The Stubborn Dowager

My mother is one stubborn dowager. She is fairly open-minded in a lot of areas… she embraces the talks about gay and lesbians, about my possibility of remaining single, her unusual critic on some of the plots in the recent TV dramas… but she refuses to carry a mobile phone.

“A waste of electricity…”, “What happened when it expires?”, “Who is going to call me?!”, “I’ll use it only once a year at most…”, “A total waste of money”… some of her remarks when the subject comes on.

I guess for a lady who is not English-educated (or little educated for that matter), it is hard to ask them to jump on the wagon of the IT age. But heck, I am not asking her to use Internet and do Skype like my overseas aunties are asking her to do… I am merely, requesting that she carrys a mobile phone with her, so that I can have a way of contacting her if something crops up.

The first time we had a serious discussion about this was about 3 months ago. There was one Saturday afternoon when she wanted us to go some place together after my gym. So I told her to wait for me at the bus stop which is in front of the building where HMV is. I also told her that it is the second bus stop after the bus turns onto Orchard Road.

Well, we arranged for 3pm. At 3:40pm or so, I am beginning to feel uneasy because it is really unusual for my mom to be this late, even after factoring the delay by the buses, the pets in the neighborhood etc. I started pacing around the bus stop to ensure that I didn’t miss her ‘hiding’ at a corner. I also thought that she might have stopped at the wrong bus stop, and went to check the other bus stop nearby. At 4pm, my mind was starting to go wild. I called my friend to call my mobile, just to ensure that it is ringing and not jammed up or something. I started to imagine what if she fell on the way out to the bus stop… what if she was bitten by a snake? I heard stories from the neighbors who sighted snakes… What if she got lost? What if she took the wrong bus? What if she fainted at home? Lots of what ifs…

At 4:40pm, my mom finally found me. Apparently, she went into the HMV building and waited for me inside instead. She didn’t want to borrow a mobile phone from the people around, and she can’t find a pay phone. So she just kept waiting… and kept me waiting. Of course by then, we were so frustrated and had not enough time to go where we intended to go.

 Today, something similarly happened. She went for a trip in KL and is taking the train back. She asked me to wait for her at home instead of waiting for her at the station. I guess on the hindsight, I should have insisted. The train left KL at around 7:30 – 8am in the morning. Typically it would reach Singapore at around 3pm or so, which means she’ll get home by 4pm.

Again, the agony of waiting… she finally arrived at 6:30pm. Twice at 5pm, I received a private call on my mobile phone, and cannot hear the other party. I thought if it was my mom, she’ll be smart enough to call the home number. Well, she was too smart for that. She thought that I was out, and hence didn’t try to call the home number.

And so, I waited and waited… flipped the magazines, jumped up and check at the windows every other minute… until she arrived at the door.

And right now? She’s angry from the row we had about her stubbornness of carrying a mobile phone, and that since I had all the time waiting for her at home, I should have gone and feed the cats first.

I think I have the reasons to be pissed. So… we have not talked to each other for 40 mins after she went to feed the cats… still counting.