The Marionette

A marionette.:n.- an object manipulated by the actions of a person, usually called a masterminder or a puppeteer.
The day I became a marionette was the day I learned how to walk. 
There was a song, it's melody wistful and beautiful, that haunted the hollow hole of my chest ever since I was born.
That those years of my tongue tripping and falling and failing to grasp the right noises and syllables were not me trying to repeat the trained array of words my mother spoon fed to me over meals of crushed fruits and cooings of "Say Mommy", but my young mind trying to voice the music playing over and over again in my head.
That my first steps were not intentionally leading me to the awaiting arms of my parents but were leading me to where the notes took my then uncoordinated feet...instead, my parents swept me away from the dance. 
The day I learned how to stand was the day I became a marionette.
My mother believed that creature who could not even walk for itself needed a masterminder in order to guide it to amble and glide elegantly, so a masterminder she became. Like a deer who stands up, legs wobbling and shaking like a twig that might break with a sickening snap at any second, I rose with my own two feet, only to have invisible fish net wires drilled into my wrists and ankles.
She dressed me in the daintiest of dresses, soft as pale rose petals to the touch and sparked and shone as if the sun were underneath them, dimming the brilliance of the curiosity in my eyes.
She painted over my tan skin with paint of crushed ivory, concealing every pore and blemish in sight while also concealing the light of curiosity in my eyes.
She painted perfect ruby red heart shaped lips over my own, as well as painting over my words and replacing them with charming giggles.
She tamed my ridiculously curly brown hair that was always escaping into my face, as well as taming my yearni ng for adventure and climbing trees and riding bikes down the little concrete path of our lake.
She scorned me for scraping and scarring my legs, using the best treatment money could buy to destroy my badges of honor. She put me in a glass case; somewhere to be admired and I would stay safe and untouched by the cruel mistress, Time. 
She drilled invisible fish net wires into my wrists and ankles, to keep the illusion of grace and balance. 
I would try to pirouette left, only to have the wind knocked out of me as gravity left me alone and afraid as the world was flipped upside down so I could twirl the other way. 
I spent long night, my body sagging against the wires as my body screamed for rest, unable to get some as I was pulled into promenades of anxiety and tangoes of self doubt. I would dance as the 13th princess would, soul and soles worn out with bags under her eyes from a long, sadly familiar night.  
I would see the disappointment in her eye s as she took in my short form, not quite the long elegant dryad she had hoped for. I would see them slowly starving me mentally and physically to maintain a lithe form. 
She taught me that while she may have been demanding my best, that others would demand more: perfection
The winds that cascaded through the silky tendrils of my free hair whispered the tragedy that I was not perfect; that no matter what I did, I would never be perfect, and anything less then perfection would not be enough for her. 
The trees that I loved welcomed me, the willows weeping in joy as I returned to the home that was their branches and ensnaring me in their intoxicating smell of sunlight and home. 
My mother was a marionette once too. Unlike me, however, her strings still linger, glistening in the sun lonng after the masterminder has left. 
So how is it, that she can be a Puppeteer, when she herself is the puppet?