Dear Mama,

I love you. All that I have ever wanted was to feel like you were proud of me.  I tried to be who you wanted.  I found that didn’t work. Then I tried being myself.  I found that I was happier,  but you still were not proud of me.  Mama I am fourty one,  and I have succeeded.  I am published.  I am usually a happy soul.  Yet when I fall,  and I do occasionally fall.  It is your voice in my ear,  telling me you expected it all along.  When I get rejected for my poetry, (as rejections are normal for the writer to recieve) that everyone else would tell me I wrote so well?  I hear you telling me that you didn’t want to hear it because of how depressing it was.

Mama,  I have published five volumes of poetry,  three children’s books,  and a novella.  You know that family have hardly even acted like it mattered?  I am doing what I told you I wanted to do at nine.  I am a writer. So I may never be a  novelist,  children’s books still need written. I have never asked for much.  Just a hey,  that is awesome.  Or even… Uh sharing it on social media that you have a daughter who is printed.  So I put space between us.  I admit that I was tired of feeling like you just didn’t care. I deserve to be someone who is cared about. I’m sorry that I was never the daughter you wanted,  but Mama,  I have always just been me.

Love always,

Your daughter.