My mothers told me stories in the filtered London light of our lounge
room, in our brightly wallpapered kitchen, in their tiny bedroom,
in that gentle way most parents do: “First I must get the baby to
sleep, and then make some dinner, but after that I’ll play with you.”
Three- part narrative structures that helped me understand the tiny
world I inhabited. Teresa, my British mother, told me her stories
of growing up in working class Essex; from Louise came stories of
her family’s raucous pub in Catholic Campbelltown. And we knew
the stories of their friends, too – warm, funny, strong-willed women
who were so quick to laughter that I thought all the laughter in the
world was within my reach.
The walls of our home were covered in bookshelves teeming with
Sadako and her paper cranes, Patience and Sarah and Looking
for Alibrandi, the Ramona stories and The Worst Witch, and Bread
and Jam for Frances, a beloved childhood book about a charmingly
strong-willed raccoon. All lovingly dewey-decimaled by librarian
Teresa, as though this library of books and the echoing laughter of
clever women could fortify us all against the world. Stories as armour.
We left London in 1988. That same year, Prime Minister Margaret
Thatcher introduced a bill to ensure local authorities didn’t
“promote the teaching in any maintained school of the acceptability
of homosexuality as a pretended family relationship” – but this
wasn’t something I knew about at the time, and it could hardly have
been my mothers’ motivation for leaving, considering queer families
weren’t offered a much warmer welcome Down Under.
We arrived in Australia to a country grappling with the bicentenary
of invasion and colonisation, a country where my family – three
kids born to two women – was not recognised, and where Teresa
was forbidden from working. Partner visas for lesbian couples
weren’t an option, so Teresa spent her days cleaning houses
for cash, and looking after me and my siblings – teaching us,
playing with us, reading to us. When Louise arrived home
from long shifts at the pharmacy, she would climb into my bed
exhausted and, still in her white uniform, she’d read to me,
often falling asleep mid-chapter, glasses perched on the end
of her nose, snoring gently.Other families’ histories are mapped out in genetics, in bloodlines.
For other kids, the connection of shared blood holds such weight
that a deep sense of belonging is contained in a simple, “Oh, she
has her father’s smile.” Or her mother’s eyes, her aunt’s chin, her
grandpa’s nose. We examine babies for evidence. We joke, “She’s
definitely yours,” or, “Maybe the postman paid a visit.” This sense
of belonging through DNA feels so natural and inevitable to most
people that even now queer couples embarking on parenthood
ask me with fear in their eyes whether I loved my parents equally,
whether I ever felt lost, or like I didn’t belong.In our family, we didn’t have the unquestioned security of blood.
My mothers mapped out our connections in every retelling of their
love for me. When I was small, they told me the story of how we
were made in blunt and clear terms, easy for a child to digest. They
told us so many times that I don’t remember the not-knowing, I only
remember from when I could already tell it myself.Now that I’m grown, I tell the story of my family with the benefit of
hindsight and perspective, weaving in my politics, my adult sense of
humour, a little sarcasm if I want to disarm the questioner. I have
my own queer politics now, built through fierce debate with friends,
lovers and, yes, my family. But I’ll tell you my story as I told it when
I was small, with simplicity and honesty, told so many times, to
friends, teachers, and curious strangers.“I was born to two mothers, Louise and Teresa, in 1983 in West
Hammersmith Hospital, London.”maeve marsden shares tales of love,
heartbreak, and a queer family.
my mothers
told me stories
real life