When I think of my mother the first word that comes to mind is courageous. Her life has never been easy, but she has always had the strength to get through it.
The first big test of her life came when she was only four years old, when her mother died in childbirth of my last uncle. In our country the sanitary conditions of those times were not very good, so many women died shortly after having their children.
As an orphan, she had a difficult childhood and when she reached adolescence, at the age of fifteen, she decided to look for a better life. She took courage and decided to leave her hometown, in western Venezuela, to come to Caracas, the capital of the country. In the early years he did everything to make a living.
Two years after her arrival in Caracas, she met my father, a man who also came from the countryside like her. She moved in with him and soon after I was born, she had not yet reached the age of eighteen. After a year my other brother was born.
My brother and I became the center of my mother's life. For her the most important thing was to take care of us, we were her priority. Sometimes there were difficult times when resources were not enough for the four of us and she managed to put smaller portions on her and my father's plate, so that my brother's and mine would always be plentiful.
During those years we moved several times until we got a piece of land on the outskirts of Caracas. My mother and my father carried materials, she made food for the workers who built our house, and more than once she served as their assistant, mixing cement and gluing blocks...
Before I was two years old, I began to suffer from a chronic respiratory disease, which complicated my mother's life even more. At that time her devotion to me was total, she gave me all the remedies people told her to give me, she took me to all the doctors they recommended. But even with so many setbacks, she was always trying to make our lives happy.
She herself made the toys that my brother and I played with. And on special dates like Christmas she would invent anything so as not to leave us without presents, and at Carnival she would have our costumes made by a neighbor. My mother took advantage of every occasion to make us happy.
As time went by, two more siblings arrived. My mother patiently taught the older ones to take care of the younger ones. It was a very nice time because she made us feel important by giving us responsibilities such as giving the bottle, or changing the diaper of the little ones...
One of the things I always value about my mother is her interest in educating us. When it was time for school she made great sacrifices to get us into the classroom. The vast majority of children in our community did not attend school. But she insisted that we would go.
Every day, at mid-morning, we would leave our house on our way to school. My mother would take the youngest child in her arms and the two older ones by the hand. That way we would walk more than three kilometers to catch the bus that would take us close to the school, where we still had to walk about two more kilometers. She would drop us off, return with the child in her arms, and at the end of the afternoon she would make the trip again to pick us up. We would arrive home between eight and nine in the evening. Thanks to that dedication and effort, my siblings and I were able to study, all of us reached university level.
Today my mother continues to set examples of courage and fortitude. She is eighty-eight years old and still works, she likes to earn her money. Today, Sunday, as I write these lines, she is selling goods in a market in Barquisimeto, the city where she lives.
Because of the difficulties in our country, it is difficult for us to see each other, since we live in distant cities. However, she has managed to update herself with technology, she knows enough to be able to communicate with her children and grandchildren through whatsapp. Every day we talk on the cell phone and at every opportunity I take the opportunity to have her tell me a few things about our family's history..... My mother is a great woman, an invaluable example for her children, grandchildren and great granddaughters. God bless her...
I am making this post prompted by the initiative the Memoir Monday, proposed by friend @ericvancewalton. This week's theme is: What was your mom like when you were a child?. I invite everyone to participate in this excellent initiative.
Thanks for your time.
Translated with DeepL.com (free version)
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