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I could not think of an approach to begin unfolding what kind of a mother my mom really is. As a matter of fact, this is one hell-of-a-task which I found extremely difficult and even tortuous on my part. If I was rather asked to describe my father, it could have been more comfortable and easier to do since there are lots of things I am exceedingly proud to tell any person about him. In contrast, putting into words the details which I know of my mother is practically way too painful and disconcerting for me. Doing this would actually make me chronicle the episodes of my life – from the moment I came into being until I have become this person I am right now. But one cannot say that without my mother, I could never have existed and should therefore be indebted to her for my life. People should realize that the principal functions of a parent, the mother above all, do not end with just childbearing, thus the reason for your being. There is more to it than that. As for me and my siblings, the only thing we could consider of her was that she was only the catalyst to our cause – nothing more but simply a “manufacturer.”
People around me, particularly those who know the story of my life, would unquestionably empathize with me and they would understand if I speak of my mother this way. After all, there is nothing good about her worth mentioning here. From the moment I have become totally aware of what was happening in our family, if truth be told, I dare say that there is no single good memory I have of my mom. To begin with, she was always nowhere to be found. We could only see her if she would be back home only to change clothes, but after that, she would leave home and enjoy herself as if she did not have any responsibility at all. She never performed her duties and obligations to us as a mother. In fact, we never grew up having her around. My grandmother who looked after us when my mom was always absent said that three days later after giving birth, she would leave home instantaneously, not even worrying for the poor children who were always left behind. My father at that time was overseas making both ends meet. So when he heard about all these occurrences back home, he just decided to fly home and assumed the responsibilities my mother failed to perform. We literally grew up without a mother around. She always came home late, hence there was never a chance we experienced being embraced by a mother. My father was the one who filled that emptiness in us. In spite of that, I still had the strongest desire of seeing my mother whenever she had the slightest bit of a possibility to come home.
As soon as my grandmother left for Australia about almost two decades ago – I was only 5 years old at that time – Mom also left home. We were so clueless as to where she would be going, after all, this was usual of her – to leave home for a mahjong session, or spend time in casinos or bars or discos with some friends. I started thinking then that our family was different from those of my friends and classmates. I often wondered why others have an incredibly beautiful family – a home which you could consider utopian – while our family had never even felt that “complete” happiness. Sometimes I asked God why life seemed so unfair. We grew up having our father to care for us, and supervise us in our studies and he never failed to introduce us to God. Every night before we had to go to bed, he would lead us five children to a short Bible study, and he always taught us to persevere against adversity, and especially the virtue of forgiveness. With the way he brought us up, I became matured in my feelings and thinking even at a young age. But as a child, I used to directly ask God why He never listened to our prayers. We were taught that the prayers of little children were most heeded, but why is it that He never answered our only plea – “Please, Lord, knock my mom’s heart and make her come home now.”
Months had passed, and still, she never came back home. Of course, she did once or twice for a year, but what? For like 15 minutes of her time, just to drop her presents (toys, clothes, etc.)? Did she ever realize that all the material things in this world were never important to us (as we were taught not to be too oriented with worldly things)? What we want from her was to come home, that’s all we wanted – nothing more. All her presents were just things that would soon be destroyed and vanished. What I wanted was a long-lasting happiness, something that would make me reminisce the good things when I grew older. My mother never realized that. It was just later we found out that she was having an affair. My dad was utterly shattered, for he remained faithful to her and kept on loving her despite her absence and imperfections, but this was what he got. He decided that it was time for him to finally let go of her, since this was what she needed. He gathered us all and he explained everything to us so we could at least understand what was happening or what would take place from then on.
When my mom decided to leave home and not come back anymore, she left us to our father’s care. She did not even take us with her, which really meant, that she wanted complete freedom – without obligations to pull off and responsibilities to think about. The five poor kids were absolutely abandoned by their uncaring, unconcerned mother. During those times when mom was not present in our lives, we still had found contentment with our father. He was able to nurture and educate us alone, devoid of the cooperation and support by what should be given by a loving and supportive wife. I used to think that maybe we really did not need a mother. Anyways, my father could provide our needs all by himself. We became accustomed to this family condition, where the father was the one who would prepare the meals for the children, wash and iron their clothes, drop and fetch them at school, guide them with their homework and studies, plan a family outing or picnic at the park, and do all the disciplining. I could see it was hard for him to accomplish all these things, because he still had to work for us to survive. All of us five children, my brother being the eldest was only 8 and the youngest was only 2 years old during the early 90’s, began to realize that the least we could do to help our dear father was help him with all the household chores. We should cooperate with him and, therefore, work together as a team. We decided to give out all the best just so we could at least please our father and make him very happy notwithstanding all his sufferings and difficulties in life. We told him he did not have to worry about us while he’s away, because we were already responsible and old enough to be left at home. So that’s what we did everyday. We cooked our food all by ourselves, tidied up the house, washed our clothes, did the dishes, etc. And every night, we would be waiting for our father to arrive home and we would be feeling excited to make our father the happiest person in the world for having us. He would notice that everything was in perfect order, the house was clean, his dinner would be ready in a while, and each one of us – from eldest to youngest – would kiss him on his cheek, one would take off his shoes, the other would remove the socks, the other would give him his slippers, and the other would make him his favorite drink – my coffee!!!
It was indeed apparent how much we loved our father. But don’t get me wrong, please. I also loved my mother (take note of the past tense). With her absence, even if we were contented just having only a father around, I still admit that I had been missing her. But whenever she would show up, she did nothing but beleaguer us through violence and harassment. We grew scared of her, not wanting to see her anymore. There was no way we could defend ourselves against her. She was stronger than us, even my father could not equal her ferocity, as he was not used to resorting to violent actions. For many times, we had witnessed the other side of our mother – the fierce and violent side of her.
Again, I would reiterate that my father was the total opposite of her. He still would talk about love and patience and forgiveness, despite everything that had occurred. He used to always tell us that even if our mother wronged us, we had to forgive her because she was our mother. Learn to forgive and we could have peace, the lesson we had to instill in our minds. However, what I have just stated was only some fragments of my life. There are still plenty of things which I would like to reveal and I am not even ashamed or reluctant to disclose the whole story and reasons behind feeling this way. But doing this would help me experience relief because I have released some emotions that were long kept hidden. Most of the time I would tell my friends that they were so blessed to have such wonderful mothers. I keep on reminding them that not all people are that lucky to have a mother like theirs, so they should treat them with utmost respect and give them the love that they deserve. Sometimes I envy them because they have what I don’t have, but then again, I would rather think that I am more blessed, for I was given the chance to experience the greatest love of a father which, I think, no one in this world could have ever felt in his or her entire life.
(written by Elizabeth Delos Reyes, August 22, 2006)