To read reread and reflect on writings of women authors is a dangerous pastime. It can build a lot of thoughts to a woman that may change her perspective to herself and to her environment.
I always aspire to be my mother’s’ daughter. My culture told me. My heart says so. My mind wants to be by her side most especially now that she no longer have a company in my father. I saw her cry only ones during the wake of my father. It was brief. I gave her the space that I always perceive she wanted. She would not talk to me about how she feels. She just takes good care of household chores, and that for her is enough. She spends most of her time praying. Sometimes she goes out in the company of other senior citizens to administer prayer meetings. I guess this activity perfects her definition of life.
My mother’s grace and wisdom only grows as she ages, along with her beauty. She has not been able to live her life though. One most important thing she could have accomplished for herself. She lives her life for others, denying her own. She possesses such an indomitable strength. I envy her or should I.
Gloria Steinem in her book Revolution from Within, A Book of Self-esteem recalls “ the day she began to look at her aging mother with different eyes. She saw her mother not as a parent but a person with her own unfulfilled dreams. When she asked her mother why she choose not to pursue her life, she was told “ If I had left, you never would have been born.” Steinem, in her essay, writes the response she would have given: “But you might have been born instead.”
I am not an avowed feminist, but like Steinem I am a woman and so is my mother, my two sisters, numerous aunts and cousins, nieces and friends who I deeply love. I would absolutely not choose not to have been born, but I would definitely have coached my mother to make choices if only I could.
Effects of a sad childhood subdues the potential greatness of a person. She and her mother and her brother grew up in the command of a man not her husband neither her father but my grandmother’s brother. My mother have not told me any physical cruelty he inflicted against her but have repeatedly shared that of her brother : He would command him to kneel atop of mongo seeds with books in his spread arms underneath the scourging heat of the sun for hours. Her mother just watched helplessly her son until he was able to serve the penalty imposed. It was a cardinal sin if one of them would not be home before six pm to attend the angelus. It was prohibited to utter any word during meal time. A young mind in her could only embrace the events of her fragile life as disciplinary measures. She had to submit to the commands of circumstances. She never saw her father neither were they able to accord him a decent burial. He died during the war and his mortal remains lies nowhere.
As a young girl I still saw this deeply religious man who acted as my mother’s father. Already old and weak my mother instructed me to pay respect to him before doing anything after arrival. I must hold his right hand towards my forehead. Obedient child as I was the feeling of indignation was never entertained. Years later, sociology supported by catechism taught me that such politeness is part of being a Filipino, a renowned trademark the world over which we are so proud of… (which i will save for another story.)
My reason is defeated each time I thought of my mother. There must really be a magic in the umbilical cord between mothers and daughters. She always forgives me for my mistakes in her person during impulsive moments. The whole world may despise my personhood but I can comfortably assure myself that there is always a mother to go home to, the first to embrace me during down moments, always the pillar to stand with during disastrous encounters with the world. She cooks the best food I have ever tasted.
Many times I reflect about my mother’s influences in the way I was raised during moments of self assessment. American Psychologist Dr. Robin L. Smith stated that “the untreated flaws of mothers during their childhood is carried over to their descendants especially female who, in one way or the other will battle the same struggle and will ask the same questions and search the same endless answers all throughout their lives. It will remain the unfinished business”.
Randolf S. David, in his book Nation, Self and Citizenship book mentioned Adrienne Rich’s study on “matrophobia – - the fear of becoming one’s own mother. . . the painful struggle of daughters not to be like them because they associate their mothers with the victim they do not want to become . . . any attempt of daughters to exorcise their mothers from their system is self-destructive . .
The same author may have marked the formula when he wrote that “the solution cannot be found in the rhetoric of mother blaming or in erecting walls between mothers and daughters, but only in the persistent “truth telling” that should characterize all mother-daughter interactions.”
I’ve never really been down there with mamang. It’s an ongoing process for me that may perhaps take me a lifetime to defeat.
There are so many questions in the world that is so difficult to answer. There are boundaries that are more convenient if left undone. There are many spaces which words cannot invade. Different lives, different circumstances.
One thing is certain… I will always be my mother’s daughter.
(re dated for a reason)
