For Mother's Day I was going to write about my toxic, jealous mother who treated me like a younger sister. Or about being a single mom. But I'll leave those for another time, maybe. Instead, my focus is on two mothers, vastly different but both controversial, and right now both highly visible.
Elizabeth Edwards just appeared on Oprah, talking about her new book, Resilience. Much has been discussed about why she wrote it and why she is staying with her unfaithful husband, John.
My guess would be that motherhood plays a large part in it. She has written and talked about her extreme closeness with her son Wade, who died in a car crash when he was 16. She has home-schooled her younger children to be with them more. And of all the awful things about John Edward's affair, she still seems in deepest denial about Rielle Hunter's baby. She says: "It doesn't look like my children, but I don't have any idea."
But I think she knows. And I think that the idea that John Edward's mistress is the mother of this child who really does look like Edwards, makes Elizabeth take us all through this mess again. I mean, imagine knowing that Rielle and "it" are probably just waiting for her to leave, one way or another. That her children probably have a half-sister who will live on as a reminder of her husband's infidelity, and that the other woman -- whom she will not call by name -- just may become their stepmother.
"It's not about this woman. It's about this family," Elizabeth said on Oprah. And when asked about her kids' response to the affair, " they pretty much know," and "maybe the cancer's a bigger thing in their lives than this woman's passing through." And, "they adore their father, they adore me," and "he's unbelievable with my children."
This may be what drives Elizabeth Edwards to appear again in the media, and to stay with a man who so visibly and deeply betrayed her in a "new reality." The mom thing, the sacred bond she thought she alone shared with her husband. By remaining in the marriage, Elizabeth Edwards is a barrier. Her children will not meet Rielle or the other child while Elizabeth is alive. She is spared that pain, at least. She has retained a smidgeon of control.
Another motherhood control issue, far less poignant but related in terms of Mothers Day: Joan Rivers is in the finals of the reality show Celebrity Apprentice this Sunday. Much is made that Joan stormed out of the Trump boardroom and threatened to quit when her frankly untalented, unfunny and sometimes obnoxious daughter was kicked off. For years Joan has propped up Melissa, her only child, in co-hosting assignments, and in constant references and endorsements. And this time Joan couldn't control things.
I have a personal vision of Joan Rivers, many cosmetic surgeries ago, which focuses on her motherhood. In the late 1980s, a friend said he'd join me and my man of the moment on a double-date. I was excited, but when he walked in with Joan Rivers I wasn't so sure. She was recovering from her husband Edgar's recent suicide, and was host of her own show and much in the news.
Does the word "demure" remind you of Joan Rivers? How about quiet, classy, thoughtful? She was just that, to my surprise. My son was attending the University of Pennsylvania then, and so was Melissa. And that was most of what we talked about for the time we spent together: our children.
When I told my sons about Joan Rivers being so unexpectedly normal, they didn't believe me, so a month or so later I brought them to meet her backstage; she was starring in a play by Neil Simon, Broadway Bound. When she met my boys she peppered them with thoughtful questions Again, really different from her stage persona.
When we left I asked my skeptical sons what they thought, and they said "She's not obnoxious. She's a mom."
And so when I watch Joan Rivers (maybe) on her reality show finale this Mothers Day, I'll see past the brash, over nip-tucked comedienne. I'll remember the mother. Both she and the suffering Elizabeth Edwards remind us that no matter our station or fame or riches or glamour, wherever we may be in the circle of life, for many of us it is motherhood that remains a center, a constant, to hold onto and protect like a lioness in even the toughest times.