Honour to our Mothers…
Today, I honour and celebrate my mother, the late Mohinder Kaur, who died on 17 December 2024, just weeks before her 95th birthday.
She had travelled from Punjab to this country and faced many challenges and barriers as a woman and as an immigrant. Yet, neither the climate (I’m talking weather here!), racial hostility or relentless obstacles from both family and society prevented her from moving forward.
Mom was quite simply, a remarkable woman… She was a fearless, courageous, tenacious, truth-speaking, open-minded, generous-hearted, illiterate wise woman who often saw what others could not – she was… ahead of her time. Her eyes lit up when people visited and engaged with her, she liked people and people liked her. She welcomed strangers into the house, as if they were ‘angels’ sent by God, and served them with the very best of what she had. Mom was delighted and thrilled to be around to welcome her great granddaughter Dhaya (you see their hands reaching out to each other in the picture).
Over the last few years, dementia drew her back to memories of life in Punjab, back to the village of her birth, memories of time spent with her auntijis and unclejis, of being with cousins, working hard, and later navigating married life, extended family and years of living apart from her husband, as he worked hard to send money back to the family so that life could be marginally better.
This is my first Mother’s Day without her…
I plan to celebrate Mom by enjoying one of her favourite Indian sweets, jalebi (a deep-fried round saffron coloured spiral of deliciousness!) but I will weep as I do…
Join me in celebrating my mother (with or without the jalebi!) and all those who weep as they celebrate the mother they have lost.
Let’s celebrate all mothers… expectant mothers, single mothers, spiritual mothers, stepmothers in blended families, adoptive mothers, foster mothers, auntiji mothers, god-mothers, widowed mothers, those who carry the ‘mothering spirit’!
Let’s celebrate while remembering those mothers for whom today is a difficult day… who have lost their child through death or miscarriage; who are struggling with infertility; who are facing the heartache of delayed adoption or fostering; who never knew their mother; who are feeling the ache of an empty nest… and especially mothers separated from their children by circumstance - war, prison, the refugee mother…
Let’s celebrate as we remember, and let’s also weep with those who weep…
