Tag: Mother’s Day

A Mom’s Gifts

Published on by Marilyn2 Comments

Walking along Boston Harbor today, I was struck by the beauty all around me. While the day dawned gloomy and chilly, by noon the sky was the blue of a clear spring day and blossoms and buds had appeared like magic. It reminded me of the children’s book The Secret Garden and the description of springtime.

“Fair fresh leaves, and buds—and buds—tiny at first but swelling and working Magic until they burst and uncurled into cups of scent delicately spilling themselves over their brims and filling the garden air.”

The Secret Garden

It’s been six months since my mom died and I’ve been thinking a lot about her these past few days. Tomorrow is Mother’s Day, and it will be my first Mother’s Day where my mom is not present on this earth. I am well aware that in the natural order of things, every person gets to a point where their mothers are no longer present. I am not alone in this. In fact, I am one of those too fortunate people who had their mom for many, many years.

And I also feel the loss acutely. Last year I was recovering from major surgery, so I was unable to go be with her for Mother’s Day. Had I known that she would be gone, would I have cancelled the surgery? I don’t know that I would. I had cancelled it once before and I really couldn’t hold off anymore. I think my mom knew this and gave me the grace I needed.

Memories of previous mother’s days and other holidays, but mostly the visits I had with her where it was just the two of us on a regular weekend loom large and precious. We would go to Lake Ontario and have picnics of egg or tuna salad on fresh bread, always buying Abbot’s frozen custard on the way home. I would read aloud from either a book my brother had begun reading to her, or we would begin a new one. Some of her favorites were books by her friends from Pakistan, her eyes sparkling as she filled in details from her own memories of events relayed in these books. Her routine was to get up much later than I would in the morning so I would fix myself a cup of tea and then have breakfast with her when she got up. Parathas and spicy eggs were a favorite from her Pakistani past, but as time went on, a simple piece of toast or an English muffin was all she could eat.

In the months before she died, it was more difficult for her to get up and get going. Our times included a lot more staying inside with reading, resting, and stories. Audio books were a plenty and I will never be able to listen to Maisie Dobbs books on audio again without thinking of my mom on her recliner, eyes open, mind alert, body tired. Sometimes she would doze off and I would gently wake her to see if she wanted to head to her bed for an afternoon nap. “I should, shouldn’t I?” she would reply, only to doze off again one or two times before going. In between all of this, I heard stories of childhood and beyond. I was taken back to her elementary years, to an older girl Evangeline walking her home from school and laughing and scolding her for having the lofty dream of attending college. “Oh Pauline! What makes you think you can go to college? Your mom and dad never finished eighth grade!” Scarlet, more from the anger that erupted in her than Evangeline’s chiding, she vowed that she’d show Evangeline! And she did.

The stories moved on from childhood to college in Boston, a city she loved dearly, friendships with roommates Maggie and Ruthie, and falling in love with my father. What a gift to those who are older that they get to fall in love again and again through their memories, reliving the joys of those initial days like they were yesterday. Mom and Dad’s love story took place in the city of Boston where, poor as the proverbial mice that roam around churches in search of morsels, they bought five cent coffees and an occasional coke float. While I had heard many of the stories before, there were new ones that emerged, while the old ones were the more precious knowing that the storyteller would soon be leaving us, leaving me.

And the storyteller did leave. She left in the late fall when the golden leaves were creating heavy earth carpets, and the smell of wood fires was in the air. Now it is the spring and I miss her. I miss the almost daily phone calls that were sometimes check-ins and other times heavy with conversation and memories. We loved talking to each other about books – those that she was listening to and others that I was reading. I miss knowing that when I got back from a trip, she would be waiting to talk with me, to ask about it. I miss having her ask me about my kids. “How is Joel?” she would say, and I knew she really cared.

Despite the missing, I would not bring her back for an instant. She is in Aslan’s country, further up and further in, and it would be cruel to bring her back from glory to a place with only glimpses.

