My mother taught me that pride is not the opposite of shame. The opposite of shame is not pride—it is humility. And humility, real humility, is willing to crawl.
I believe my mother understood, on a level deeper than psychology, that some apologies cannot be made from a position of height. In Filipino culture, hierarchy is everything. The parent stands above the child. The elder sits while the younger kneels. To apologize from a chair, from a position of standing, would have still been an apology from the throne. the day my mother made an apology on all fours
I grew up fearing her silences more than her shouts. When we fought—about my curfew, my "rebellious" choice to major in English literature instead of nursing, my white boyfriend she disapproved of—the resolution was never an apology. It was simply a return to normalcy, an unspoken agreement to pretend the fight never happened. The air would clear, but the debris would remain, buried under the rug. The fight that led to the crawl had been brewing for years, but it erupted over something small. It always does. My mother taught me that pride is not the opposite of shame
It is the sound of love finally learning to say, I am sorry. I am sorry. I am sorry. I believe my mother understood, on a level
"Lola would have wanted it to stay with our blood," she said, her voice flat. "Not for… mixed grandchildren."
"I am apologizing," she said, her words muffled by the linoleum. "Not because I am weak. But because I am dying inside this pride. I was wrong about Marcus. I was wrong about your life. I was wrong about the rosary. I am sorry. I am sorry for every silence. I am sorry for every time I chose to be right over being your mother."