Much as I hate to admit it or want to allow it to get me down, I will always be touched by the blues or mild depression when the month of May comes around. First, because May is the birthday month of my late mom. Born in 1934, she succumbed to cancer in July of 1996, a scant five months after she began complaining of pain. A relatively young 62 when she passed away, she was at an age I actually reached last month, and that kind of drove home how fate had made her leave us much too early. I regularly see FB posts of friends highlighting birthday parties, their mother’s or father’s 85th, 90th or some such number, and it frankly evokes bittersweet feelings in me — still wondering why it couldn’t be her enjoying that milestone.
Secondly, because May is Mother’s Day month, when both traditional media — the dailies and the glossies, and digital space — news portals and all forms of social media, are literally flooded with features, reminders, posts and photos in celebration of mothers — and I feel terribly left out. Ironic, as it reminds me of how during her lifetime, we actually weren’t very big on making too much of a fuss about Mother’s Day.
My mom was oftentimes a riot, very opinionated and contrary. And in so many words, she made it clear to us that if we all couldn’t bother to be nice to her the other 364 days of the year, we didn’t have to bother making her feel special on just one day of the year. For her, Mother’s Day was more an American creation, as there, kids are regularly booted out of the “family nest” when they reach the age of consent, and Mother’s Day was more a way to remind them of that “nest” (and to create a shopping frenzy)!
Watching a movie with my mom was exquisite torture as she was the type to get really involved, and audibly “tsk-tsk” or sigh when the heroine would make some wrong decision, or when some disaster was about to transpire. She had a mean hook shot, and was actually the first “coach” I had in basketball — turning me on to the Bill Russell-led Celtics. And she was my “guidebook” to manners and style, as she would always preach that being understated and sticking to the classics, was far better than ending up some fashion victim or garish peacock. And I smile recalling how she would say this while looking at my father with her raised eyebrows, as he loved his boldly printed shirts and brightly colored trousers. She taught me to never be reluctant or embarrassed to be a gentleman, even to strangers. For her, to possess this as an instinct was to be hoped for and it was recognition of the situation that was called for, and not just being courteous to specific persons, i.e. people I know — as that would just be me trying to impress.
It may be 21 years since she left us but for those who have lost a loved one, they will understand it when I say that the pain does not go away. You can numb it, you can relegate it to some corner of your consciousness — but that it persists, still exists, and refuses to just wither and go away is testament to the feelings we have for the one who has gone. The smallest thing — a scene in a movie or on TV, a photo or mental image, a line in a book or a remark overhead, or even finding oneself in a place or location fraught with memories — and the floodgates open, with regret and sadness leading the charge.
If there is some master class in the Art of Forgetting, when it comes to my mom, I know I have failed that course...and I’m happy to have failed. And am even proud to say that I share that failure with my siblings. Remembering her, still feeling the loss, are our own ways of keeping her spirit alive. Having been, in her own way, such a spirited person, I wouldn’t want it any other way. I purposely wrote this after Mother’s Day, as I know there are undertones of being a killjoy or party pooper. But for some of you out there, you will empathize with where I’m coming from and it’s good to know we aren’t alone in being so bull-headed about “holding on” and never really letting go. Sometimes, they really deserve it!