In truth, Mom left me with many lasting gifts that I hold on to tight with hopes that I can one day pass on the same – the gift of an enduring faith lived out in stubborn persistence, the gifts of reading and writing, the gifts of delving deeply into the scriptures and daily prayer, the gifts of learning when to speak up and when to keep silent. Most of all, the life-long example of a mom who knew how to love well.

On this Mother’s Day, I reflect on these gifts with a healthy mixture of tears, wistful longing, and gratitude. Though her presence is gone, the gifts remain, and I am deeply grateful. Honoring her is about entering wholeheartedly into the day with laughter, love, tea, and cake, expressing love and thanks to those around me and those at a distance.

I wonder as I write this – what gifts have you received from your mom? Whether alive or no longer here, what do you hold precious because of her?

About Mother’s Day – aka Holidays Out of Control

Published on by Marilyn11 Comments

Of all the negative traits of capitalism, the co-opting of holidays is one of the most insidious and destructive to our bank accounts and our relationships. 

It’s almost mother’s day – and what was started in the United States during Civil War days to bring honor to a mother deeply loved by her daughter has become a day that causes bitterness, strife, guilt, and all the things that mothers hate so much. Articles circulate the World Wide Web applauding moms as the jewels of the planet or rebuking pastors about not making those who are not moms feel bad.

It is all exhausting

A woman named Anna Jarvis started this holiday. During the civil war she worked hard to promote peace between moms on both sides of the Mason-Dixon Line, women with either Confederate or Union loyalties, recognizing that they had far more in common then they disagreed on. She loved her own mom deeply and grieved when she died, working to commemorate her by promoting a day to honor mothers. Although it took several years she pushed the idea through to Congress and in 1914 the first official Mother’s Day was recognized, signed into law by President Woodrow Wilson. Jarvis would later be enraged at the commercialism of the holiday, throwing a “Mother’s Day Salad” onto the floor of a restaurant and walking out in disgust as well as trying to rescind the holiday.*

Her beloved idea had spiraled out of control and she was appalled. Her idea of the holiday was “a visit home or writing a long letter to your mother.” She is quoted as saying “A maudlin, insincere printed card or ready-made telegram means nothing except that you’re too lazy to write to the woman who has done more for you than anyone else in the world.”

Let me be clear: I love holidays as much as anybody. I love family, I love getting together, I love tradition. And I love being honored on Mother’s Day. I also love mothers – a spot as soft as velvet is in my heart for mothers everywhere. We have been gifted with so much but there is a cost.

What I don’t love is what we have done with holidays, turning them – all of them, not just Mother’s Day — into opportunities to spend money, times where we feel guilt, experiences where we are left with a sense of inadequacy or inability to do things “right.”, times of mourning our singleness or grieving our losses.

I didn’t grow up under the shadow of Hallmark. There were no card stores in Pakistan and no television shouting at me that “if he loved me he would go to Jared’s”. No stores did campaigns of pink or blue and there were no florist’s shops – just street hawkers with their glorious Irises and Day Lilies sold on the mall of the town of Murree. I feel fortunate that my formative years were free of these images.

Despite this, I have become a product of the society where I currently live and it is sometimes terrifying.

I don’t want to be that mom that imagines her children don’t love her because they forget a card or a phone call. I don’t want to be that person that spends money she doesn’t have to get things other don’t need because of advertising that excels in digging into the human psyche and finding the cracks in our well-oiled armor. I don’t want my holidays and traditions to be characterized by green and red M&M’s and bunny rabbits; by large pink “Remember Your Mom” posters and guilt-ridden stress; by silver hearts from Jared’s and kisses beginning with Kay; by Hollywood and Hallmark telling me what my family, my marriage, my love, and my Mother’s Day should look like.

I want to own my holidays – I don’t want my holidays to own me. 

How can we take back what has been strategically taken from us? How can we reshape our thinking and our expectations so that the goal becomes fun memories and healthy interactions , holidays reconstructed with less money, less stuff, fewer expectations and ultimately more fun?

