Ponder: My Mother's Words and Thoughts

 I've been laboring under the difficulty of not being able to tell you about the things that cross my mind which I have no way of saying outright. Now the moment is gone and what remains is wanting only to tell you we miss you and want to see you soon....

The sentiments above are only a few of the words contained in a box of letters from my mother, written throughout a decade, which I've kept. If a fire razes through the house, this box will be the first one I will save from the flames.

I'm not simply writing this,  riding on the trail of the recent Mother's Day bandwagon. It was also actually my mother's birthday yesterday and I thought of her last week, more than any other time in my life.

I went to high school in the capital city of Manila, a two-hour bus ride and another two-hour airplane ride away. I left home when I was twelve. I came home on Christmas holidays and the long summer break from school. While at university, I would be home less frequently, mostly only during the two-week Christmas holidays.

Despite many growing pains in the city among my father's kin and living through what may be considered an abusive environment by others, I look back on this period as a great blessing. I would not be where I am now, and my circumstances would have been very different, without my education.

Yet I would have been a far different woman--a very different person,in fact--but for my mother. Her guidance and care never faltered, despite great physical separation, because of her letters to me. She relayed to me her concern, affection and guidance.  She gave me the sense of always being present in our family life through letters that told of my father, my siblings, my neighborhood (that consisted of our extended family of her own mother and her siblings), the townspeople, and her thoughts on social issues of the day.

To start from the very beginning: my mother is singularly amazing. I could only hope to be nearly as inspiring and wise as her. My mother is a writer by trade, and far better skilled than I could hope to be. Her thoughts and movement are imbued with grace and elegance. She possesses the gift of teaching, not as a classroom teacher, but of seizing your imagination and mind. To borrow from the movie "Inception," she can plant a seed of an idea. She is of small stature, but larger than life. Her charm, counsel, tact, graciousness and diplomacy is sought and heeded by a great number of people in our town, both by ordinary folk and even those in public office. Together with my father, with the strength of their personality, charisma and great talent, their pairing is a class act, quite tough to follow.

I recently took out the box of her yellowing letters and reread them. These were handwritten or typed out (yes, on a typewriter) on different kinds of paper--used sheets, thin/onion-skin copy paper, office forms, various colored stationery offcuts from our family's printing press jobs. My mother was a prolific letter writer and could do it at the drop of a hat-- writing night and day, at two or four in the morning, by candlelight during those years where our hometown was plagued by power blackouts, during spiritual retreats, while at work in the office, or on a break from household chores.

She wrote at odd hours, also because she relied on other travelers who were leaving the countryside early in the morning to travel to Manila.  She would ask them to hand me a package containing some clothes, reading materials, money or old letters unsent by post. She also knew that in interacting with these messengers (her friends, acquaintances or work colleagues), it would give me a sense of home, a kindly familiar chat, a way to get out of my shell and learn to interact confidently with adults.

I was instantly propelled back to those years around 1983, an age so different from today's instant downloads, mobile technologies, and faster-than-the-speed-of-light transmission of communication. To be able to speak to me, my parents would have to go to the downtown postal office (PT&T), where they would give an operator my number and the operator would try to reach me at my aunt's house. This was often met with great disappointment for the expense, since the telephone connection from my hometown to the suburb where I lived, outside of the inner city, was terrible.

What did my mother write about? From the less personal to those that touched on my own concerns, I list them here and will try to be brief. 

1.  She wrote to me about the people and events in our town, of families’ tragedies and triumphs. She would relate it to me, not in a manner of a gossip but rather something out of  Elizabeth Gaskell's “Cranford,” with great tenderness and empathy about the people she would tell me about. Writing at length about a jailbreak and a chase across several towns, she ends the account:

Tragically, one jail guard died when he was fired on in the jail for not relinquishing his firearm to the convicts. You know him by sight—he’s the thin, dark old man who plods up [the road] in his khaki uniform every afternoon, pushing a bike as he goes.

2.  She would tell me about the poverty of individual people, especially of working students, who would live with townsfolk (as is common practice) as housemaids in order to educate themselves. Even until now, she tells me of the circumstances of their employees and the poor children in the streets. When I was home on school holidays, I would meet them face to face: indigenous people begging or selling their woven wares, the town lunatic raving about in the highway, a reclusive old woman.  All of them she knew by name and where they lived, including the details of  their tragic circumstances.

Through her stories, I was taught basic human truths, values, social mores, and some sort of implied and private approval or reproof for behaviour and viewpoints that in public may appear deceptively acceptable (or unacceptable). She told me of many teenage pregnancies, and often these were appalling but hilarious accounts of how these pregnancies were discovered.  (With the scores of teenagers getting pregnant in our town, I suspected that this was her secret fear for me.)

