Tears… MUM
Mum is seventy-three. Small, stooped, her hands always busy, her gaze a mix of weariness and warmth. She hands me a bag and gives me a guilty smile:
“Here are some pears, Annie. They’re not the prettiest, but they’re homegrown. No chemicals. You like them, don’t you? Take them, please.”
I take them. Of course I do. And the yogurt too, because Mum always “accidentally leaves one pot” if she knows I’m stopping by.
“You’re not rushing off straight away, are you? You’ll stay for dinner a couple of times…” she adds quietly, almost hopefully.
I climb into the car. Start the engine.
Off I go again, always running. Work, meetings, errands, cities, time zones, the endless rush… Everything’s important, everything’s urgent. I visit Mum only when everything else is done—squeezed between coffee with friends and a massage, between a presentation and a flight.
I never arrive empty-handed—I bring her fish, cheese, treats. I ask how she and Dad are doing. Listen half-heartedly, interrupt, sometimes even mock—what could possibly be happening in their lives at their age? I live in parallel.
Mum will inevitably say I’m “always underdressed,” that I should wrap up, that my cough is from “leaving my coat open,” and that I work too much. She’ll repeat that life is hard, yes, and that she understands, and it’s fine that I don’t visit often.
We live just twenty-five miles apart.
I call her almost every day. She tells me everything slowly, in detail:
“Tomatoes have gone up at the market. Your sister’s struggling with the farm, all on her own. The parsley needs cutting again after the rain. And our cat, Whiskers, came home with a scratched eye—no idea where he’s been…”
I listen. Sometimes just out of politeness.
It feels like nothing important ever happens in her life.
I get frustrated when she complains about her heart but refuses to see a doctor. What can I do? I’m not a medic! I tell her, “Mum, please, just go! I don’t know what you should take!”
Then she says something completely different, softly:
“Who else can I tell, love, if not you?”
And my fingers freeze on the phone.
Because it’s true. Because I’m her person. The only one who’s truly hers.
So I drop everything. Rush to her. No warning. No plan. Just because I have to.
And she—as if she’d been waiting. Already at the door with a towel. Already frying fish. Dad’s slicing melon, pulling out a bottle of homemade wine:
“Just finished fermenting a few days ago,” he says proudly.
I refuse—I’m driving. He nods, pours himself a glass. We laugh. Loudly, from the heart.
I’m chilly. I wrap myself in Mum’s warm cardigan. She immediately turns on the oven:
“Let’s warm up the kitchen so you don’t freeze.”
And I’m little again. That girl who’s loved. Who’s fed. For whom the room is warmed.
Everything tastes right. Everything’s warm. Everything’s real.
Mum, my dear, my darling…
Just keep living.
A long, long time.
Because I don’t know how to live without hearing your voice on the phone.
Because I don’t know how to live without your kitchen, where you always make sure I’m warm.
Because no matter what happens in the world, I need an anchor. And that anchor has always been you.
Mum.
Just be.
