8th
of March, the international Women’s Day, was an official state
holiday in the socialist Yugoslavia. From my childhood, I vaguely
remember some adults connotations of the holiday but what I remember
very well is that this was Mothers Day for all of us, children. And
it stayed like this, Mothers Day, throughout my life.
The
deepest feelings come over me when I remember my mother. Call it
love, or so I assume, I have no idea, actually, if the term ‘love’
renders into these feelings. I wish I could see her with a poet’s
eyes and recount our relationship in a poet’s terms, like Esenin
did in a letter-poem to his mother.
My
mother’s reactions to my ups and downs were more emphatic than my
father’s. And yet, she was rather firm and persistent in her
everyday requirements and general moral guidance. She would put
forward a clever folk saying, appropriate for a given occasion - and
I’m sure some of them she invented herself or at least
refurbished. Like, when I made a long face on her request to do some
work on our farm before going to school: "What eyes are afraid
of, hands will do."