My mommy dearest

May 10 was Mother’s day. Initially, I planned to write a tribute to my mother; but since the editor insists I write more than three lines I might have to abandon the idea. On second thought, what the heck, all we are hearing the last few days is elections, elections and elections. And the root cause for many of the nincompoops who are standing for elections, may be traced to well one thing, their err… mothers.

My first memory of my mother was a large burly person with kind hands, a loving smile and a bald spot. It was years later that I realised that the person was actually my father. Keep in mind that at seven months, gender differentiation is a controversial subject, and even today at age 37 I mistake occasionally one parent for the other. What else can explain my buying a dressing gown for my father? Although why he didn’t return the thing, I can’t rightly answer.

Like most babies, my mother was the nicest person I knew, and like most babies my mother was the only person I knew. Unlike me by age 19 other youngsters had influences and friends other than their mother. I, of course, was deeply controlled by my mother. Also known as the mother hen in Greek, the mother load in Zulu, and Mrs Sharma in Hindi.

My mother taught me most things. Things that make one acceptable in open society such as never sneezing and coughing simultaneously; never loaning your used underwear to a friend and never shaving and eating cornflakes at the same time. My mother was also rarely harsh or aggressive. When angered she’d only use ancient Kung Fu martial art ‘Flying Rubber Slipper on Face’, which is rarely practiced today, not even I’m told in the holy precincts of the shaolin temple. From this I learnt three important lessons — i) not to do whatever I had just done again, ii) rubber slippers bend both forwards and backwards, and iii) rubber slippers come in four colours, blue, green, white and lilac pink. (A lilac pink slipper can be particularly embarrassing for a 14-year-old boy.)

My mother also told me that if I didn’t finish my food, I’d never grow into a man. That I did finish my food, and still didn’t become a man is another story, and a matter I really should take up with her when she returns from the USA. Anyway, it’s Happy Mother’s Day to all. Mothers are celebrated in all cultures except on the Afghan-Pak border. There they are shot. Especially, the ones who struggle to grow facial hair. In the civilised world there’s no one like a mother… except maybe a father who dressed up like a mother, but that’s a tale for father’s day.