Her voice, her beliefs, and the way she described or criticized events, behavior, the politics of the day,  formed and influenced me so much that there are times I laugh because I can hear her in myself and see the same thread of her thought. Sometimes, I say it out loud, “Oh my God, I have become my mother!”

3.  She also shared her thoughts about social issues of that time. Among one of the countless examples, of a transport strike, she wrote:

I walked to the office and no buses are running...I dropped [my brother] off to school and made a stroll thinking how full of unrest and oppression and disorder and emptiness is the world.

Only weeks before the People Power Revolution of ’86, with the instability of the snap election still in the air, she opened her letter with:

I do hope you are spending the lull from school productively for your body and your mind.  These are dangerous times and these are also exciting times. History is being made, whatever color it assumes. The one thing to remember is: this too shall pass...

4.  She wrote to me about literature, reading, magazines and books, since all these were her expertise. She counselled me on what to read. In one letter she wrote when I was about 14, she urged me to read “The Merchant of Venice,” because reading Portia’s defense of her client would “make you feel triumphant as a human being.”

5.  She told me about my siblings, how they get into trouble, their interests and friends. Above all, she would relay their great affection for me, their conversations and questions about when they could see me again. I knew that she also did the same in reverse, by regaling my siblings about my determination and fearlessness, painting a model and mentor for them to look up to. How hard it must have been to juggle that task--to guide me and hope that I would make the right decisions, and not let her down, and yet upbuild me to my siblings, never knowing what trouble I might throw out to her one day.

In all this, she was tireless and generous in making her persona diminish; she took herself out of the spotlight and beamed it all on me, my father and much later, on my talented and promising siblings. 

6.  She wrote of my father's work, his business and plans. I watched him change his hats as a businessman and artisan. I learned about farming seasons and cycles. I became familiar with my father's tools and equipment--a tractor, typesetters, or printing press machines. She would even discuss these in her letters at length!

From her I learned tidbits of art history and design styles, as she learned them from her own readings and my father the artist, but she could best explain these concepts. Her knowledge of the arts is quite extensive; her personal style is timeless and tasteful.  Even to this day, we consult her on many things and relish conversations about fashion or design styles.

7.  She asked constantly about my diet, fearful that I was skipping meals or had no money for food. This was from her own experience about saving money or not having any, while she herself was at university, far away from her own mother.

8.  She inquired constantly about receiving the money they sent, knowing that “you find it difficult to summon the nerve to ask anybody when you are in need.”  She often wrote anxiously (in every letter!) of my ability to access money sent by telegraphic transfer or bank transfer, which in those days took three days before one could get it from the bank.

9.  She admonished me about being safe and prudent always when travelling or going out. She was worried about my use of public transportation. Knowing that the route I had to take featured regularly in front page newspapers as a dumping ground for murders and summary executions must have terrified her no end.

10.  She urged me to pray, to have some time of quiet and reflection. Her prayers for me at the end of each letter was beautifully expressed, Above all, she wanted me to be young and full of gaiety (knowing I was too serious for my own good), to truly be alive and not consumed by disappointments and fears.

11.  More importantly, she taught me about boys (and men). Perhaps that will be a separate post, because that is funny and endearing, insightful and encouraging, all at the same time.

Reading her letters again put a lot of my parenting concerns in perspective, especially about my own sons' future and my brush with anxiety and depression in the past. I feel a bit sheepish, foolish even, to crumble so easily.

My mother endured all these concerns and so much more.  In later years, my own siblings would also leave home for university studies (we were all spaced far apart in birth). What I have experienced so far as a parent could not compare to her fears for my welfare and health. She spoke honestly about her anxieties for my wellbeing, but she never appeared weak or highly strung. To imagine that I was not eating well and often, that I was in some sort of dire need, out taking public transport in the rough streets of Manila in the evenings, must have been terrifying. As I look on my own sons and think of my own fears for them, and the fact that they are in the safety of our house or in my company makes my worries pale in comparison. I shudder to think of her torment and all other doubts and fears she had to bear.

12.  Her letters also showed me that despite years of being apart, she knew me very well: I was too shy, tended to please people and not want to cause any fuss; she spoke often with grave concern about my perfectionism, intolerance, idealism and extreme zeal and knew that one day I would these would cause me pain or despair.  

13.  The most refreshing thing of all is that in pursuit of a good education and a better future, she and my father gave us the freedom to choose the career or discipline that would give us peace and gladness.  She articulated many of my burdens and made me know that she understood. 

