I wish he had never written that song. Or I wish that my mother hadn’t been quite so devout – that she had named me Marigold, or Summer. She was a hippy, my mother, in every way a good Catholic girl can be a hippy. She wore flower print dresses and talked softly of love, the way you whisper secrets you think everyone should know. She kissed a boy in a party in the dark, and married him in the rain on a Friday because he talked about poetry, about changing the world, because he believed in charity and freedom and helping your fellow man. She baked cakes for strangers who slept on our couch when times were hard, printed leaflets and wore hand-knit sweaters and taught me to use macaroni as prayer beads – Hail Mary full of grace, don’t eat the rosary beads, they aren’t cooked.
I am not a problem to be solved. That’s what my mother told me the first time someone sang that stupid song at me. It got worse when I became a nun, obviously, but I heard it first when I was seven and I knocked over a vase in a fit of rage. You are not a problem to be solved, she soothed, and the unflinching compassion of her arms chased me out of the room, to a place where I could not fail to live up to someone’s lofty expectations.
Parents can’t bear to think that they can ruin you with love. That the dreams in their eyes can be prison sentences as much as their opposite; that there are a thousand ways to wreck a spirit that isn’t strong enough to stand on its own. Not that bad parents would have helped – I think I was destined for a place where I could do good and hide my face and know that I would be forgiven, endlessly, as I failed again and again and again.
I like I like failing. I suppose I am a problem, and that’s why I always hear that stupid song. I break the rules not because I want to, but because I know I will eventually, so I might as well get it over with. But as I stand here smoking a cigarette, and I think about the girls back home, about the looks I’ll get when they smell the tobacco on my habit, I know Sister Sarah will sing that stupid song. And I wish he had never written it – or that my mother hadn’t named me Maria.
Image courtesy of Stuart Thursby. Stuart is an art director and photographer, currently adventuring in the wilds of Germany, where this photo was taken. To see more of his work, or to check out his portfolio, please visit StuartThursby.com.