There’s a muay thai tournament on May 11 and I’m supposed to compete. Prepared hard for it, training for almost 3 hours everyday, including Sunday for 2 months. Then my only sister arrived, from Papua New Guinea for a vacation. They will be migrating to Vancouver on May 20, after that we may not be able to see each other for 4 or 5 years. Then my plans changed.
Mother’s Day this year will be celebrated on May 11. And it will be the first time, in more than a decade that I will be with my sister on this special day for mothers. And ironically, our mom will not be with us. Its been 9 months since my mother died and the wound is still as fresh as on the day it happened.
Nine months… and I still haven’t forgiven myself for not being with my mom at a time when she needed me most. She was diagnosed with Acute Myelogenous Leukemia (AML) on May 20, 2007. The doctors frankly advised me that the chances of surviving AML is very low if not treated immediately. And being her only child here (my only sister is in another country), I have to take charge of her treatment and hospitalization. But despite this, life still went on for me. I still went to work and I still trained for my sport like its just any ordinary day. I have a muay thai tournament in July of that year and instead of being with my mom, I trained hard for that tournament. I won a trophy in that forgotten day in July, but I lost my mother one night in August, a night that will haunt me forever.
Now, there’s another muay thai tournament and it fell on Mother’s day. But I will not make the same mistake. I will visit my mother’s grave with my sister this Mother’s Day.
*****************************************************************************************************
My mother is both a strong woman and a woman of strength. She’s a humble seamstress who never finished elementary school but was able to raise and educate her two children: One is now a Financial Controller of a large multinational in PNG; the other is a Managing Director of the Philippine office of a US firm. One graduated with honors both in college and in high school and finished her MBA in Australia; the other received and won numerous awards including a medal and congratulatory letter from the President of the Philippines. My sister and I both owe who we are to our mother.
Perhaps one of the most one sided relationship is the one between mothers and their sons. Sons will never be able to equal the amount of love their mother has given them. And sons will only realize the power of their mother’s love only when she’s already gone. Though thanking and honoring my mother through this song may not be enough, I will still dedicate this to her: I recited this song during the last night of her wake:
