I was only waiting for an opportunity for a final rupture. And, once evening, as Mamma was setting out next day for Combray, where she was to attend the deathbed of one of her mother's sisters, leaving me behind so that I might continue to benefit, as my grandmother would have wished, from the sea air, I had announced to her that I had irrevocably decided not to marry Albertine and would very soon stop seeing her. I was glad to have been able, by these words, to gratify my mother's wishes on the eve of her departure. She had made no secret of the fact that she was indeed extremely gratified. I also had to have things out with Albertine.
Marcel Proust, Cities of the Plain, p. 1150
We've begun "Chapter Four" and it seems, at least momentarily, that Marcel is a man of his word. Marcel makes it clear to his mother ("to gratify my mother's wishes") that he is ending things with Albertine, which makes her happy. In all the relationships of my life - whether the woman was merely passing smoothly through my life or I was passing smoothly through hers - I've only encountered one mother who actively didn't like me. To be fair, I was twenty-three years older than the daughter in question, although she was thirty, as compared to say seventeen, so it wasn't a complete replay of Manhattan. Also, truthfully, she didn't dislike me until she found out that said daughter and I were an item. Still, it hung over the relationship like a dark cloud, and was certainly one of the things that helped kill it in the end. I felt for said daughter because she was tremendously devoted to her parents, so it was hard for me to get mad at her. Plus, part of it was certainly my fault because I had reached the point in my life where I didn't have the patience to try and bridge that gap (I mean, I offered to show her my CV, isn't that enough?). As we've discussed before, one of the hardest things for any parent to come to grips with is that there comes a point when it's simply not their business anymore. My son and I will have this serious conversations about his future and I'm happy to give my advice if he asks for it, but I always end up throwing in some disclaimer like, "OK, this is what I think, but keep in mind that soon, soon, all too soon I will have shuffled off this mortal coil and it won't matter what I think about anything - this has to be about you." When we stop being parents, or at least having the authority of being a parent, it's one more proof that we're getting older and it's one more proof of how we matter less and less. Arguably, what the mother in question should have cared about was that a reasonably good man who was reasonably successful loved said daughter and wanted to spend his reasonably good life with her, but she couldn't get there. That said, maybe she was just a really good judge of character and did her daughter a tremendous favor.
Oh, and how about this statement for famous last words: "I also had to have things out with Albertine."?
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