The woman no one remembers

The Boston Herald

BEVERLY BECKHAM

It was a small ad that ran in the theater section of the New York Times last Thursday. The graphics were simple; nothing clever stood out. Even the words were old, the promotion a cliche: "Cyrano. The Musical. The Greatest Love Of All." And yet it has stuck with me, nagged at me. “The Greatest Love of All?”

Most everyone knows the story of Cyrano de Bergerac, a love-struck young man who pens eloquent, romantic letters to the woman he loves, only in another man's name. Because he is ugly, Cyrano fears rejection. Because he doesn't trust in the power of love, Cyrano hides his identity. And so he writes love letters for a handsome man who uses his words and emotions to woe Roxanne.

It is a tender, sad and sentimental story full of good-intentions, selflessness and devotion. But the greatest love of all? I hardly think so.

Cyrano's devotion, however remarkable, doesn't hold a candle to a mother's love. The greatest love of all is this: rearing a child, rearranging a life for a child, teaching, loving and guiding and nurturing a child, then one day standing back and letting that child go.

I watch my friend Lynne, a mother of two, Kiley 4, and Michael, just 8 months old, and I see her constantly giving, doing, bathing, dressing, comforting, reassuring. She reads to Kiley, plays with her, takes her to school, listens to her, all the while carrying Michael around and holding him because he doesn't sleep and hasn't slept since he was born, not for more than an hour at a time. So Lynne doesn't sleep either and she's tired and has lost weight and some days she just drags around because it's getting to her, this 24-hour duty.

But she loves her children, loves them more than she ever thought possible and though this is a bad time, she wouldn't trade what she has for anything in the world. She doesn't travel anymore or go to the movies or out to dinner. She doesn't read or talk on the phone. All she does is mother. She does this not for what she will get from it, but solely for love.

Would Cyrano have loved Roxanne if she had cried all night, every night, for eight months? Would Cyrano have loved Roxanne if he couldn't write anymore, if the time he once had for himself was devoured by commitment and responsibility? If he had to feed, change, read to, comfort and entertain her? Would Cyrano or any man or woman put up with this from the person they say they love? Basic motherhood, the garden-variety kind, that's all we're talking here.

Lisa's kids are 6 and 4. The 6-year-old, Michelle, came home crying from school the other day because her cousin, who is her best friend, wouldn't sit with her on the bus. "I felt awful," Lisa said. "Here she was getting off the bus in tears and my heart just broke for her. It was the first time something like this ever happened."

Lisa comforted Michelle, hugged her and talked to her and suggested she call her cousin and tell her how she felt. Michelle did and the cousin explained that Michelle was her best friend in the whole wide world. "But I see you all the time," she said. "I don't see my other friends except on the bus. That's why I wanted to sit with them." Michelle's father bought his daughter a new Polly Pocket on the way home from work. "I understand you've had a bad day," he said, giving it to her. The bad day got better. Michelle went to bed smiling.

Lisa had a bad day, too. But mothers are expected to have bad days. No one writes plays about this. No one even notices. What's heartbreaking and unfair and far more tragic than the fictitious story of Cyrano is the real-life story of kids growing up and their mothers getting old and now needing their children to love and understand and care for them. And the children don't. The sons whom they held and comforted countless nights, the daughters whose tears they dried and whose hearts they ached to mend at least a million times, aren't there for them. They're busy. Or they don't have anything in common with their mothers anymore. Or they're angry. Or disappointed. Or they simply can't be bothered.

This happens to the best of mothers. Their adult children, when the time comes for them to give back, do not. The greatest love of all isn't Cyrano's. And the greatest tragedy of all isn't Cyrano's either. It's when love is unrequited. It's when a mother's lifetime of love is forgotten.