A day worth millions of celebrations

Every year, I celebrate my birthday with great zest and enthusiasm with all my near and dear ones as the day reminds me how grateful I am for this beautiful life and spending one more eventful year on this earth. However, I never planned to celebrate a day for a person, who bore an excruciating pain for nine months to bring me into this life. An angel becomes a guiding soul in this alien world and a guardian to protect me from the odds. Who unceremoniously takes up the role of a teacher, friend, mentor, role model and so to this day, and still in return wish only the best of me.

When I look back at my childhood memories, one of the occasions comes in my mind when my family was gearing up for a function at my aunts’ house. My cousins and I were playing at the rooftop and having a lot of fun as we met after a long time. Suddenly, an ice cream cart entered the neighborhood, and the ice cream man honked the little horn. All of us would rush to get our ice creams and in excitement, my foot slipped from the stairs and I skidded down the remaining steps. I received a severe head injury and taken to the hospital immediately. I got discharged after getting five stitches and medication.

Once I reached home, I was so scared; as the pain in the head was acute, due to loss of blood I was feeling very weak, and the hysteric thoughts of not being able to play again soon were creating havoc in my little mind. With teary eyes, I was lying on the bed when my mother entered the room with turmeric milk. She comforted me in her arms by saying,” you are a brave son, and brave boys never lose hope. We all learn from our mistakes and promise me you will be more careful from the next time on wards. Now, just complete this milk, have some rest and you will see the pain will be gone soon”. Those words had a magical effect on me as they alleviated my mental agony and fostered a seed of belief in me.

So many years have been passed, and I have grown a lot since then still, there is plenty of space in my mother’s arms to fit in. Although I am living thousands of miles away on a different continent, she receives a message whenever I am in trouble, perhaps due to some mystical telepathy connection. Sometimes, I believe, mothers are the universe’s special task forces, armed with eyes that can only see the best in their child, and past all their mistakes. They are given ears to listen patiently, a heart to love unconditionally, and trusted with words that can infuse life into a lifeless, and assuage sufferings. They juggle a million things at a time, ‘wear different hats’ throughout the day and still go to bed with a smile on their faces.

The world is blessed as mothers are not only limited to being housewives but also actively working in remote areas to big corporate houses, running multinationals to charitable organizations. They are not just fierce and competitive, but also bring the value of compassion, care, and inclusion when the time demands. Though a single day is, for sure, not enough to celebrate, still mother's day reminds us to honor the contribution of every mother whether they are housewives or working mothers, young mothers or old ones and their achievements, unconditional love, and sacrifice for their families and making this world a better place to live.

Happy Mother’s day!!