What my mother taught me about womanhood

“Have you figured out what it means to be a woman?” I look at Aama (mother), her slightly wrinkling eyes, the adornment on her nose, and the tika between her eyebrows.

I have been asking these questions lately—to myself, to the women around me, to the women who seem to know the answer, to the women who pretend to know the answer. I had never asked the question to Aama.