Words are something that can be both beautiful and deadly at the same time. Like a praying mantis, that to us is a beautiful majestic creature that can mesmerize us so easily. But to other insects, it is a deadly predator that will even eat its mate. Two sides of words, the beautiful and the dangerous. There are times where you truly see how much words can hurt, one of these times, I was young but it will still be obvious how my words had hurt. At that time I hated baths. I don't know why, it may just be a kid thing. It was something both me and my mother had to struggle with for many years.  The bath was the most dreaded thing that lay in my parent’s bathroom, a place where I spent much of my time when I was younger. Their bathroom, open and airy with a tub, curved and spotless, large enough for seemingly ten people to fit (the place of my nightmares.) Next to that was a huge shower that at my young age looked to be never-ending with beautiful delicate gray tiling running up its wall another place where I hadn’t had many fond memories.  Right across from that was the largest mirror I had ever seen stretching almost across the wall, it was one of my favorite parts of the bathroom. I always loved to make faces at myself and pretend that if I held it long enough my face would get stuck there permanently. 

Ironically, I thought of myself as much more mature than I truly was. That is why I never liked it when my mother helped me with anything especially bath time, something that I emphasize I hated. My mother, a small but powerful woman standing at only 5’2 with the ability to silence a room of hundreds. With a soft round face and big beautiful blue eyes, like pools, you would jump in on a hot summer’s day. A thin straight nose, different from my larger round nose, and thin pink lips that spoke the kindest of words. Her hair was beautiful blonde curls with delicate ringlets framing her face. She is my favorite person in the world but one particular night when she was trying to bathe me, I wanted nothing to do with her.  That night we went through the same routine of her pleading me to cooperate and I continuously voiced my hatred for bath time, my eyes watering and arms flailing. Why did I need help from her? Why was it my misfortune that I had to take a bath? “Mommy I don’t want a bath, let me out”. I whined.

“You have to have a bath, you don’t want to be all dirty.” My mother said patiently. 

“But I don’t want to” Crying out I splashed the water everywhere. 

“Catherine Leigh you need a bath, it will be over soon then we can go watch TV.”

I wasn’t satisfied with that answer. “Mommy I don’t what to”  I whaled and wriggled, squirmed, and sobbed, anything to get my mother to stop and let me out of the bath. At that moment amid my tantrum, I thought popped into my mind. Why did I have to put up with this? This is so unfair, what did I do to deserve this?  Tears stopping I started to say the words that would hang in my mother’s heart for years to come “ I hate you, I wish you weren't my mommy.” At first, my mother looked at me stunned, eyes widening. We made eye contact, then she quickly pulled away. I studied her gentle face now showing signs of age her wrinkles showing and her face growing pale. Her eyes fell to the floor, losing their light and her tear ducts filling, but stopping before the tears were able to make their escape down her face. Her lips turned slightly downward and her eyebrows furrowing in the center creating a shallow crease between them. She had seemingly lost all of her joy for just a moment. For the rest of my bath, I continued to complain and attempt to convince my mother to let me leave. But there was something off about my mother, for the rest of my bath, she no longer seemed the same. Something was eating at her but I couldn’t tell what. 

 Eventually finished my bath, with all of its trials and tribulations. My mother kept her promise and allowed me to watch TV. Now that I think about I don’t remember what I watched, all I can remember was how I thought my mom seemed off. At bedtime, I crawled my way into my warm bed and had both of my parents kiss me goodnight. As I drifted off to sleep my mom stopped wondering about what had made my mother's mood change so suddenly but it wander to other things such as what I wanted for my birthday, or the friends that I would see at daycare the next day. Little did I know that while I was sleeping soundly my mother was crying. I was so calmly sleeping in my bed while my favorite person in the whole world was feeling such pain from the words that I let slip through my mouth with such little thought that had so greatly hurt someone. The praying mantis struck with its deadly force, with swift movements their prey was no more. 

That was one of the first times that my words had so deeply impacted someone. Now I did not know that my mother had cried herself to sleep that night until years later, but it was still hard for me to understand why my words hurt so much. Why would my mother care so much about what I had said especially because I was so young when I had said it? Why did they matter so much? Looking back at both of those experiences I can now see where my mother was coming from. With the experiences, I have had in the time between then and now I have said things and had things said to me that truly hurt. My mother was so hurt by what I had said because words do truly have weight to them. With every word, I saw I can either make or break someone's day. That is what I have to struggle with every day knowing how much I can hurt others or how much they can hurt me with just a few words. They can worm their way into your heart and rot it inside out until there is nothing left. The true weight of words.