Can we be brave enough to live counter-culture, set our own agenda our own traditions? Can we turn off the television with its brilliant messaging that tells us how we are supposed to celebrate, that lures us in with soft porn Victoria’s Secret ads and super glossy symbols of false love ? Can we turn down our hearing aids so we are not affected by the insidious words that tell us “this – this is how it’s supposed to be – and it it isn’t then something is wrong?”

I for one want to live free of the bondage of false images and expectations and reclaim my holidays, my relationships, and my money. Is anyone else in?

*[Source-The Founder of Mother’s Day Later Fought to Have It Abolished ]

In Honor of Boarding School Moms

Published on by Marilyn28 Comments

For many moms, sending a child to boarding school is probably a bit like giving them up for adoption. You are entrusting another to care for that child who you birthed, who you love, who holds your heart. For let’s be honest, the minute we give birth there is a crack in our fine-oiled armor – A crack that is all soft, sweet-smelling baby. The crack widens when boarding school is a part of the picture.

And often there is criticism from others when boarding school becomes a part of the lives of children.  Sometimes the criticism is founded, other times it perhaps needs to be rethought and the words “God didn’t intend it this way” or “Your kids will never really heal” needs to be said cautiously, if at all.

For there are those of us who went to boarding school and knew even as young children that it was okay. We knew beyond doubt that our parents loved us. Knew that we were given to them as a gift on loan. Our parents understood that they were never the primary authors of our story – for that authorship belongs to God alone. But they wrote on our lives and allowed others to as well – our boarding parents.

Some of those boarding parents wrote well – words of wisdom, laughter, joy, and discipline. Others weren’t sure what to write – and that’s okay. They are and were human. Others wrote poorly – and that was difficult.

Today I honor my mom and two of those boarding moms – Deb & Eunice.

Eunice spoke into my life when I was a little girl. I was seven years old when I met her. Eunice was pretty and had the voice of an angel. She could be heard singing in the halls of our dormitory. I would pretend I was homesick just so I could have Auntie Eunice to myself. Auntie Eunice wrote music and joy into my elementary world. She mothered so many of us so well, yet always gave us up without a grudge when our real moms came to reclaim us.

But we were still always her kids.

Deb spoke into my life when I was a teenager. When boys and belief became more complicated and I was learning to work out my faith with fear and trembling. Deb’s small studio apartment had room for our cooking, our laughter, and even our tears – sometimes falling so fast it was hard to keep up. Deb loved us when we were unloveable and kept in touch with us when we faced the daunting task of returning to our passport countries. Deb was less housemother and more friend.

Deb and Eunice taught me to love well, without holding too tight. They taught me about sacrifice and perseverance. They taught me about laughter and the long journey. As I grew they became my friends – friends I could pray with, cry with, and laugh with until the wee morning hours.

And my mom allowed them to do that. She gave me to God and prayed for those who could walk beside me when she wasn’t there.

And He granted her request.

So to Deb, Eunice and Mom – Happy Mother’s Day and thank you! You loved well and taught so many of us to do the same.

Happy Mother’s Day. Thank you for loving well

Service of Dedication

This post is dedicated as well to the moms who send kids to Rift Valley Academy, Murree Christian School, Dakar Academy, Black Forest Academy and the many other place I have forgotten. Thanks for who you are and what you do. 

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I Remember

Published on by Marilyn20 Comments
Me & My Mom – Easter, 2019

Today is Mother’s Day in the United States. For the first time ever as a mom I am neither with any of my children or with my own mom. I have hungrily devoured messages, emails, and phone calls that are filled with love and words of affirmation of this amazing and difficult task called ‘being a mom’. In honor of my own mom, who I am fortunate enough to still have on this planet, I post this piece that I wrote a number of years ago. 

To My Mom

I remember sleeping on the rooftop of our house in Ratodero. We would wake at dawn when we heard the call to prayer from the nearby mosque and despite your maternal pleadings, we couldn’t go back to sleep.

I remember being tucked into bed at night, you would read me a story, kiss me, and then sit by my bedside and sing. It’s what I missed the most in boarding school.

I remember that first trip on the train party. In my memory I had just turned seven years old and we were in Hyderabad. I cried tears from my soul the entire way to the station. As the train pulled out, I stopped crying and you began. I never saw your tears and it wasn’t until later that I heard about them.

