Tuesday, April 19, 2005

one more day

my mother takes a nap every day at 2pm. it is a ritual she's followed since we returned from hong kong 11 years ago. all our friends and family know better than to call from 2-3pm lest my mother be disturbed from slumber.

these days, as i am still rotting at home and chiding myself for not trying out S papers, i am usually in the living room watching repeats on the telly while my mother lies asleep on the couch. i have been watching her as she snores gently, her eyes closed, her face serene. and i think: my mother is so beautiful! despite the ravages of time and disease, she's still beautiful.

she's been ill for a couple of years now. i find myself wondering what life will be like the day God takes her away from me. my father, who is so reliant on her company, would never be the same again. as for my sister and i...we'd still be relatively young and would have no choice but to try and go about life as normally as possible. but how could we?

i harbour a secret fear of watching my loved ones leave me, one by one, leaving me alone. it is a selfish fear and i hate myself for being afraid of being by myself, for having a secret desire to die before everyone else so that the grief would not be mine, but theirs.

i harbour a secret mission, to keep everyone safe in my world. to make sure they are alive.

when my mother sleeps, i watch for the gentle rise and fall of her chest. her soft snores assure me that yes, she is still with me. yet i feel insecure everytime she takes her nap. what if she doesn't wake up? when she eventually does wake up, just in time for her favourite television show, i heave a big sigh of relief because it means that i have just earned one more day with her.

one more day without having to be alone.

lishun at 8:45 PM

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