Mom. We all love our mom; the first thing we do when we reach our home is in search of our mom’s face. If she is not at home, we keep shouting her name, going everywhere and finding her. We only relax after we see her face and talk to her.
I don't know how you have a relationship with your mother. My mother is so friendly to me. Whenever I see her standing, I always run to her and hug her, lift her and go around whenever I am happy, even if she runs away from it. We even had deep conversations where I started to understand more about her.
One day I forcefully sat on her, holding all her hands and putting pink lipstick on her lips. And I took a picture with her. She looked too young, and I started to admire her. Wow, ma, you look so great. She was looking into the mirror, and she felt so happy. She always tells me before getting married, she used to wear an ugly dress purposely because she thought being beautiful will create a problem. She has four sisters and two brothers who grow up with a single mom. She doesn't want her mom to get into trouble. She always tells me men judge us if we do makeup on our faces. She always hopes she can wear a kajal and do makeup after she gets married, where she might feel safe. But unfortunately, my father hates everything, so she ends up sacrificing all her desires.
My mom and I share the same room. I woke up very early that morning. She had a beautiful dream. In her dream, she left everything for two days and went out and did whatever she liked. In her dream, she didn’t see us. From that day on, I started to oversee my mom. It irritates me when she washes dishes and makes different food for everyone. She only eats when everyone's stomach is full. Before I started my career, I used to cook and wash dishes. I seriously felt my life was useless back then. But I wonder how she is doing this throughout her lifetime with no help. She must have a dream, right? Deep inside, i felt she was asking for help, but she buried everything behind her happy face mask.
Whenever I asked her the meaning of our life, she used to say my 3 children are the meaning of my life. My life will be complete when I get married and have kids. I laugh every time whenever I hear this. I will ask again and again, mom, you don’t want anything else, you want to live by doing all the work and seeing these kids and die.? Maybe I am not at her age to think alike. But seriously, why doesn’t she want her happiness? Why our happiness is always her happiness. My mother should not talk like this to her overthinking daughter. I started to think think think. And I found out that there are so many struggles for her to pass to attain her happiness. She totally depends on us. she gave up her happiness and started to believe our happiness is hers.
Mom is not a god. She is a normal human like us. My mom is the coolest in my family. My cousins always guess my mom is inside the house if they find heels(footwear) outside. My brother taught her how to drive a car. And she took my mama and all our cousins outside. My cousins and I were so proud of her. BTW I never sat in the driver’s seat. I saw her happiness at that time. Every afternoon she cooks our lunch and goes on a car drive with my brother. One day my father said don't drive a car until our daughter gets married. Everyone is asking why your daughter is not married yet and talking about how you can drive the vehicle. We both have the same weight, and she does yoga with me—such a Super cool fit mom. Whenever I go out with my mom, I hold her hand tight and take her everywhere. She never shows what she likes, so i have to act like i like everything and let her try with me. Come with me. She tells everyone that she loves going out with me. She has her own happiness, but we are the reason for her sacrifices.
I don't talk about everything. But why I wrote this is when you say you love your mom, think she is a human like you and has so many dreams like you. She might not talk about that. But every human has a desire for their own life. Make sure you are not disturbing her. I am not a perfect daughter; I depend on my mom every day like everyone.
Talk to her, take her out with you, teach her how to dance, teach her how she should not be bothered about other people's opinions, and show her what real happiness looks like. I Hope you help your mom realise the true meaning of her life and let her travel on that. Help her find her own dreams, understand her. Let's not let her say again that your happiness is her happiness
Nicely crafted. Proud of you Asha.
ReplyDeleteSharing few lines here from my scribbling notes.
One fine evening I was lying in my mother’s lap teaching the way around her first smartphone. It was amusing to see her taking baby steps in the world of touchscreen mobile phones in a year in which Augmented reality has started to take over.
I showed her what Youtube is and played one of her favorite songs. The mood suddenly changed. She held me a little closer. A little tighter. I noticed her eyes were being filled slowly.
Reality struck me. I haven’t done this in a very long time. I had the habit of lying in my mother’s lap and talking about random things. That has not happened in a while. Because I was busy chasing success. I was busy chasing dreams.
After all People matters!