About my Mother - University of Porto, Portugal
“Will you have a minute at the end?” whispered The Professor in my ear. He was sitting next to me in the auditorium where the third and final lecture in memory of my mother was about to start. The faces of her mentors and friends – Piaget, Inhelder, Klein, Trevarthan – were being projected on the screen. “There’s something I need to tell you,” he added.
I was curious. Perhaps he wanted to share memories of the time, the very long time he was a regular visitor at my parents. He was named The Professor by the cook, who complained to my mother he ate her croquettes before they were ready. Besides food, he loved Philosophy, Kant most of all, which he talked about continuously to students and anyone else who’d listen.
‘How have you been?” I asked him. He gave me his other ear and I repeated the question.
“Can’t get what people say these days – even in my own language!” he said. We laughed, remembering how upset he would become when my parents and their friends moved from philosophy to politics. French had become the language for anything political since the secret police had jailed a neighbor after receiving information from his maid. The Professor was not good with foreign languages, and insisted on going back to Portuguese. ”French isn’t safe either,” he argued. “Words like democracy and freedom sound too similar in our language.” By the time I was a teenager, I was convinced he had a point. French was not so hard. The secret police could easily find someone who understood the language to pose as a maid. Did he not think so, I asked one day.
“Harder to plant a maid than a bugging device,” he answered. “I bet there’s one somewhere.”
“What, in the house?”
“Oh, sure,” he said.
“OMG,” I thought, though not exactly in those terms as everyone was an atheist then; my father is the only one still carrying on that tradition.
University of Porto students/copyright@mariaclarapaulino
In the auditorium the first speaker took the floor. The Professor leaned forward trying to hear. It was sad to think of him living on his own. I should visit him, listen to him again. The speaker finished, another one started, and then it was time for me to leave. The Professor came too. I helped him up the stairs and we walked together into the sunlight.
“So,” he said. He hesitated.
“Is everything alright?” I asked.
“Well, you know, not really. I have a request.”
“Yes?” I said, bracing myself. I had had half a day of intense emotion. I’d give anything for some light conversation.
“I loved your mother. No, wait, that’s not true. I love your mother.”
“Excuse me?” someone said. I think it was me, the me about to faint. The other me was busy Being Positive: You can deal with this, yes, you with your gorgeous grown-up daughters, your travels and nationalities, your cultural in-between-ness, your hundred ways to navigate an airport, your skyping, your loves and losses and successes, you. But the me about to faint just wanted to faint.
“Sorry, there was no other way to say this,” he went on. “Would you be kind enough to put flowers on your mother’s grave when I’m gone? I mean, on my behalf?”
So, that’s who they are from, the roses my father finds there almost every Sunday; they have become an on and off topic of conversation in the family.
“The roses – is that you?”
copyright @mariaclarapaulino
“Yes, but let me assure you, your mother never knew. I never interfered.” He looked thinner and frailer than minutes before.
“I don’t know what to say. Sorry. I need to think. There’s my father to consider.”
“Quite. You must think. But there’s very little time left.”
“I see.”
“You’ll let me know soon?”
“Soon, yes.”
“Thank you. Or shall I say, Merci?”
I had to smile. I hailed a taxi for him and saw him disappear in heavy traffic; young people in an open red bus went noisily by, celebrating Portugal and soccer. And all I could think was, Oh Mother!
Dear Clara
The professor was such a gentleman. It must not have been easy to be so unselfish and keep this to himself all these years. Well easy for me to say…from the third person perspective.
To be honest, all I can think of is you have such interesting things happen to you…
Good to read you!
Best
Padmavani
Thanks Padmavani! I know, he is unselfish but to be honest, that was not what I wanted to hear (I mean, from him). I’m recovering fast, but still wondering what to do…
A man loves a woman very deeply, from afar, even after death, and she never knows it. He deserves a great deal of respect, this man, for he obviously had a great deal of respect for her, your father, you and countless others who might have suffered from an open declaration of love. He has indeed proved the depth of his love…
Kathy – I have been wondering where you were. I was just looking at your SW blog and the Dervish one and realised there is something new there. In short, I have missed you. And of course you are absolutely right about this man – and thank you from the bottom of my heart for saying what you said. I am still undecided and will use all the help I can get to try to see clearly.
The Professor’s request is a disservice to you, the daughter. He should have kept silent.
Reading your posts once wills a wait, a good, long thoughtful wait, lingering say a day, before reading twice. Words, like water, can be found; writing, like wine, must be brought.
For what it is worth, I think the Professor should not have burdened you with this. He should have made arrangements with someone else. He is asking you, in a way, to betray your father because now you know where those roses come from and will have to deny knowing or lie.
