I was born at a very young age and apparently so ugly they slapped my mother. She claimed she had morning sickness after I was born. All I heard when I was growing up was: “Why can’t you be like your cousin Cyril?” Cyril died at birth.
It was one of Emily Pankhurst’s cronies that pointed out that for mothers, the pay is lousy and the career ladder non-existent.
Mother, mum, mummy, mam, mummsy, mummy dearest, mamma or maa are all in use for varying degrees of affection. The choice of greeting can reflect the depth and severity of trouble you’re in, or the cost and magnitude of the request you’re about to ask.
“Mummy, can I borrow your car?” Later, same day. “Mummy dearest, you know your car. Well, I had a small accident, do we know a panel beater?”
In my family ‘mother’ was used more for formal occasions, when perhaps the bishop came to dinner.
“Mother pass the gravy please. Mother, may I be excused please?”
Sunday church was also a mother day and ‘maa’ was only used at the beach or on holiday when the family felt free to test their new bad jokes.
My mother-in-law has a speech impediment. Every now and then she has to pause for a breath. Boom boom. I never forget a face. But, in my mother-in-law’s case. I’m willing to make an exception.
Of all the red-letter days in our yearly calendar that we celebrate, Mother’s Day, in my humble opinion, should be at the top of the tree. After all, like father, we all have one, but birth via Mum was our point of entry, so to speak, to our time on planet earth, and therefore takes the cake. (Chocolate with whipped cream.)
“When I find myself in times of trouble, Mother Mary comes to me.”
So sang Paul McCartney about the most famous mumsy of all. Known in Christian circles as the Virgin Mother of Jesus, I wonder whether Joseph passed the pub test when he had to defend himself. “I did not have sexual relations with that woman!”
John Lennon wailed mercilessly:
“Mother, you had me, but I never had you. I wanted you, but you didn’t want me, so I just gotta tell you goodbye. Mamma don’t go.”
Mother Teresa was born 1910 at Skopje North. Macedonia. Her origins were, Albanian, Indian, Ottoman, Yugoslav. Her real name was Anjeze’ Gonxhe Bojaxhiu.
No wonder they called her Mother Teresa. She said, “Peace begins with a smile.” She died in 1997.
Mother Superior is the ‘Boss Cocky’ (in charge) of the other nuns in a Catholic convent. Superior does not necessarily mean she is of greater intellect, or that she can kick a goal from the sideline, but more that she runs the show.
The mother of invention, also a crucial member of society, begs the question; where did the inventor of the drawing board go back to when he messed up?
Next week we start Diarrhoea Awareness Week. It runs until Friday. Surely the inventor of the flushing toilet deserves an award.
The Mother Lode must surely be the atom bombs dropped on Nagasaki and Hiroshima.
My mother tongue is Kiwi with a fair dinkum sprinkling of outback Ozzy lingo.
Kalbarri, Northampton, Geraldton and surrounds just suffered the mother of all cyclones and we wish them well for their recovery.
Good luck, blessings and have a beautiful peaceful day all you mums out there.
Grand mamma was busy in the kitchen cooking her famous, own recipe, ANZAC brownie biscuits.
They were Grandpa’s favourite and as he lay in bed dying, the aroma spurred him, and with extreme difficulty, he managed to extricate himself from bed and crawl slowly down the stairs and into the kitchen. As he outstretched his failing feeble arthritic right hand to partake of his beloved choice of maa’s cooking, a wooden spoon whacked him hard on the knuckles.
“Bugger off,” she cried, “these are for the funeral!”
Cheers dears.
