Having her mother, keep a record of her own life, to attempt, to slow down the process of, deterioration, and this daughter had, found something extra about her mother, how creative her mother actually is! Translated…
My mother is ninety-six years old this year. Since my father passed away, I was so shocked, that I’d not, spent enough time with my parents, and so, I’d set time aside, to go home to visit my mother in Menon every month. Although she’d nagged me about the long way I’d traveled, and the cost, told me to not visit her as often, but I’d always played coy with her, “Spending a little more money, and I got to see you, and we get to sleep together, in the same bed, it’s, more than, worth what I’d, spent!”
like this???, NOT my photograph…
We’d continued this sort of interactions for over twenty years, until that day, I was on the train back up north from visiting her, I’d called her to tell her I’d arrived safely home, but, she’d not done as she usually had, told me to eat my meals, instead, “How come you hadn’t come visited in such a long time?”, I’d suddenly felt my heart go tight, what was inevitable, still, came, my mother was, caught, by slight amnesia now.
In order to reduce the speed to which she was to lose her memories, I’d, handed her a diary, so she can, record the happenings in her life down by the day. She knew Japanese, and, knew most of the Chinese characters too, I’d recalled, how flustered she’d become, asking me what she’d needed to, write down? I’d told her, any and everything is fine, what she ate, or what she saw for the day. And so, she’d, put down, “My eldest visited home today, brought me pudding, and gave me a @@@@@”, I’d asked her what the Japanese characters meant, she’d told me that they’d meant “red envelope”.
And, just like that, mom started, recording her life down her way, with Chinese characters, Japanese characters, her sketches too, and every time I’d visited home, the two of us would read through her diary together, and, when she didn’t understood what she’d written down, I’d guided her with her own illustrations. Then, she’d told me, that day, the duck laid two eggs, on this day, she’d gotten her haircut, yesterday, she saw Brother Fei, two days ago, she heard the songbird singing to her………
An assortment of stories, showed up in my mother’s diaries, and, the purpose of me, having her write in her diary, was to have her mind become more activated, and, I’d, accidentally discovered, that my mother, is very creative too!
or this, even??? Not my photo still…
So, the daughter’s purpose of her mother keeping a diary, is to hopefully, slow down the process of her mind deteriorating away, and, the “accidental” gain of this, was that, it’d, brought out the creative means that her mother had, kept locked up inside of her all these years.
Life, the Obstacle Course 