I am no prude and am not one to judge but you should not be the one chosen to continue his profession of love for your mother, even if he had been a gentleman while she was alive. He is free to love and provide the flowers but he should make his own arrangements for when he is gone. If you do it, you may feel you betrayed your parents’ love for each other, if you agree to do it and then stop, you’ve broken your promise to the professor.
Good luck,
@ Marylin – Thank you for such a clear, lucid explanation of what you think I should do. I really appreciate that you took the time to help me. I agree with you: he did put a burden on me. On the other hand, he did ask and it saddens me to say no. But sense will prevail, I think, for all the good reasons you mentioned. Once in a while bring a flower from him? perhaps, we’ll see.
@Jerry – what a lovely thing to say about my writing. I really look forward to your comments, you know. I sense you ‘get’ what I am doing almost more clearly than I do myself. About the professor – I know. You are right, of course, and I am thankful that you put it so clearly and succinctly. It is hard to say no, yet i cannot say yes. OMG (again) please someone get me out of this dilemma. Coming to Portugal and revisiting family history and traditions has turned out to be so much more involved, interesting, and hard than I could ever have imagined.
Clara – here’s something I’ve been wondering since I read this piece – regardless of the discomfort the man’s request creates in you, would you rather *not know* how deeply and unconditionally your mother was loved? And you? Would you want to be loved from afar like this, though you might never know it:?
Kathy – Such good questions! My first response is: If I never knew, the question wouldn’t exist for me. But I do know and your questions are very good, so here goes: Your second question is easier to answer – I would say Yes, if only because love is always good and we all (well, I think we all) want to be loved (however, if I didn’t know about it, it would not be a factor at all in my life). As to your first question, The answer is both Yes and … Undecided. Yes, I am now (key word here) glad that he told me; and I am undecided about bringing flowers in his name because that involves my feelings for my father. My father would not know who they are from, but I would. One cannot undo knowledge. Do you see my problem?
Marie Clara,
What a wonderful post, thank you for sharing. At the moment I don’t want to drift from this very post, to find out if you shared earlier when your mother died, whether your loss occurred recently. Please accept my condolences. And excuse me saying this, but the post reads like fiction, which actually is meant as a compliment.
If I think of the experience as such, I like that the Professor shared his secret. I don’t think the narrator needs to oblige him at all. That would mean a pact between the (not so) distant admirer and the narrator, a pact that has no basis and goes against the more intimate relationship with the father..
If the narrator shares her knowledge about the source of the weekly roses with her father, several things are possible. Daughter and father will reflect on the importance of mother and wife in the mind and lives of other people.
For the father certain puzzling pieces might start falling in place too. Would that be a good thing or a bad? How does one feel thinking about a man who came to one’s house regularly while harboring a secret love for one’s wife?
But then again, perhaps the mother and father of the narrator were well aware of the man’s infatuation. What if this secret admirer made the father even appreciate his wife more?
All this said, I think the man made a faux pas asking the narrator what he did and insinuating a relationship with her.
So there you go. I think you’re off the hook Marie Clara.
There’s no equality between him and you.
He ought to ask a maid to plant the roses.
Warmly,
Judith
If it was me, and my mother….
I would take the roses. So rare is it to hear of love so selfless that it does not even ask to be recognized…
Oh Clara, how I’ve missed reading your words. Each flows so easily across the eye, regardless of their depth and weight.
The ‘right’ answer will come to you, I know, since you’re a listener, even of the unspoken word. And if you care to share the rest of this unfolding story, I would love to “listen” to it.
But can I confess how touched I am by the Professor’s vulnerability in asking you to grant him this favor. But then, I always am when ‘masks’ come off and people reveal their truth.
As you do so beautifully here.
Janell
@Judith – Your comment is very insightful. You are right, of course, about me not having to oblige. I am still undecided. And thank you for your comments about my writing. As to the post sounding like fiction, I did take it as a compliment. The truth is, I toned what happened down. I sometimes find life is too rich and complex for fiction, don’t you? Fiction is simply not a match
)
@ Jennifer – True, absolutely true. And that is the catch. What you say is as true, to me, as what others have said, and yet some said the opposite. This mirrors my own dilemma. I am glad you wrote. Thank you.
@ Janell – I missed you too, you know. Strange how these attachments happen in cyberspace. I am moved by your words but then I usually am. You put things so delicately, and so ‘right’ somehow, just the exact word. You write beautifully.
It must have come to a surprise for you! I wouldn’t have known what to do. I thought that stories like these only happened in novel, but apparently not. he is a very romantic chap, but what was the exact point of telling you? Why now?
@mumuGB – Hi and welcome to my comment page. It is always lovely to hear what people think. My answer to your question about why the Professor talked to me is: I do not know. I can guess and come up with a few possibilities, but who knows the reasons others have to do the things they do? As to my new living environment, yes, it does take a lot to get used to but I have a memory of it from when I was a child and draw resources from it all the time. Thank you for commenting!