There is a hole in me from missing my mother and it goes that every stream of my consciousness diverts in that direction.

Everything reminds me of her. 

My mom passed away from an auto-immune disease that was, in the end, not fully diagnosed. She died from suffocation as we watched and waited helplessly.

When I went home and stayed in the hospital with her last January, she was still able to remove the oxygen mask a few seconds at a time to speak. By March however the decision was between eating and speaking as she refused the feeding tube. 

I still wonder every single day what went through her mind as she laid there those few months, fully conscious as her body attacked her lungs. What was she trying to say as my brother and I rushed to her bedside after they allowed us in the ICU? What was in her silent scream and stare as she struggled to get up with her wrists and legs bound and an intubation tube strapped to her head? 

When she was still able to talk, she’d made us promise that she would not be intubated. I’d never seen my mother so angry before. I’d never seen her angry. 

A few days before the doctors moved her into ICU, I laid my head down on the bed by her side. She smoothed my hair and felt the tremble from my soundless cry. She gestured to the oxygen mask for me to remove it. 

“It’s ok. I’ve led a happy life.”

I would give up anything to remember that as the last thing she said to me.

“If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?”

This has been the question on my mind since I watched The Founder last night.

Starring Michael Keaton, Nick Offerman (aka Ron on Parks and Recreation, one of the best characters in TV history) and John Carroll Lynch, the movie is based on the true story of how the McDonald’s business empire came to be. Ray Kroc an embattled salesman with a series of failed ventures under his belt maneuvered himself into the McDonald brothers’ burger business and took their speedy food concept to build a massive global enterprise. In developing the origin story for McDonald’s, for Kroc understood the essential connection between myth building and empire building, he erased the (his)stories of the McDonald brothers.

It’s as if he’d built a time machines and changed the past. Kroc alone was the founder.

This erasure and how easy it seemed was disconcerting if not downright terrifying. What does this mean to the ordinary people like us who’ve led ordinary lives? This is why we tell each other’s stories. Storytelling is remembering is history making is bearing witness to lives lived. 

So were men consulted when mother’s day was invented? Did they agree to the deal or was it simply a unilateral contract? Maybe it seems unfair to some that they have to be on their best behavior the whole day?

What’s up with “I” have to do everything around the house? The whole 24 hours?

I imagine a tiny voice grumbling.

I expect the same thing on father’s day then.

Maybe it will work better if the mother is removed from the environment of the house then there’s no hard feeling going around about who’s doing what on the day when all the commercials make you believe that we’re all supposed to be waited on hand and foot without lifting a finger, that all our whims are catered to, etc. It seems such a drag for all involved. The crushing weight of expectations. A stifling cloud of unspoken, unjustified disappointment hanging.

Maybe it should just be mother’s morning? Mother’s luncheon? Till after lunch? And then everything goes back to normal? To be honest, I can’t wait for this day to be over myself so I can go back to doing things per life dealt me instead of having to wait until Monday.

Most likely this is just another whining episode of first world problems when so many mothers out there genuinely deserve and need a break. I wonder whether you would consider joining me in making donations to non-profit organizations that land a helping hand to women, especially mothers? From Heifer International, Women to Women, to Help A Mother Out (Did you know that the simple act of donating diapers can help change somebody’s life for the better?)

Have a truly happy, contented, mother’s day!

My plan to eat nothing until I reach Taipei completely failed. Thanks to Asiana Airlines.