Myparents never sat me down to share stories of their growing up. They spared me the hard stories of their lost childhoods and the sacrifices they made as kids in a world much harsher than I grew up.
They put themselves on the line so the next generation could have a good life. I benefit from their sacrifices, blood, tears and sweat.
I want to go back in time and sit beside my mother, who had just lost her mother to mental illness. I want to know how she dared to take abuse from her sick mother. I want to know how she dealt without a mother's love at such a tender age. How she managed that large household, made of brick, without electricity, surrounded by acres of paddy fields? I want to know what she cooked for her father and siblings. I want to record how she ran the house without a mother. I want to know how she protected her younger sister. I want to sit with the teenage version of my mother and ask about her dreams. I want to know how she dealt with moving homes and schools at short notice. I want to know how she studied after finishing the housework. I want to know how she supported her single father. I want to know how she felt when visiting her sick mother at the mental asylum. I want to know how my mother helped her orphaned cousins living in her household. Is that her secret to leadership?
I want to go back in time and sit with my father, fifteen years old, who had just lost his father. How did he deal with it? Did he miss his father? Did he cry when his father’s coffin was lowered to the ground? I want to know when he decided to help his widowed mother. What time did he get up in the morning to help his mother run her shop? What was it like to distribute food orders in the morning for his mother? Did he enjoy serving customers and measuring groceries in the afternoons? How did he study under a kerosene lamp at night? Did he miss his father’s loving touch when he slept alone at night? What did he feel carrying his shoes in his school bag and wearing them at the school entrance to save wear and tear? What did he feel about walking that long distance to school every day? Did his bare feet hurt as he stepped on the pebbles? How did my father help his orphaned cousin? What was it like to be a kid during WW2? What was it like being poor?
I want to know what they laughed about with friends and cousins. What did they do to relax? Did they not get a chance to relax?
I want to make a home movie with my father and mother when both were kids and in their teenage years, when their young bodies and were hard at work paying in blood and sweat.
By some fate, the year 1942 was significant to both my parents. In that year, my father, fifteen, lost his father. In the same year, my mother, eight, lost her mother to mental illness. Traumatic events for two young kids. Though two unrelated events, that year defined their lives and mine.
I wish I had unsettled them. I wish I had pried them about their childhood, like opening a closed door. I wish I had found a small opening. I wish I pushed my head inside and witnessed their childhood. My parents had an entire life before me, which I wish I had experienced.
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Doctor Doctor Memories of medical care in my early years As a toddler, I contracted whooping cough, a deadly disease of that time. My mother went through a lot of anxiety until I got better. She was so pleased with the doctor who treated me that he became our family doctor. As a two-year-old, I don’t remember a thing about that trying time. It must have shaken my mother so much; she thought my survival was a miracle. She never failed to remind me of that fact growing up. At four years, I was operated on for hydrocele at Lady Ridgeway Children’s Hospital in Colombo. During my entire stay, my mother stayed with me at the hospital, sleeping nearby. I have great memories in the hospital, caring nurses and frequent visits from my grandfather, Lewis . I loved his visits, his fancy stories sitting on my bed. When the hospital discharged me after four days, my grandfather carried me to his car. Back home, I was not allowed to wear pants until I healed. That was embarrassing. The discharge...
3 min read·Sep 27, 2022
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