On Friday, my mother will turn 61. With each passing year I take a closer and closer look at my parents' mortality. This may sound morbid to some of you, but others of you are probably nodding your heads in understanding. The older my parents get (my father will be 61 in October), the more I think about my own lot in life and the lots of my siblings. As some of you may know, I do have two biological siblings. A sister, 37; and a brother, 38. I don't have a working relationship with either, and I mainly know about their lives through the bits and pieces I get from our parents (even now it feels weird saying our parents). Both my brother and sister each have a child, and my sister has been married for 15 years. Now you may be wondering how my parents' mortality ties in with my brother and sister. You see, the older my parents get, and the more single I get (okay, so maybe singleness doesn't really increase, but occasionally it feels that way); the more resentment becomes a concern. Given our family medical history, I'm somewhat concerned about how many "good years" my parents have left.
The resentment comes in when I start thinking about all the things my parents have shared with my significantly older siblings. They (my sibs) got my parents when they were a young, fresh, newly wed couple. Both got the "new parent" smell. They were involved with all kinds of things, and their childhoods were like the Golden Ages. They got to go through their 20s and finding their way in life when my parents were middle aged. My father walked my sister down the isle. I remember when he had "the talk" with my future brother-in-law before he proposed. Facing my parents' mortality as a single woman scares the crap out of me. I think back to how they took care of my paternal grandfather during his last years of life, and I know they couldn't have done it without each other. Christians, I know we aren't supposed to worry about tomorrow, nor what we shall eat, drink or wear, because God will handle it, but that doesn't mean that I don't.
What if my parents pass away before I finally get established in a career, marriage, or in some other way? What if the Lord FINALLY blesses me with children, and my parents are there to share in that? Sometimes I find myself anxious to give them grandchildren just to "make it up to them". They were definitely part of the movement of "grandparents as parents". They practically had to raise my nephew (who is 15 now), because in someways, I feel my sister wasn't ready to be a mother...and she didn't chose a husband wisely. They haven't gotten to be just grandparents, because I was only 10 when my nephew was born. So not only did they have the mid-life child to raise, but they had to start over again with a grandchild that lived with them off and on.
I guess, if I'm honest, I'd say I want to make them proud. I want to be the child that has a good working relationship with both of them, went to college, got married, had a family and was just a well behaved, Christian woman. I want them to see that before it's too late. So this is where the resentment that my brother and sister "got them first", comes from. I feel as if I now have half the time to be 4 times better. Not to mention, I don't want to face their mortality as a single person because I know I will NEED the love and support of someone who's there "for better or for worse". This may sound old fashioned, but I sometimes sense that my father worries about whether or not I'll be taken care of if anything ever happened to them. Just something to think about: what do you want your parents to see happen in your life before they pass? Brings new meaning to the words "die happy", huh?
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