Blog 2 | How I re-met my Mother | Yasas Vithange

Update to Vlogs: My software crashed so I will be uploading my vlogs when I come back to Wichita.

Blog 2: How I re-met my mother…

I always volunteer to lift heavy things because I love lifting heavy things. This is a fact that my team always choose to laugh at, but I say know your strengths, and my strength is my strength. This will be the theme of this week.

I met Mrs. Hicks at an organization called A Wider Circle, she reminded me of my Ammi (mother in Sinhalese). A Wider Circle is an organization that helps families at risk of falling into poverty or in poverty get out of that cycle by either helping them furnish homes, or get clothes, or to receive interview clothing and training. Mrs. Hicks is a 56 year old African American who is a single mother of 2 older sons. She needed furniture for her new apartment far away from the city. Her job doesn’t pay enough for her to keep the house she raised her children in, and her boys are married and no longer can fully support her as she gets older. My mother on the other hand is a 50 year old Sri Lankan house wife who raised my sister and I while my father was abroad winning the bread for our family. My sister and I have since moved out and she now lives with my father in Dubai. Mrs. Hicks and my mother share two very important traits, they have an attitude of modesty and strength. Mrs. Hicks was picking her furniture and would say “that would look fantastic in the corner by the kitchen… please, please, please I need that in our house, our life would not be complete without that”, which are all things my mother would say. My mother and I are very close and I haven’t got to talk to her for a few weeks and that really made me miss her and was a quiet reminder that all families are real people with everyday problems. I see her strength through her continuous hopeful nature, finding the positives out of every situation. I see her modesty through her love for all the people around her and honesty about her current situation. She is a timid woman in a harsh world with no problem standing up for herself.

I, of course, helped play heavy furniture tetris (my favorite game other than regular tetris) because I like lifting heavy things. At one point when our tetris leader said we couldn’t fit any more furniture in her 2001 Toyota Hilux and I didn’t buy it, he was terrible at tetris. Thus I proceeded to repacked the truck to fit all her furniture. It was nothing short of exhausting but Mrs. Hicks was so thankful and she looked at me with her a kind brown eyes and gave me a warm, loving, motherly hug and told me to keep her in her prayers. I fell to pieces. I was overwhelmed with emotions because all I saw, felt, heard, or felt was my mother and I didn’t want to let go. Knowing that I will never see her again made me feel numb because for a second I had my mother next to me again, and I felt loved for the first time in a long time. I live in America, alone, and she will be as well. We were both far from family and made a connection that we hadn’t felt in a long time. I had to walk away to collect myself and when I came back she was gone and I had missed the opportunity to take a picture with her, but it was okay. Remembering that I helped Ammi (mother in Sinhalese) was enough satisfaction for the day.

To feel love from a stranger for a single moment is preferable than to feel nothing at all. She filled a little part of my heart that has been empty for a long time. Ammi, I love you.