Jan 12
There is always so much talk about the sins of the fathers, but it is the sins of the mothers that are the most difficult to avoid repeating.
Melanie Benjamin, Alice I Have Been, 2010
As she gently fingered the frame on her desk, Jennifer Shepard pondered why everyone spoke of the sins of the fathers.
She had loved her father – still did – and had enjoyed growing up as an Army brat. The moving house constantly, changing schools and having to make new friends had never bothered her; her father had been calling her a social butterfly long before she had understood the phrase. Her father had loved his job and she had loved him and so she had not minded the constant upheaval.
He had installed a sense of duty in her, as well as the belief that hard work would get her wherever she wanted to go. He had taught her how to survive in a man's world and that she was just as good, if not better, than them.
The sins of her mother were the ones she was most anxious to avoid. Despite growing up in a loving household until her mother's untimely demise, Jenny had still felt the tension between her parents. Her mother had been full of ambition, a trait she had passed to her daughter, but felt unfulfilled. She had given everything up to be with the man she loved, followed him all over the country and supported him completely. Yet sometimes Jenny could sense her bitterness and resentment at giving up so much to preserve her family.
Her own abandoning the love of her life was fueled by a desire not to turn into her mother. He was the senior agent, and despite her then willingness to give everything up and follow him to the ends of the world if need be, she had known that eventually she would have begun to resent him. She could not do that; she loved him too much. And so she had chosen another path, perhaps not the best one but certainly one away from the particular form of heartache she feared.
After all, heartache was only supposed to be temporary if they were apart…