Like any other family, my family too had its own set of problems and it’d be abnormal if it didn’t, because how will one understand what happiness is, if he hasn’t experienced sadness. Through this reflection, I want to talk about the importance of listening and how my own mother developed in me the essentiality of it. It’s ironical how I learned to become a good listener by starting off as being a pathetic listener to my mother. My father had a drinking problem, fortunately it’s not a problem anymore, not because my father has reduced drinking but because he has developed a strong tolerance for it. In any relationship, it is important that both the partners respect each other. In the relationship between my mother and father, my father had always been the dominant one and my mother had always been the submissive one. I don’t know who to blame in this, but had my mother rebelled against the dominant one from Day 1, probably things could have been better today.
Due to my dad’s drinking problems and also due to his temper, there have been a number of instances where my dad has disrespected my mother, talked in a manner where he had literally rode a roughshod over her and treated her like she does not deserve any respect. I understand I have no right to speak about the way my father should behave, because ideally that is something you are being taught by your parents, but interestingly this behaviour of his was enough to make me and my brother understand that respecting your significant others is extremely important. There has been no instance of domestic violence and I am not even saying that my father neglected us but with what my father earns, we could have led an even better or probably a luxurious life. Nonetheless, the things he has done for us is unparalleled and I literally owe my life to him.
Coming to where I was. During the times when my mother was treated the way she was, she would find solace in talking to me. The only thing was that she would bitch about my dad, sometimes even use cuss words and would say things like “Your dad never loved me”. As a kid, I didn’t know how to react to this venting. Hence, I would respond by saying “Mom, you should have answered back from Day 1 itself. There is no point crying over spilt milk”, I would even say things like “Mom, he is my dad and I cannot hear such stuff against him even though I know that the way he behaved was wrong.” Mostly my responses were cold and were ignorant to her emotions. Things got worse at our home and it reached the point where my brother and I both suggested divorce. Thankfully, things got better and by better I mean, the fights decreased but the dynamics of the relationship remained the same.
My mother has been a housewife for 28 years now, having sacrificed her job for us and she is fit for being called a ‘perfect parent’ because the kind of things that she has done for me and my brother and the sacrifices she has made, is something I can never even imagine to reciprocate. I believe that is something every mother does but one just needs to acknowledge that. The sad part of her existence was that she never had a permanent friend in these 28 years. We shifted houses, cities, met new people, met new dogs (haha) but nobody really remained permanent in the process. I understand it is stupid to seek permanence in a generation like this but for my mother, who is a lonely housewife, the need of a Best friend or a confidant was way higher. I never really understood this as a kid.
She devoted her entire attention towards my studies and made sure that things remained on track for me, the same for my brother too. But, down the line, I realised that she didn’t really want me to be the best. I think, for her, more important was that there was someone who could just listen to her at her worst. All she really wanted me to do was sit , face her and listen to all her grievances because if not me, who else? She never shared about dad’s drinking problems with her own family because she feared that her marriage will fall apart and my brother was already born. That was one big sacrifice she made for all of us. But as a human, I think she is this sensitive person who seeks harmony in all kinds of relationships.
During the critical years, when she would share with me her grievances, she didn’t really want me to give her suggestions on how things could get better, she didn’t want to change anything really but she just wanted that there’s someone who could listen to her and tell her that there’s someone always there for her to talk to. I understood this pretty late but now when I look back, I realise that all those instances where my mother would go on talking to my friends when they would come to place, only to my annoyance, made sense. She was simply alone. She just needed friends.
My only regret is that I couldn’t reciprocate, not even remotely. But, I believe, it is never too late to make amends. The lesson I learned from this is that whenever someone talks and shares or vents, be a meaningful listener. You don’t even have to respond, you don’t even have to advise, you just need to sit there and make that person realise that there’s someone they can talk to. Even during my experience at Tihar Jail in the last semester, I came to realise that those ladies out there, didn’t want us to help them really, because most of them knew we couldn’t but they expected us to listen to them, they expected us to sit and chat. Sometimes, a simple conversation has therapeutic powers.
So, now, i have pledged to myself that I will never let my mother down and sit with her to talk because for the person she is and for the things she has done for us, she does not deserve to stay alone and drown in her own grievances. The rest of the job my dog does every efficiently. (haha)