My Year With Proust - Day 6

"It is a long time, too, since my father has been able to tell Mamma to 'Go with the child.' Never again will such hours be possible for me. But of late I have been increasingly able to catch, if I listen attentively, the sound of the sobs which I had the strength to control in my father's presence, and which broke out only when I found myself alone with Mamma. Actually, their echo has never ceased; it is only because life is now growing more and more quiet round about me that I hear them afresh, like those convent bells which are so effectively drowned during the day by the noises of the streets that one would suppose them to have been stopped for ever, until they sound out again through the silent evening air."

Marcel Proust, Swann's Way, p. 38

This is one of my favorite passages so far, not only because it is beautifully written, certainly, but also because my own mother has been much in my thoughts lately. My son and I just spent the better part of a week with her when we visited my sister's house in Savannah (which will doubtless pop up in its own postings soon enough).  My mother is very frail, and has reached that point where every time I see her I fear it might be the last. I guess we always had a pretty good relationship, mainly because I don't think we ever fought much (which may relate to my earlier musings about my tendency to not really be there). Mainly I remember her being very unhappy for years, which, upon reflection, we all played a role in exacerbating, if not necessarily creating. I think we favored my father, which increasingly isolated my mother. One time when we were getting ready to head out on a family vacation she was in a terrible mood and I found myself saying to her, "I'm not your enemy." Of all of the thousands and thousands of exchanges we've had over the years, why do I remember that one was distinctly?  Partially, I'm sure, because it is a rather odd thing to say to one's mother, but maybe even then I had a sense, albeit unconsciously, that I was playing a role in her anger by not being more supportive and present.