My mother’s voice, as the sweetest of never-fade echoes, is a hearth-side cup of cocoa. It comes in both the sunny weather and when winter blows most cold. No matter what happens in this life, she loved me. She would have gone to war to save me, if that’s what it took. Yet, as is so often with mothers, her love was there in the everyday mundane chores that are necessary to make a house a home. When we call mothers “unsung heroes,” do we ever realise what a monumental understatement it is?
Mother night, mother heart right, mother of comfort's sight, stay with me the days that become years. For it is easy to see when the sunshines, but you are moon and starlight, not caring for the chill of space and void. Mother knight, mother heart write.
"Mother to one, mother to all." Isn't that the way we feel after giving birth? Suddenly our heart grows infinitely wide and we need children all over the world to have safety, good nutrition and love. For suddenly we feel their suffering as if they were our own child.
When a mother is stressed, brain function is decreased in her infant even by two months old. This alteration of the brain harms the ability of the child to be a happy person who is a member of a functional complex society. The stress also changes the expression of over 900 genes for a shorter life in a competitive (rather than a cooperative) society. Darwinist principles would only operate for humanity if their society was broken... and this is the most stressful environment a human can be asked to endure. So, for the future, for peace, the first gift we must give to every newborn baby is an unstressed mother... and this comes of taking food out of capitalism and working together as farmers, scientists and engineers... working out how to maximise a nutritious global harvest for all that is distributed fairly to all nations. To change the world, decrease stress.
The traditional work of mother's and women is the glue of society, providing the bed rock of mental health. Thus, in a society run with a financial system and obsessed by financial status, power and vanity, society crumbles. And so, it is not a women's issue to care properly for women, it is everyone's issue. If a woman is disadvantaged so are her kids, male and female. If a mother is disadvantaged, so is the father of her children and her parents who may be called upon for support... and her friends if her mental health suffers and she needs to reach out. Supporting women, mothers especially, is the smartest thing we can do as a society, to mend our communities and regain a sense of happiness and solidarity with one another.
Mama's apron was a staple of my childhood, patterned with all things British, from teapots to the palace guards. When I think of it the aromas of her fresh baking come flooding in to my brain, my heart leaps and there is that moment of serenity. I see her in that apron, arms wide, a hug just a few steps away.
There was a fire in that old aga everyday that I thought of myself as a child, and even long into adulthood. It was a whole thing, more than metal, more than nostalgia. Those aromas and the warmth it brought are so intwined with memories of my mother's love, those small moments of affection that built the foundation of who I am today.
"I'd be up early, voice blaring. My mother would be upstairs, 'putting her eyebrows on' as she used to say. Then she'd shush me and I'd complain of her reducing my rights to freedom of expression, only to hear her stock response, 'I'm not seeking to reduce your rights, love, just your volume."
My mother was one for surprises, each day a multitude of tiny things... how they made me smile from toe to lips. Which hand was my cookie in? Which way would we walk to school? Would be splashing in puddles or leaping over? Would we dance our special jig if we saw a cat? It was so fun, all those everyday adventures... I cans still feel her excitement at seeing a simple flower or the way the light played upon the path. In a life so ordinary it was her that was extraordinary, not because she was given so much, yet because she made it that way. As the baker turns flour and water to bread, as God turns seed and water to flower, mother turned the mundane into fascination and love; she was my heaven, my superhero.
My mother, looking like a disco ball in red lipstick and platinum hair, wearing her smile and her kind eyes, places the milk in the cart. We talk of my imaginary game and I tell her of her role, and mine and granny's and grandpa's. She puts on the paper crown I made her home and I giggle. Then I see the chocolate milk, I had some at a party once. I want it. I ask. She says no and I pout. But I know that tone means no in a way that's not play and she goes back to talking about our game. Suddenly I'm thinking of my character, how I want to be the bad guy this time. I practice my evil laugh. It's good.
Lara is slumped at the breakfast table, her brows creased and face tense. When Mom sits, coffee in hand, she asks "What's up?" her tone casual and light.
Lara's scowls at her scrambled eggs, "I don't know whether to do basketball or swimming. I like both but I only see Claire at swimming."
Mom takes another sip and then continues, serious faced, "I see, well, what's does your gut tell you? Which one do you want more?"
Lara's face crumples again, "I don't know!"
Mom makes her face straighter than a poker player and says, "Lara, you're not going swimming." For a fraction of a second the corners of Lara's mouth twitch upwards, until her conscious mind asserts control again. Then Mom says "Actually, no, you're not going to basketball." Lara's face is serious all the way from her eyes to her mouth, no pleasure at all, not even masked. "OK," Mom says, "We'll finish this set of swim lessons, then switch to just basketball. You can still see Claire every week, OK honey?"
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