{"id":28068,"date":"2014-02-13T17:31:22","date_gmt":"2014-02-13T22:31:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/?p=28068"},"modified":"2014-02-13T17:31:22","modified_gmt":"2014-02-13T22:31:22","slug":"she-was-courageousshe-was-kindshe-was-simple-and-she-was-unique-she-was-my-mother","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/?p=28068","title":{"rendered":"“She was Courageous,She was Kind,She was Simple and She was Unique………………….She was my Mother”"},"content":{"rendered":"


\nby <\/p>\n

Palitha Pelpola<\/strong><\/p>\n


\n \u201dA mother is a person who, seeing there are only four pieces of pie for five people, promptly announces she never did care for pie.\u201d<\/em>
\n ~ Tenneva Jordan<\/strong><\/p>\n

Many eulogies have been dedicated to mothers of our time. Since the dawn of time, no more words have been spoken, no more essays written and tributes orated in praise of anything or anyone other than the persona of ‘Mother’. <\/p>\n

Mother is indeed a very noble institution, whosever we are speaking of. Every mother carries within her womb, for nine long and painful months, from conception to birth, either premature or fully-grown, the hope of all mankind: its regeneration. And it is not the physical weight that tells on her as much as the mental anticipation of bearing a bundle of joy and ecstasy that comes in the way of a child. <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

I had the rare privilege of playing cricket for my Alma Mater. Beginning from the under 14 level and going all the way up to the first eleven within a period spanning over seven years and after captaining the under 16 and the second eleven sides, I played in the first eleven team for three consecutive years under three illustrious captains. Yet I had the unspeakable distinction of never being endowed with that rare privilege of playing in the ‘Big Match’ before thousands of spectators and to the cheers of old and present boys of my School.<\/p>\n

I was the perennial ‘twelfth man’ of the team so much so that even after I left school, I was made fun of at various public get-togethers by being called ‘the Reserve Captain’ (although I never took it as either an insult or a humiliation). Allow me some indulgence here. Although my inclusion in the team for the ‘Big Match’ in the preceding two years prior to my last year in School was in doubt, I was fairly certain that in the third and last year, considering my form just prior to the ‘Big Match’, I would play at the venerated cricket grounds which is well-known for its legendary history and closeness to the city center. <\/p>\n

In the match before the penultimate game, we had to travel to Galle to take up the fairly formidable Mahinda College cricket team and in that game, I took six wickets in both innings and my coach told me that since I was a left-arm bowler (I was exclusively a bowler) they would ‘hide’ me from the prying eyes of our ‘Big Match’ rivals and play me straight in the ‘Big match’. I was elated beyond words and came home and told my parents that this time I would be playing in the Grand Finale.<\/p>\n

It was the tradition before the ‘Big Match’ each year that a ‘practice match\u2019 would be played at the same venue. It was usually a match between the team selected for the Big Match against the rest of those who came for practice regularly. I was included in the first team. And we took the field as our Captain lost the toss. While I was on the field, a frantic message reached our Captain and I was recalled to the pavilion and another player who had another three more years to play was sent in my place. Apparently his mother, after hearing that her son had not been selected to the ‘first team’, had rushed to the venue and been sobbing that her son was not selected. This guy’s parents were quite influential and were related to the Captain’s family too. I knew that my goose was cooked! <\/p>\n

At the end of the day when the team was announced, I was yet again named ‘twelfth man’. I came home thoroughly dejected and an expectant mother was waiting to hear the confirmation of my inclusion in the side. I told them that I was not selected again and went to bed without eating. I had made up my mind that I would not go to the match at all, leave alone carrying out the ‘twelfth man’-duties.<\/p>\n


\nFollowing morning I woke to my mother pulling the bed sheet and asking: “Punchi Putha, aren’t you going to the Match?” I replied no. Then my mother told me the words that are still ringing in my ears: “Putha, go and let them know that you are made of better stuff, go do your ‘twelfth man’-duties.” Those immortal words instilled in me then and there the will to never ‘give up’ and it has sustained me all these years in triumph and peril, in trouble and joy and in defeat and victory. <\/em><\/p>\n

Mother’s love can never be understated nor could it be belittled. As much as it was another mother’s love, in no less weight and care, that interfered in the selection of my team, my mother, instead of wallowing in a sense of loss, gave all the encouragement and indomitable will to me to carry on come what may. For that alone I am grateful to her.<\/p>\n

She indeed was a strange woman. At the time I was at the zenith of my career, she never took the time to boast about her children to her neighbors or relations; not that she was not proud of them, but she took it in stride, whatever that came in the journey of life, both flowers and cacti.<\/p>\n

An ardent follower of the Dharma, she hardly forgot to send alms to the priests but always within her means. Never ever showing what she did not have, she lived within herself and advised her five children, four boys and one girl, on the same line. Sometimes singing an enchanting melody of yesteryear, she was stubborn at times to an insufferable extent yet sometimes as soft as the softest rose petals one could touch. If all love in the universe could be put together into one bundle, that bundle will be called mother.<\/p>\n

No tributes would pay sufficient gratitude for her devotion to duty; no tempest could sway her courage and no ingratitude would bend her will. Her universe was her home; her joy was her children’s and her grief was never expressed. Ninety four years on earth for a mundane man or woman is a long time. To live each moment of those years to the fullest is even more phenomenal. Great men have been borne by mothers and small men too have had their mothers. No mother is different to another, neither in character nor in substance. All mothers are the fountain of love and the fountain of life itself, literally. <\/p>\n

In that great gallery of mothers, my mother takes no second tier. She indeed belongs on top. She was courageous, she was kind, she was simple and she was unique and last week in the twilight hours of the day, she breathed her last, leaving only the memories of a life well lived. She was my mother.<\/em><\/p>\n

May she attain Nibbana!<\/em>
\n<\/strong><\/p>\n

Tweet<\/a><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Palitha Pelpola \u201dA mother is a person who, seeing there are only four pieces of pie for five people, promptly announces she never did care for pie.\u201d ~ Tenneva Jordan Many eulogies have been dedicated to mothers of our time. Since the dawn of time, no more words have been spoken, no more essays …<\/p>\n

Continue reading ‘“She was Courageous,She was Kind,She was Simple and She was Unique………………….She was my Mother”’ »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[12],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28068"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=28068"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28068\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28069,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28068\/revisions\/28069"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=28068"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=28068"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=28068"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}