She expressly took away the pressure of good grades when I couldn't have them; assured me that good grades and a career in medicine are not worth the loss of my peace of mind and a life of enslavement to expectations.

I know there have been hours and days and weeks of pure hell just wanting to run home and bury your head in the sand, maybe terrified at everything and having pounding headaches and low grades...If you felt these, I imagined them and knew they were your ghosts.  But you just sailed through the storms, you handled it your way, you righted your boat and made do with your own hands...I have always been with you in thoughts and every thought that crossed your mind pealed in my heart.

Woven into all these words was the depth of her experiences, from her own experience of going to university in the city in the 60s, as a young journalist in the country's leading newspaper, or working in television and public relations with high-profile personalities, from years of  being involved serving the community, from listening to an endless stream of people to her living room who consulted and discussed their problems with her.  This mentoring and counseling she does best, demonstrating an open heart, listening skills,  great clarity of mind, the ability to articulate what cannot be expressed easily, and her insight into their concerns.

She would write about these confidences and conflicts to me, explaining to me what was actually the heart of the matter—pointing out the things left unspoken as these the conflicts or problems unfolded. This correspondence sharpened my instinct, sensitivity and perceptiveness about human behaviour and relationships.  These qualities also made me earn many good strong, and steady friendships along the way.  This life of pondering, of thinking perhaps too much and always reading deeper into things can be my handicap many times.  But this practice has kept me in good stead and has seen me through the darkest times.

Many memories flooded back to me. As I open a letter on blue colored sheets, and read it again, I would remember exactly where I was when I read it the first time, how I would weep quietly, with an inexpressible pang of homesickness. And how strange it was for me to see simple stories about other people that would send me crying with loneliness and homesickness. I remember how I would tear open an envelope and scan through it quickly, hungrily, as if I could propel myself back in her arms by taking it all in.

We are all here on the table under candlelight because of [power blackout], writing you letters. How much better it would be if you were here with us even in this darkness....

There are more, much more words and counsel, great humor and affection in these letters. How can you condense a decade’s worth of correspondence, especially during my most crucial years of growth and maturity? This pile I've sifted through does not yet even include letters written when I began working, or in my early years of marriage and motherhood!  Until now, she ministers to all from afar, and allows everyone else, but herself, to shine brighter. Her emails are the funniest, most detailed, honest and candid.

(Funnily enough, we both seemed to be obssessed with two things, which I nag my boys constantly with this common plea: eat your food and take care of your teeth!)

I wish to tell her now that although I have yet to have a child who would leave home for studies or a career, I appreciate the depth and intensity of each emotion she felt for me all those years.  I wish to tell her, repeatedly, that as a mother I have now understood what she way expressing in this passage:

One day you will understand it, as now I understand my own mother--with all her weaknesses and strength.  It's only in the future that you would really, really know what is a mother, from another mother's viewpoint....

...All these are not new to me. I know what’s in your heart. I know when your soul faints from hurts, worries, fears, but a mother’s job is to allow the child to mature and find her way out of the woods. It’s also true to animals, but from instinct rather than reason.

The top three lessons from her that immediately come to mind?

First, character. You may be the most statesque beauty in the word, the most talented, the most articulate, moving writer, an extremely gifted, witty speaker or most profound thinker. But if inside you, there is a lack of humility, courtesy, generosity, respect and mindfulness, a lack of belief in goodness, then it all comes to naught.

Secondly, never be afraid to speak honestly, that is, to speak with love and humility and from the core of your being. This is the hardest, the best--the only--way to go about in this world. This is enough to break down the most sullen teenager, an aggrieved spouse or partner, to get out of the most difficult situation, to mend relationships. I have journeyed back to peace and gladness because of this wisdom.

Thirdly, you can never doubt the power of a well written and honest letter. If there is only one thing you can do in life: learn how to write better, and this you do by reading.

I end this with one of the many wise thoughts from her letters:

One last word. In every circumstance, be thankful and at the same time say, "This too will pass." If you have a defeat, a devastation, a crisis--remember it too will end and time will close over it like sand in the desert closes in over each other. If you have a victory, a joy, a real reward--remember it too will pass away. The next day could bring another defeat. Then you can stop being swell-headed over an exhilarating prize.  It too will pass away. His enduring mercy and kindness remains. Only He is eternal.

I realized that I've written so many things and stretched this blog post too long, in the hope that I could express only this simple truth: Mama, I love you, and I am deeply thankful that you are my mother.  You have expressed that gratitude so many times, being grateful at the kind of daughter I am. This is because you helped make me become that daughter.