Love was the enduring gift my mother gave to me
Thathi, we remember your loving smile, your caring heart and your thoughtful ways. Selflessly, you gave your best to the community and to us. You made the time to stop and be there for anyone who needed a helping hand. You taught us to be humble with greater professional success. You nurtured us throughout our childhood into adulthood, to ensure that we would both make it in life. We are who we are today, because of the foundation you and ammi together gave us. We witnessed how you nursed ammi, your soul-mate, into good health, like a father in times of illness. We learnt commitment, dedication and loyalty from you.
We will forever remember the values and principles you taught us and the love you gave us, the way you know how. We will miss your wisdom, your kind words, your medical advice, and most of all your precious laughter that would echo through the house. Your loving cards bridged the miles between us, communicating your warmth. We will cherish you in our hearts and hold the wealth of precious memories you left behind. May the Noble Triple Gem Bless You. May you attain Nibbana
My mother Bali, was born between the two world wars, when people instinctively knew that life was more about giving than receiving. She was a giver of her time, her kindness, her help and her hospitality. In time she came to possess everything she freely gave away. To her four children she gave her unconditional and unstinting affection.
Her enduring gift to me has been love. She placed no expectations on either of us her children and did not value us for our ability but instilled at our very core, that her love would always be greater than our achievements. She supported us equally in any mundane preoccupation of childhood, frivolous social activity of our youth and later mediocre or academic pursuits. I never knew her to be harsh or critical towards us, nor did she compare us to each other leading to sibling rivalry or intra familial competition for her love or attention. She mirrored the mothering she received from her mother Mrs Lolita Cooke which was one of effortless affectionate affirmation and patience that allowed us to become who we were meant to be.
As I sat beside her during the final days of her life and reflected my view of her being a very good mother her natural response was ‘Are not all mothers good?’ showing that she carried no pride for being complimented on the scale of motherhood and for being the loyal, faithful, caring mother she had been to me. She was always welcoming and sociable towards our friends, insisting they come back for a meal. Many enjoyed her warmth and overflowing hospitality in our homes in Jaffna, Kandy and Colombo.
I cannot weigh up my mother’s life by career, qualifications or prestige none of which she claimed to have had. But if life is about relationships then my mother knew what was required based on the depth, breadth and impact her interactions have had on others. No one truly dies until they are completely forgotten and by that measure my mother will live on in the hearts and minds of her remaining friends, family, our school friends and the domestics who supported her for a long time.
After losing my father she grew in her Christian faith, firmly believing that with God’s forgiveness she could become better than herself. She tried to make amends where she had failed and believed that she deeply mattered to God. In the eve of her life she came to realise the certainty of the words of Martin Luther King who said ‘ In life I have held many things in my hands and have lost them all, but that which I placed in the hands of God, I still possess.’
My mother died on April 3 this year, after a short illness. Even though she was the great grand daughter, granddaughter, niece, sister, wife, mother and the grandmother of doctors, she never needed the attention of a doctor herself until the last two months of her life. She died at the National Hospital where her stay was short, but the care they afforded her was excellent. The nurses were competent and professional and even though they knew my mother was dying, they acted as if she would live. She would have been pleased that she died close to the ward where my father once worked. For someone as loyal as my mother such things mattered very much as she always found meaning in small things. Sixty two years ago I was born her daughter by chance but I came to love, respect and honour her out of choice. May her gentle soul now rest in peace. Dr. Ayesha Muthuveloe