What a difference a...generation makes

written on January 28, 2021

Mom says my corridor with all the show posters is like a cinema.  Her mood has greatly improved in the past month.  She’s super talkative nowadays and she is aware of it so I tell her no wonder I’m her daughter, and dad’s too.  They both can really talk a lot – the original Mr & Mrs Cakap Banyak yo!  Haha, it runs in da family.

So the oral history continues.  On almost every day I see them at meal times at my place.  My job is easy when everyone is relatively healthy. I cook, eat with them, and then sit at the table and listen to the story of the day.  Some days the stories are those I’ve heard before and on some days they are news to my ears.  

 

Yesterday I got a slice of what the neighbourhood community was like when I was super young (so I hardly remember or know a thing).  Mom said the day starts with hearing the next door neighbour mother scolding her children loudly, curse words, profanity and all.  Somehow that went on to other stories about the kind of colourful language and choice of words people around her used, when she was a young woman. Just plain crude, bad words, some bullying and verbal abuse happening in her times.  My mom said she was influenced by those bad habits from others and she spoke like them too, and was abusive too towards her own children.  She said I had it a lot better because by the time I came and was growing up she has mellowed a lot, after becoming religious and trying to change. 

 

The mom I remember from my childhood days, she was very temperamental, highly strung and with sharp words.  But now I know things were harsher before I was born, or when I was still very young.

What amazed and moved me when I heard these stories – is the fact that somehow, somewhere along the way, my mom’s offspring have grown up differently – I look at where I am now, and my sister who has three children of her own and my brother who is married.  I see a complete different generation with such contrast to what my parents went through…or is still going through now. Whether in terms of life choices, cultures, the people I surround myself with, our reaction towards challenges; all look so far removed from the environment that my mom and dad grew up with (wait till I start interviewing my dad for his stories).   

I get it, life’s cycles are the same for everyone no matter the year we are born. We all go through the same stages of life as humans.  But what is humbling for me, is to witness the realities of life between these two generations.  We have the same struggles but the environment for me and my siblings have been so much more empowering.  Though my parents have not been able to provide us kids with expensive education and nice toys, we were all free to pursue what we like and there was so much space for us to explore – that is priceless.  And that, allow us children to break away from a pattern (of abusive and harsh environment) to seek something better. 

I often turn to my mom at the end of her story about the unpleasantness of her youth and say, “See, you’ve gone through so much in your life back then, and that’s why life now rewards you with this idyllic life now here in KL, with us.  You just sit back, eat good food that I cook for you, drink lots of water, exercise every day, sleep whenever you want to, practice your dancing and speaking English.” 

“Mom, you’re retired now, so just enjoy your life now.” 
Namaste.

#parentingmyparents 
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