Getting up each day before the sun rose, she would carefully lay out the material on the table and after drawing her pattern for that specific dress, she traced the lines precisely with her long-time trusted scissors. Her husband being away as he sailed other parts of the world, she became both the father and mother during those times. By sewing dresses and other things to wear, that was how she was able to help her husband with the family's financial needs. Her customers, barely picking up the finished dresses, were already giving her more materials for her to do. I never heard any complaints but all praises for her work.
I remembered seeing her cooking in between doing the trade she mastered. Good aromas from her food filled the small kitchen that fed six growing up children. Late at night, wearily, she retired to bed without any complaints, only to do the same things the following day. The more hunger she had to keep herself even busier to sustain her family’s needs. Her priority was for her children to finish their education.
I had seen her tears shed during the darkest of the nights and as she tried to face the toughest storms of life that she had to endure, minus my father’s physical help, I had seen her strengthened by her faith in God and her pleas for God’s mercy and help, instead. To the wooden pews in the church, she was quick to bend her knees and as she bowed her head, it seemed it took forever the way she uttered her prayers. I never understood it back then “why”…but at the latter years, I knew she interceded for each of her children.
My mother loved to help out others. She brought her home cooked meals to sick relatives, even to those who hurt her constantly and had said lies about her, she paid them back with what she could offer: her love and passion for cooking.
When she passed away, I couldn’t even ascend the stairs when I got home after 13 hours of flying. That was the only time I didn’t want to rush entering her house. Literally and figuratively, I had learned that day that we truly lost the “light of our home.”
I heard people whispered how some made fun of her as she shook people’s hands in the church as she took time with those she knew and she didn’t know. But when she died, everyone missed that gesture.
She was the biggest loss in my father’s and her children’s lives and we knew at that moment, no other could ever fill the hole she left in our hearts.
I know I could never be like my mother with those strong qualities she possessed: industrious, has strong integrity, very resourceful, and has strong faith in God. But she remains to be my inspiration, day after day. Successful or not, strong or weak, accomplished or not, I know she would always be proud of me and her other children no matter what.
She is that kind of mother who always believes in her children’s best after all. I love you mom, the Proverbs 31 woman in my life. I miss you more than ever!
"She is clothed with strength and dignity;she can laugh at the days to come.She speaks with wisdom,and faithful instruction is on her tongue.She watches over the affairs of her household and does not eat the bread of idleness.Her children arise and call her blessed;her husband also, and he praises her:“Many women do noble things,but you surpass them all.”Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting;but a woman who fears the LORD is to be praised." - Proverbs 31:25-30 (NIV)
Happy Mother's Day to you, mothers out there. And to you who have a heart like that of a mother's. Thank You God for giving us "mothers."
