Mothers' Day Evokes Mixed Emotions

By Chandapiwa Baputaki | Monday May 14, 2007 00:00

 

It is at this time that mothers are pampered and given all the attention that they rarely get during the year. They are given presents as a sign of appreciation for all the things that they have done for their children and families.

For children whose mothers have died, the day naturally evokes sad memories. But for the fortunate ones, it is and was yet another great day to remember.

I was among those who were aching, imagining what I would have been doing with my mother, Florence Baputaki, who died in September 2003. For about two years I have been grieving and failing to come to terms with her untimely death. I had plans that I needed her to be alive to witness. I needed her to be there and hug me when I graduated from university but she was not - I was alone.

For 23 years she had been there, nurturing me into the kind of woman I have become. She fended for my six siblings, as we grew up in Nkange village, north of Francistown. She gave us all the motherly love that we needed and, like the mother chicken, kept her watchful eye on us to ensure no danger came our way. She gave us the comfort by just being there and making us aware that there was our pillar in times of need.

I cannot help but think how I must have hurt her by not heeding her wise counsel. I retrace my steps to my childhood days and cannot help but smile at my carefree self and how she disciplined us. It was not that she did not love us, but as she used to say, she loved us so much she did not want us to get into any mischief that would ruin our lives. She beat us with a stick whenever we did not listen to her and if we disobeyed her we would be given a good beating but not enough to hurt us. I remember the time she beat my cousin and I. We were told to feed the chickens before sunset and we went out to our neighbours and instead played untill late, when we came back we took a basket full of sorghum and threw it outside the house's door step making it slippery so that she will miss her balance and fall when she arrived. That was the last time she beat us and told us that if she got angry with us she would die of a heart attack. We took that as a sign of a frustrated aging woman whom we would count up to three when she called us before we could respond. Those were my silly days when I was taking my mother for granted.

She was not all about disciplining us but she was a good mother, an ever-smiling woman who was full of humour.

She managed to joke about our hardships when we were growing up and kept her smile even on days when the chips were down. I thought her smile would fade away after the death of our father, but after a few months while she was still wearing the blue mourning dress she joked about how she could not go anywhere in that state. 'Everyone will be feeling pity for me and saying shame,' she would say, laughing about how she was supposed to wear that dress till it became worn out. It is part of our culture that the mourning dress is the only one or two to be worn every day for a year.

I found myself in the same situation after her death when one woman asked me if it was true that she had died. I was on a bus from Francistown to Gaborone with my younger brother. When we confirmed she said 'agh shame' and we felt like crying there and then but we managed to joke about how we were going to be pitied for a few years.

Now that she is no more I cannot help but wonder what our lives would have been, how happy or happier we could be. Now that I am a parent, too, I cannot help but wonder how she could have moulded my daughters into the woman that she moulded me into.

She was my messenger, relaying God's word, always outpouring with genuine love, trusted in God, her heart set on things above, she was an earthly saint and the rescuer of the wayward. Now I feel neglected and unloved, I miss her bear hug that I will never have and can only dream about. At the weekend, like I have always done since her death, I bought her another happy Mothers' Day card and kept it, as a way of keeping myself closer to her and hoping in my own way that she sees what I am doing.

All that I am I owe to my mother. I attribute my success in life to the moral, intellectual and physical education I received from her. To me, it is true that God realised that He could not be everywhere at the same time and therefore made mothers.