Monday, May 14, 2012

Everyday is Mother's Day

Disclaimer: Blog entry made on actual Mother's day. Did not go online. 


Mother's day in our house is on May 7th, not the second Sunday of May like what every female-targeting advertising announced it to be. It's simply because that is my Inay's birthday. This year I went home for the weekend before our mother's day since her birthday landed on a Monday. My little sister and I joined my parents for my dad's company outing. I had to sleep in a tent and give up sleep all day Saturday to being in a tent room and not being able to lounge around in comfort. But I think my parents liked it there and there is a chance I would have to do this again. They didn't wake me up for the bonfire which I was waiting for. They ended up with blurry night pictures but they had fun while I rested so I guess it's win-win.

My mom, as most of my blogger friends and readers already know is a superwoman for me. And I am not even kidding how many kids she has raised apart from me and my brother. But this is a common occurrence in the province, the most rooted and stable aunt ends up bringing up kids in lieu of grandmothers not being available. Still at 26, I don't feel like a good daughter just yet. I am still about 20% of the woman my mother was when she was 26. She was already a mother, married and has a job that she kept all the way to her 50's. I am working towards getting confirmed in my new job, that means regularized for us all, I am still working towards self-improvement and perhaps spinsterhood (which I don't dread really with kind of  men that have been churning up around me) and I don't really know if I would be able to have children in the future. But still I would never ever settle for anything else than the kind of love and relationship my parents found in each other. They say that it is hard to put a family together is yours was broken, then they haven't seen the girls who struggle to find the man who would fit the bill and give them the love their parents have. It's harder when you know that the standard set by your father is too high.

On mother's day we give flowers, thank you letters and gifts to our mother. I gave my mom two packs of babyruth. ^.^ I had originally thought of giving my sister money to buy my mom something on the actual international mother's day but I forgot. Nevertheless, I will make it up to her by going to Star City on the 27th to help her watch my cousins and sister go on the rides. I am not big on heights and would end up taking pictures and watching their bags that is for certain but I wouldn't mind except that I have to go to work at 9pm so I would have to sleep in then take the rest of my time going to work.

In my life I have met different kinds of mothers and have seen and felt different kinds of love from them. There are those who are practical mothers, who show their love in teaching and nagging. There are those smotherers who spoil their children to the point that their child needs to rebel to be able to find a semblance of self or end up being exactly like them only towards their own relationships. There are those who are highlighters. They arrive on graduations, weddings, and major life events and have to be away, by choice or preference, from their children and family most of the time. Then there are those who are ghosts, they are there physically but can't be reached out on to raise their children or to even look at them. But then there are the HëirMöther,Stamom's and Dragon ladies. They are the extreme versions of carino brutal. The first one would insist that there is only one kind of person that is valuable in the world and that is the class from which they belong and would control their child from being close to anyone else. The Stamom would make sure their child follows just one way of living and the values that they must follow are only those that are in their mother's book of living and values. Lastly the Dragon Ladies would make their children the perfect prodigy to the point that their social skills are lacking being of lack of interaction with humans as supposed to instruments and learning devices.

No, these classifications are not to lower down or belittle these kinds of mothers, it's just to enumerate the kinds that they seem on the surface. But underneath all the tags is the heart that would love from womb to tomb. Sometimes we forget that our mothers were women and people apart from us before we came to be. We only know a side of them and not all. As I grew older, I found that it was easier to understand my mother and to admire her for all that she has done and all that she is doing. I realized that in order to find a man who would hold me close in his sleep and would be my life partners for decades and decades I would have to be a woman after my mother. It was not the search for the perfectly imperfect man that was difficult. It was being a woman who would be able to draw that kind of man's attention towards me that was extremely hard. My mother and I are not the same, though her love has a compartment in my heart. I tap into it whenever I feel like life is not as great as I had hoped or when I am feeling exceptionally vulnerable. Then there is that Inay folder in my head where all the recordings of the nagging...este...life lesson video and audio files are stored for me to play whenever I am thinking of whether or not I should do something. The sound quality and the video quality are not as good as it was but my hearing is better and my inner eye makes me understand the message better.

What I learned from my parents can't fit in a book let alone a time blog.

But I would believe that when I have my own child, if ever I do and have a husband, if ever he gets around to meeting me, I would apply the things that I learned from my mother.

1.      When really mad do not speak. Sometimes the words you would say wounds both side and leaves scars that would never go away.
2.      When really happy laugh and smile. Share your happiness with your friends and family and you would soon realize that one small thing like a new pair of shoes and your daughter in a dress had made ripples of good energy.
3.      Be honest in the way you do your work and you would be rewarded with a trust that can not be shaken.
4.      Love like you are not asking for anything in return or even thinking of it. Because the love that you send out into the world, has a way of coming back like a boomerang.
5.      Always believe that you can do it and if your self-confidence is not enough, don't leave it to chance, get some back-up and pray.

There are more, like I said, that I learned from mothers and women who are about to be mothers. But someday, even if I never become one, I would continue to apply the things my mother taught me. I just wish that one of these days I would fulfill my own dream of being able to help out at home. One girl shoes step at a time I suppose.

To all the mothers out there, you are THE WOMAN! Blessed are we your children for the love that you gave us and the lessons you continually remind us. Thank you for the support and the sacrifice that you have given and done for us. We might not always be that good at expressing our gratitude but let it be known that without you, there wouldn't be a me. A gazillion thanks for all that you are and all that you have made us, your kiddos out to be.


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