My one-eyed mother

موضوع: My one-eyed mother الثلاثاء سبتمبر 14, 2010 1:41 pm

My mom only had one eye. I hated her… she was such an embarrassment. My mom ran a small shop at the local market. She collected little weeds and such to sell… anything for the money that we needed, she was such an embarrassment.

There was this one day during primary school. I remember that it was field day, and my mom came. I was so embarrassed. How could she do this to me? I cast her a hateful look and ran away. The next day at school…’your mom only has one eye?!' and they taunted me. I wished that my mom would just disappear from this world, so I said to my mom, 'Mom, why don't you have the other eye?! You're making me a laughing stock. Why don't you just die?' My mom didn't respond.

I guess I felt a little bad, but at the same time it felt good to think that I had said what I'd wanted to say all this time. Maybe it was because my mom didn't punish me, but I didn't think that I had hurt her feelings. That night…I woke up and went to the kitchen to get a glass of water. My mom was crying there, so quietly, as if she was afraid that she might wake me. I took a look at her and then turned away.

Because of the thing I had said to her earlier, there was something pinching at me in the corner of my heart. Even so, I hated my mother who was crying out of her one eye. So I told myself that I would grow up and become successful, because I hated my one-eyed mom and our desperate poverty. Then I studied really hard. I left my mother and came to Seoul and studied, and got accepted in the Seoul University with all the confidence I had. Then, I got married. I bought a house of my own. Then I had kids too. Now I'm living happily as a successful man.

I like it here because it's a place that doesn't remind me of my mom. This happiness was getting bigger and bigger, until someone unexpected came to see me 'what?! Who's this?!' …It was my mother…Still with her one eye. It felt as if the whole sky was falling apart on me. My little girl ran away, scared of my mom's eye. And I yelled at her, ’who are you? I don't know you!!!' I screamed at her 'How dare you come to my house and scare my daughter! GET OUT OF HERE! NOW!!!' And to this, my mother quietly answered, 'oh, I'm so sorry. I may have gotten the wrong address,' and she disappeared. Thank God… she didn't recognise me. I was quite relieved. I told myself that I wasn't going to care, or think about this for the rest of my life.

Then a wave of relief came upon me…one day, a letter regarding a school reunion came to my house. I lied to my wife saying that I was going on a business trip. After the reunion, I went down to the old shack, that I used to call a house…just out of curiosity there, I found my mother lying on the cold ground. But I did not shed a single tear. She had a piece of paper in her hand…. it was a letter to me.

She wrote:

My son…

I think my life has been long enough now. And… I won't visit Seoul anymore… but would it be too much to ask if I wanted you to come visit me once in a while? I miss you so much. And I was so glad when I heard you were coming for the reunion. But I decided not to go to the school…. For you… I'm sorry that I only have one eye, and that I was an embarrassment for you. You see, when you were very little, you got into an accident, and lost your eye. As a mother, I couldn't bear watching you having to grow up with only one eye… so I gave you mine… I was so proud of my son that was seeing a whole new world for me, in my place, with my eye. I was never upset at you for anything you did. The couple times that you were angry with me. I thought to myself, 'it's because he loves me.' I miss the times when you were still young around me.

I miss you so much. I love you. You mean the world to me

My world shattered!!!

Then I cried for the person who lived for me… My MOTHER