One sweltering May, many years ago, I stitched up a patchwork of colourful
cloth scraps and stuffed it with silk cotton from an old pillow to make mom my first ever Mother’s Day present, a pincushion to keep her needles .The next year
it was a pink organdie rose, I learnt to make in craft class.
Mom in her pastel cotton saris (sometimes tinged with a hint
of yellow from a stubborn turmeric stain), ever exuding a faint scent of her
favourite Cuticura talc, was always prompt to gush with joy at these little
surprises.
Looking back, I realise that I never knew what mom truly fancied,
nor can I slip anymore into the psyche of the ten year old who thought that a
pincushion would make an exciting Mother’s Day gift. From where I stood as a child, mom’s face was
an expanse of serene acceptance, no specific needs or demands, no unique likes
or fetishes.
It was as if motherhood had neutralised her humours and
smoothened the sharp edges of her youth to mould her into mom, pleasantly plump
and warm in her floral voiles.
Cut to May 2013.
The scene: my bedroom
It is last minute frenzied packing time as I try to stuff an
assortment of clothing into a very disobedient bag. The train to our annual holiday
destination leaves early the next morning and it is literally mounds to go
before I sleep.
Enter my fifteen year old: “Are you wearing that tomorrow? “She
points to the green shirt I have laid aside.
”Why not?” I ask prepared for another unreasonable adolescent-
mom tiff.
“Because I am wearing something similar and it is so u n c o
o l to dress like your mom”, she replies aghast.
“No worries Babe”, I
quip back, “I’ll pretend we’re not related”
She stomps out of the room to sulk in solitude.
Fighting over clothes isn’t something I did with my mother
as a teen. She cooked, cleaned and entertained in her graceful Lucknow Chikankari
saris and starched cottons. Today, I hop, skip and jog through my chores in Capris
and tracks, sometimes sharing and other times sneaking from my teen’s wardrobe.
But then, neither did mom ever eat a
full bar of chocolate all by herself every weekend, fight for the remote or
clamour for the window seat.
In all this and more,
my children have had in me another sibling to negotiate with.
What then, about this ache to be lauded and remembered as a
mother-the universal epitome of selflessness. This I presume is one of the latter
day honours reserved for mothers like mine, from an age when a placid wide lake
flowed between generations, separating our lives into different eras. Mom
exalted in her aura of dignified charm taught me to sift the right from the taboo.
Today, I blend with the lives and experiences of my children, infusing it with
a measure of care, a pinch of good advice and a wise ounce of admonition. Not
too different from when I disguised the ‘yucky vegetables’ and the bitter pills
of their toddlerhood.
So it is fine if I hear more of “Mom you freak me out” from
my teenagers rather than the “Mom I love you “of their pre adolescent
innocence. It is okay to be reminded
that I belong to the Bryan Adams generation if I am caught humming my favourite
Jayeslee cover of “pay phone”.
Because, I would rather be a ‘current version mom’ fully
loaded with all the relevant apps rather than a faint echo from across the
turbulent waters that separates this challenging generation from mine.
P.S:- On the two hour ride to our resort from the station,
my son leans on my shoulder dizzy and car sick, my daughter rests her head on my lap. The shirts we are
wearing are kind of similar but mom is clearly the one in charge.
As I celebrate my mother as a daughter and my daughter as a mother,
I experience the currents of courage and support that flow instinctively between
women of two different generations. Why then does a mother resort to killing
her greatest source of strength, her unborn daughter?
This is a conscience call to all women, many educated yet
ignorant, who commit the blunder of weeding their female off springs, in a cowardly
act of surrender to warped dictates.
After all to be a mother
is not for the weak and nor is Mother’s day for the faint hearted.
Echoes from the Womb
____________________________
What are little girl's lives made of?
Not sugar, nor spice
Nothing quite so nice.
In the snug darkness of your womb,
When you stealthily sensed my presence,
You tore me out in haste,
Long before my term
And snuffed out my little life
As if I was a worm.
Elsewhere... in some nameless village,
On a hot and dusty morn,
I announce with a lusty cry,
'Mother I am Born'
But you sing a dirge to me,
With tears my body you soak,
You feed me husk with milk
And dig my grave as I choke.
Did you never yearn my mother?
To feel my soft curls in your arms
Or press gently against my cheeks
As you fall to their dimpled charms?
Or kiss my little hands,
That hug you so tight in sleep
Or bless my grateful heart
That loves you ever so deep!
Mother, I am your flesh and blood, not regret,
No mirage you choose to forget,
Grant me a life; I am your daughter,
Not a blunder in your quest for my brother!
-Asha Susan Mathew
