Five for a Mother

Mothers' Day must be coming up soon - I see Groupon and Facebook ads telling people what to do to make their ordinary moms feel extraordinary. That made me think of my mater and what an unnecessarily forgiving martyr she has been to a completely undeserving family. I would not be surprised if this realization strikes women when they turn mothers themselves. Happens right around the time when your FB feed is inundated by "Moms rock" posts, or when the newborn is being swaddled by a grandmother. I figured nobody was ever going to spare a word for her (not really swashbuckling hero material), so while my pen's still leaking...let me tell you a bit about this bundle of contradictions aka My Mother.

She was too timid to show up at Parent-Teacher meetings, but not enough to take the 24/29 tram all the way to the marble floored school to deliver the tiffin-box her nincompoop child had not bothered to pack. We had a running joke around the dinner table to erect a marble statue in honor of her martyrdom, since she would willingly relegate herself to licking off bowls whose contents had been emptied onto her family's plates. I mean, please! Mother India much? Not unusual, you say? Right up there with the other mothers that save money from the meagre "shongsharer khoroch" to buy a little milk for the pregnant maid, or with those who offer up their gold earrings as a wedding gift to a sister-in-law because the husband didn't get his bonus this year? Maybe, maybe not. She had grit, and that didn't come from education, pedigree or her station in life. She just wasn't one to whine.

She was terrible at accepting anything construed as a handout - well, screw handout, even simple help. There was a section of her saree pallu that was always warm and damp from kitchen fumes. You could see portions of her feet that were swollen from standing too long in line for kerosene, or for the dignified SBI official. But her hands, like her heart, were soft - they never betrayed the hours of stirring, dragging, washing, mopping,pulling, pounding and poultice-applying her job demanded. She was not a feminist in the "Would you believe it? They advertised football as a MAN'S GAME" sort of way. But, there was something not quite conventional about her....can you raise non-conformists on a staple diet of convention, I wonder.


We are still working on that statue, Ma. Happy Mother's Day, whenever that is.