I remember you never let anyone call me chubby, even when I was.

I remember our fights. Stone-faced cold I could be to my mother. And I think I may have been the child that could bring on your fiery temper better than the others. I remember your forgiveness. Sometimes I think we both thought the fights would continue forever, but we were wrong.

I remember the picture you hung on our wall, a snow scene of New England, reminder of your home so far away from the desert of Sindh. It wasn’t until I became an adult that I realized that there must have been times when you missed your home so much that it hurt.

I remember seeing you every morning. No matter how early I got up, you were up earlier, praying and reading your Bible, strength of your soul.

I remember your presence in the first couple of weeks of me becoming a mom. Your common sense wisdom was a gift.

And I remember the first time I realize that you were aging. I fought it. Because if you were aging it meant there would come one day when you would no longer be available to talk to and ask questions of; to pray for me, my marriage, my children.

But you are still here and still speak into my life. So today I remember that I want to Thank You publicly and privately, from my heart.

Happy Mother’s Day. On this day it’s good to remember.

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Repost: For the Love of Girls

Published on by Marilyn1 Comment

Only Girl Amongst Boys

I wrote this in honor of Mother’s Day – but it resonates on every day. Women world-wide need to know their worth. How can those of us with more do something for those with less? What part are we called to play in changing the landscape for girls and women?

I have always loved being a girl. Growing up with 5 boys never made me want to be a boy. It’s not that I didn’t like them! I loved boys, initially making the outward proclamation that they were gross and had cooties, moving on to liking them as friends. Then they became interesting and attractive, fun to think about as I dreamily wrote my name linked with a Boys across my notebooks.  I went on to marry, and then raise boys, 2 are now adults and one is a 15-year-old. And I love them. Despite the heart breaks and frustration with the obvious differences in cognitive functions, I love boys – but I have never wanted to be one.  I loved being a girl.

Being a girl was an honored place in my family. Born after 3 boys, I broke statistics and was emotionally spoiled from my first breath. Even at the most awkward of stages I thought I was a princess. My best friend in Pakistan, Nancy, was also the only girl in her family. She was dark-haired and beautiful and I imagined us both as exotic princesses. We would be swept away by handsome princes who resembled George Harrison from the Beatles. That was my innocent world for a while.

Then I became 13. I was living in Pakistan as a middle schooler when an awareness flooded over me that life could be brutally unfair to girls. At 13, I suddenly realized had I been a poor Pakistani or Afghan girl my choices and path in life would be different. I thought about being 13 and being married to a 40-year-old, taking the place as second wife, place and identity precarious until that first male child was born. I don’t know how, but it washed over me like water one day and has become a question throughout my life. Why me here? Why them there?

13 was my moment of truth and realization that everyone born a girl is not so blessed as I. Everyone born a girl doesn’t feel it’s all about princess privilege. Millions of girls world-wide will never know what it’s like to love being a girl and move on to love being a woman.  From birth to death and covering all areas in between like education, childbirth, jobs, literacy, even until death there are opportunities lost and tragedies made for so many girls across the globe.

But it doesn’t have to look this way. The picture can change and it can change even with a little action on our parts for the love of girls. In the book Half the Sky by Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl Wudunn a case is made that the “best way to fight poverty and extremism is to educate and empower women and girls”.   I read the book last summer, not wanting it to end because of its conviction and call to action. I am impressed that it is fair and practical. Love of girls doesn’t have to be about politics, and it doesn’t have to be about difference. It can be all about girls. Through the organization Half the Sky there are concrete ways to get involved and get others involved.  The agenda on the website is clear and I guarantee, no matter what your politics, there will be an organization that you can believe in and support – whether it be with time, finances, or spreading the word through networking.

So in honor of Mother’s Day this weekend – for the love of Girls who turn into Women – Girls with gifts, potential, personality, and strength; Girls that “hold up half the sky” I write this as a result of my journey to care.

