Wednesday, May 30, 2007

QUOTE OF THE DAY

Got this brilliant text message yesterday from my mentor, Professor Cruz: “If you can’t find the book you wish to read, write it.” Brilliant idea! Simply brilliant! Now why didn’t I think of that in the first place?

Thursday, May 03, 2007

Help Wanted: All Around Mom

I just read this post by Reuters at Yahoo! The title of the post reads, “Stay-at-home mother's work worth $138,095 a year” and is reported by Ellen Wilfhorst. The story goes like this:

“If the typical stay-at-home mother in the United States were paid for her work as a housekeeper, cook and psychologist among other roles, she would earn $138,095 a year, according to research released on Wednesday………..
The 10 jobs listed as comprising a mother's work were housekeeper, cook, day care center teacher, laundry machine operator, van driver, facilities manager, janitor, computer operator, chief executive officer and psychologist, it said.
The typical mother puts in a 92-hour work week, it said, working 40 hours at base pay and 52 hours overtime.”

I find this post rather bizarre and laughable in the sense that they even put a price tag on a Mom’s work! Talk about a materialist’s world! How can one place a price tag on a mother’s labor of love? It is simply priceless and cannot be evaluated by any modern accounting methods! I mean, if you dangle $138,095 or Php6,766,655 (at Php49:$1) as yearly salary, would any lady apply for a housewife? Errrr, come to think of it, yeah, of course, I mean where can you find a 140 gram job nowadays and in dollars (Good thing I lived in the Philippines where everything is cheap…………..)! Seriously, what’s the difference between a McDonald’s burger and the good, o’l homemade mom’s burger? Never mind about the “possible” fact that McDonald’s burger might taste better than mom’s burger but consider the effort and thought that went with the simple burger. Mom would be up early in the morning way before anybody else in the household is up just to prepare that special mom’s burger for breakfast just for you and she timed it in such a way that once you wake up in the morning, you’ll have that burger on your table, not too hot, not too cold but just right. And it comes in the tenderness, the juiciness, and the size and the portion that you always come to expect but take it for granted (even if it may not taste as great as a burger from McDonald’s). Plus, there is more to it. Mom’s burger comes with a huge free load of advice and lectures like drink your milk, eat your breakfast, don’t play with your food, hurry up and finish your breakfast or you’ll be late for school… etc (moms can be annoying sometimes). Come to think of it, can I have the Mcdo burger instead. “ ) Ok, maybe the burger comparison is a bad idea but the question I’m posing here is, “what is a mom all about?” Is she a slave of ours? Is she a housekeeper? A laundry woman? A cook? Yes and no! A mom is more than that. A mom is a person that gave us life. She is the one that cuddle us when we were young, weak, and defenseless. She is the person that nurse us to strength. She is our first teacher that taught us the ABC’s and the life long mentor that taught us the ABC’s of life. She is the person that would wake up in the middle of the cold night and cover us with a blanket without us knowing about it. Now, price that! And even though we could price a mother’s love, can we ever pay it back? And if we do and can pay that back in hard cash, would she even accept it? And granted that she did accept that payment we gave her, would we feel satisfied that we gave her, her fair due? She gave us all her youth, her vigor, her thoughts, her life, her everything. Would a wad of cash be sufficed to pay for a back made bent from nurturing us? Never. Ever! Mothers are perhaps the most wonderful person in this world and at the same time, the most under appreciated person in the world as well. It’s about time that we show them our heartfelt appreciation not by paying her for the work she has done for us in $ but by a warm hug.

Happy Mother’s Day (May 13).

P.S. That is why we have a day for Mothers.