. If I’m down (she always knows before I’ve told her), she tells me that it’s just a temporary loss of perspective. She often insists that I buy myself some flowers and “smell the daisies”.
