And yet another Mother Day comes in where all the social media posts, the WhatsApp statuses and family group (yeah, the same notorious ones with 1000s of good morning mes1sages which we all endure daily) are being filled with, “Mother is God” and other highest tributes reserve for this day. Seeing all these, a thing clicks on my mind whether by equalling mother to god (now I am an Atheist since I was 12, but that story is for another day), we are losing a sense of connection with our mothers by making them less human. And do mothers also feel pressurized with this Godhood status that is being bestowed upon them irrespective of their own likings and dreams? Well, I tried to humanize my mother (anyway if I will tell her she is a god she will say that means you don’t believe in me!) here mentioning some of her quirks and we all are living with that. Sometimes we laugh at it and sometimes we laugh with it!
Too emotional, decently angry at times (she has changed over the years)
Have you met people who just go into one or other form of overthinking over how society sees you, or why people say and other stuff? Well, my mother used to be one of them. And that gave her hypertension at 32. The angry part probably stemmed from her tenure as a teacher and later as a Principal. Unfortunately for her, all the 3 kids (me and my elder siblings) have been thoroughly hard-skinned rhinoceros so the anger couldn’t permeate through our body and heart. Reminds me of an incident, when I was a kid and after a decent round of trying wrestling moves on a mud, my mother got super angry and put me below an open tap and start washing me up angrily and I asked her, “Mom, why are you washing me like linen, are you going to hang me up for drying?” And she laughed for 1 hour straight!
Her most important love is sleep (sorry dad, not you!)
She loved sleeping when she was 26. Now she is 62 and while because of health complications the quality of sleep suffers, her mood and day still brighten up if she gets an enjoyable sleep. Her late in morning sleep had a positive impact right from start and dad became a good breakfast home-chef over years trying original recipes. For some sleep is a task. For some, sleep is a process. For some sleep is heaven. I feel my mom belongs to the latter category. She absolutely loathed early mornings and needs a decent afternoon nap. Used to be a delightful time for us for stealing cookies and other things when she was fast asleep.
We got only 1 life to eat philosophy (irrespective of health)
She got hypertension at 32, diabetes at 39, which led to bit strict controls on food for her by us. Still, regardless of her senior citizen status, she can walk for like 2 miles to have that favourite street food (no matter how many PHD’s you share with her for hygiene) or she will eat the thing discreetly at home telling no one. (Now I understand where we kids got the cookie stealing DNA!). I told her she can have these kinds of stuff once a month and she will raise furore and emotional melodrama so much that once a month becomes once a week or sometimes even more after detailed negotiations. Sometimes, I wonder whether they do not prescribe whatever food under some precautions; we develop a passion for the same food it seems. She loves non-vegs; she loves street foods; she loves ice creams; she loves South Indian snacks. So technically she loves and eats all the food, which is not that much healthy for her conditions. Not a role model in patience!
She like talks (very much)
Just like machines run on petrol, my mother needs conversation as oxygen. Without a decent conversation, her day feels incomplete. And not necessarily that conversation needs to be peaceful, but it should a conversation or a discussion or an argument. Lucky for her, that my dad probably is equally or even more talkative than my mother thus both complement each other. Their 40 years of married life has probably this strong “need to talk” as a major success factor. They absolutely have a strong preference and love towards people who talks excessively as unfortunately, their own children are on a relatively silent side so they can't get a full quota from us (relatively is a keyword here as very few can match their talkativeness). She can even give subtle messaging to her kids, even if she feels something needs to be blurted out. Like while she will not directly call her daughter a fat but will send her messages about 20 best yoga poses to reduce belly fat. This is name-calling of the highest order! My sister though have her revenge by naming my mother as the grandmother of her cat and dog!
Well, I have just covered 4 of her habits, there are like 400 at least. We all have this habit of romanticising the sacrifices that mothers make and over time we are so staunch in our thinking a mother has to make sacrifice otherwise she is not a good or a worthwhile mother. This means we expect mothers to make her life a downer for the sake of our life. And the reward is a eulogy or a terminological equivalent of God. Is this even the right way? Why can’t we treat the mothers as humans with their own set of imperfections and their own dreams? Why do we expect a mother has to make a sacrifice, and that is more or less a granted thing? This kind of thinking also made mothers question their choices if sometimes they think about themselves or lead the life they love. I have seen millions of cases where a mother sacrifice her career for a child or where a mother is living in an awful marriage for a child. Does being a mother means stop being a woman or the entire purpose of life is to be the perfect sacrificing role model for a child? When we as a society will start treating mothers as humans with human feelings, human imperfections and human dreams instead of some highly perfect godly image? My mother is not a god. She lived her life, her dreams, loved us and have her own set of imperfections like every one of us. Probably when we humanize mother, they will feel more relieved or freer than the high expectations and unnecessary pressure that comes from god tag. Kudos to non-godly human mothers all around the world and hope we get to see non-godly mothers everywhere.
