Page 65 - My Memoirs - Max Kurz
P. 65
2007-2010 Onto Green Pastures
I have not spoken much about my immediate family namely my sister Sabine, my brother Louie, and my Mum. They are my family, we each had our own lives to live, our own families going in different directions. However, the connection was always there. We did not agree on philosophical issues related to religion, we had different interests, in time we learnt to accept our differences. What connects us is still strong and always will be. My mum passed away on the 28th October 2009. It was a very sad day for me because we were never close. My mum lived with unresolved guilt, I lived with unresolved issues towards my mother, and neither one of us knew how to resolve events that had shaped and influenced our lives. However, we did have some valuable and important moments in her final years, where the two of us would just sit together and impromptu conversations would evolve with Mum saying things that she obviously always wanted to say and just could not have said previously. For me it provided some clarity in what was otherwise a difficult situation, it saddened me to see her suffering, with the realisation that we are all a product of the environment that we are borne into, and the influences and experiences that shape our lives. Mum spent her life living to fulfill the expectations of others, working hard, with little or no time for herself or the realisation of her own self-worth. On top of that having to live with guilt.
My son recently asked me, “Did Mum love her grandchildren?”. It was not a strange or unusual question, it was understandable, because my Mum did not know how to demonstrate her love. I have no doubt how she felt about all her family, and that she in her own way loved them all. She was not conscious of her lack of emotion towards them. Sadly, my mother felt inadequate, not able to articulate her feelings, more concerned about doing the right thing for others and what was expected of her.
I miss not having a mother and father and all those wonderful experiences that we take so much for granted until we do not have it. However, my parents did leave us a legacy in their own way. One only must look at Sabine, her limitless energy, love, and devotion to family. She was my confidante, who at times served as my pseudo mother always concerned for my welfare. She was the matriarch of us all. All of us are committed to family first and foremost, maybe not in the way that our children would always like, nonetheless, we love and are protective of them.
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