Maria Grech Ganado

My mother was lots of things I am not – practical, prudent, self-assured, house-proud, neat. We were alike in other ways – sociable and easy-going, we both enjoyed simple pleasures, family, Nature, the Arts, humour, books. Since her unfailing motto was ‘Moderation in Everything’, however, she was confused by the excesses of my occasional bipolar moodswings, not properly understood those days. Generally tolerant, she could be judgemental, even guilt-wielding, where religious tenets were concerned. She found my preference for literature over ‘normal’ feminine interests perplexing, and disliked my studying abroad. I avoided challenging her conservative convictions, even condoning her life-long vigilance over my lifestyle, including the way I raised my children. She considered it her duty. Sometimes it irritated me, but respect was engraved on our mindset then, and overstepping the threshold of my parents’ principles didn’t extend to my overlooking the particular contexts whch had formed them. Irony helped too. I had a caring, relaxed relationship with my mother, and can’t remember our ever having been confrontational, or my ever falling out with her. I’m glad to have inherited her contagious smile, evident also when she was sad, as she sometimes was. On the whole, though, she was a positive, cheerful, sunny person and very loved.

When I first told my mother I was considering publishing a collection of my poetry, her response was hardly encouraging. ‘ But do you know how poetry is written? Aren’t you worried you’ll be laughed at?’. Since I specialised in Practical Criticism, I was simultaneously amused and a bit hurt, till I remembered what a perfectionist she’d always been. Though it was she who had overseen my reading as a child, and fuelled my love of literature by regularly purchasing suitable versions of the classics (as also books with titles like Saints for Girls), she grew anxious when I became more interested in literature than in traditional women’s pursuits. A family-oriented, religious woman, she dreaded both my absence and the inevitable threat to my morality. She’d much rather my creativity had been channelled into something like flower-arranging. When I launched Izda Mhux Biss she was 93, and despite having a jolly time, couldn’t understand why she was there at all. Two days after her funeral, the book won the National Award, and I wish so much she could have known. She used to tease about my never having written a poem for her, but now there so many she knows nothing about.