So let us be clear up front: We hope to recruit you to join an incipient movement to emancipate women and fight global poverty by unlocking women’s power as economic catalysts. It is a process that transforms bubbly teenage girls from brothel slaves into successful businesswomen. You can help accelerate change if you’ll just open your heart and join in.” From Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity Worldwide

Take a look at this video clip from the Global Campaign for Education: 

Dedicated to my two girls – Annie and Stefanie. You are beautiful, amazing, strong and gifted. Thank you for who you are. Also to my mom for teaching me that being a girl is great.

Bloggers Note: Half the Sky comes from a quote by Mao Tse -Tung “Women hold up half the sky”. This quote was the inspiration for the title of Kristof and Wudunn’s book. 

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For the Love of Girls

Published on by Marilyn3 Comments

Only Girl Amongst Boys

I have always loved being a girl. Growing up with 5 boys never made me want to be a boy. It’s not that I didn’t like them! I loved boys, initially making the outward proclamation that they were gross and had cooties, moving on to liking them as friends. Then they became interesting and attractive, fun to think about as I dreamily wrote my name linked with a Boys across my notebooks.  I went on to marry, and then raise boys, 2 are now adults and one is a 15-year-old. And I love them. Despite the heart breaks and frustration with the obvious differences in cognitive functions, I love boys – but I have never wanted to be one.  I loved being a girl.

Being a girl was an honored place in my family. Born after 3 boys, I broke statistics and was emotionally spoiled from my first breath. Even at the most awkward of stages I thought I was a princess. My best friend in Pakistan, Nancy, was also the only girl in her family. She was dark-haired and beautiful and I imagined us both as exotic princesses. We would be swept away by handsome princes who resembled George Harrison from the Beatles. That was my innocent world for a while.

Then I became 13. I was living in Pakistan as a middle schooler when an awareness flooded over me that life could be brutally unfair to girls. At 13, I suddenly realized had I been a poor Pakistani or Afghan girl my choices and path in life would be different. I thought about being 13 and being married to a 40-year-old, taking the place as second wife, place and identity precarious until that first male child was born. I don’t know how, but it washed over me like water one day and has become a question throughout my life. Why me here? Why them there?

13 was my moment of truth and realization that everyone born a girl is not so blessed as I. Everyone born a girl doesn’t feel it’s all about princess privilege. Millions of girls world-wide will never know what it’s like to love being a girl and move on to love being a woman.  From birth to death and covering all areas in between like education, childbirth, jobs, literacy, even until death there are opportunities lost and tragedies made for so many girls across the globe.

But it doesn’t have to look this way. The picture can change and it can change even with a little action on our parts for the love of girls. In the book Half the Sky by Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl Wudunn a case is made that the “best way to fight poverty and extremism is to educate and empower women and girls”.   I read the book last summer, not wanting it to end because of its conviction and call to action. I am impressed that it is fair and practical. Love of girls doesn’t have to be about politics, and it doesn’t have to be about difference. It can be all about girls. Through the organization Half the Sky there are concrete ways to get involved and get others involved.  The agenda on the website is clear and I guarantee, no matter what your politics, there will be an organization that you can believe in and support – whether it be with time, finances, or spreading the word through networking.

So in honor of Mother’s Day this weekend – for the love of Girls who turn into Women – Girls with gifts, potential, personality, and strength; Girls that “hold up half the sky” I write this as a result of my journey to care.

So let us be clear up front: We hope to recruit you to join an incipient movement to emancipate women and fight global poverty by unlocking women’s power as economic catalysts. It is a process that transforms bubbly teenage girls from brothel slaves into successful businesswomen. You can help accelerate change if you’ll just open your heart and join in.” From Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity Worldwide

Take a look at this video clip from the Global Campaign for Education: 

Dedicated to my two girls – Annie and Stefanie. You are beautiful, amazing, strong and gifted. Thank you for who you are. Also to my mom for teaching me that being a girl is great.

Bloggers Note: Half the Sky comes from a quote by Mao Tse -Tung “Women hold up half the sky”. This quote was the inspiration for the title of Kristof and Wudunn’s book. 

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