No sé por qué pero hay cosas que uno dice que parecen chiquiticas y después se vuelven enormes, como, por ejemplo, una frase mal dicha, un gesto, o incluso un silencio. A mà me pasó con mi mamá.
Estábamos en la cocina y ella me estaba hablando de algo que ahora ni me acuerdo, seguro era de cĂłmo mal gastaba mi sueldo o del trabajo o de que siempre llegaba tarde, lo cierto es que yo ya venĂa molesto, no sĂ© si por cansancio o porque justo ese dĂa me habĂa salido todo al revĂ©s, y le dije algo asĂ como: "ya está bueno mamá, no me jod…s más con eso".
Apenas lo dije me arrepentĂ, pero ya estaba dicho, fue como tirar una piedrita en un charco y ver cĂłmo se hacen las olas.
Ella no me contestó, solo bajó la mirada y siguió pelando las papas, y eso, su silencio, fue lo que más me dolió.
Lo que habĂa empezado como un enojo de dos minutos se me hizo una carga durante semanas, yo la visitaba todos los dĂas, conversábamos de otras cosas, pero ese momento seguĂa ahĂ, agrandándose en mi cabeza, como si cada vez que lo recordara se volviera más pesado.
Hasta que un dĂa me animĂ© a decirle, con la torpeza que crea el remordimiento y la culpa, “Mami Âżte doliĂł lo que te dije ese dĂa, verdad?”, y ella, sin drama y con la paciencia que le caracterizaba, me dijo, “SĂ, un poco… pero entendĂ que no hablabas tu, hablaba tu enojo”.
Me dio un beso en la cabeza, como cuando era chico, y me puso un plato de comida sin decir nada más.
AllĂ me di cuenta, tarde, pero entendĂ, que agrandar el ego es achicar el corazĂłn.
I don't know why, but there are things you say that seem so small and then become huge, like, for example, a poorly spoken sentence, a gesture, or even a silence. It happened to me with my mom.
We were in the kitchen, and she was talking to me about something I can't even remember now. It was probably about how I was spending my paycheck, or about work, or about how I was always late. The truth is, I was already feeling annoyed. I don't know if it was from tiredness or because everything had gone wrong that day, and I said something like, "That's enough, Mom, don't bother me with this anymore."
The moment I said it, I regretted it, but it was over. It was like throwing a pebble in a puddle and watching the waves form.
She didn't answer; she just lowered her gaze and continued peeling the potatoes, and that, her silence, was what hurt me the most.
What had started as a two-minute tantrum became a burden for weeks. I visited her every day, we talked about other things, but that moment was still there, growing larger in my head, as if every time I remembered it, it became heavier.
Until one day I got the courage to say to her, with the awkwardness that remorse and guilt create, "Mommy, what I said that day hurt you, didn't it?" And she, without drama and with her characteristic patience, said, "Yes, a little... but I understood that it wasn't you who was speaking, it was your anger that was speaking."
She kissed me on the head, like when I was a kid, and placed a plate of food in front of me without saying anything else.
That's when I realized, belatedly, but I understood, that to enlarge one's ego is to shrink one's heart.
