In Memory of Swastika and My Mother

Terence Stone

Sometimes I feel compelled to write something at a particular time. The last few days haven’t been so great. I began my last entry, “The Butterfly and the Babushka”, with the sentence, "Between a single birthday and the death to which it acts as guarantor, there is usually lots of room for experience". That was a referrence--unconscious I know--to a one year anniversary of things that have me struggling a little emotionally right now.

You see, last year on December 7, some of you will know that Nancy and I were in a terrorist bombing in Varanasi as we attended evening prayers to the Ganges. We were just 30 metres in front of the blast, but the major force of it was probably a few feet above our heads. We were luck, but it killed a little girl instantly just two days before her second birthday. I won’t talk about the other victims, not because they’re not important, but because we can all appreciate the horror of a child’s death in any form. As you all read this, I’d like you all to whisper or speak the child’s name to give verbal shape to her life and death—“Swastika Sharma”. Two women friends of ours from Victoria were playing with her just before the blast—“Swastika Sharma”, the whisper goes.

My mother’s birthday was November 30. She died on December 15 after the bombing; so in a way we’re right between the anniversary of her birthday and her death: “Between a single birthday and the death to which it acts as guarantor, there is usually lots of room for experience”—the death of Swastika.

Patterns shape the unconscious in very strange ways. The “Butterfly and the Babushka” is a true story; and so is the life and death of my mother. As December 15 approaches, I feel her presence layered on me—she the babushka in death to me as I continue living. Yes. There is sadness; but I feel joy in her enfolding presence.

I guess I want to say that she wasn’t the perfection of motherhood; but every nesting self that still remains a part of me—scarred in living--she always provided some touch-up paintwork on me as best she could. Sometimes her hand wasn’t so steady or her eye clear to see my needs; but it doesn’t matter so much. She loved me the best she knew how and the life she lived is enough to educate me for the rest of my days. Above all she talked of the need for love and justice in her later years. I know she felt a pasion for this she could never fully express.

I’d like the memories of my mom to be a celebration of motherhood as it’s lived in love--imperfectly. It should be the same for fathers, too. Unfortunately, we have a language of the singular when it comes to primary caregiver. I never hear in my work, the plural—primary caregivers. It’s as if there is an inherited cultural norm of speaking this way that creates a poverty of parenting experiences for many children and their fathers. I honestly believe bonding and attachment can be quite balanced in a parenting-child relationship where there is a dad. Of course, this isn’t always the case and when it isn’t mom can capably provide the attachment an infant needs to grow up in confidence and security.

This time of year is a time of darkness in what is an age of darkness. But there is hope that comes with intent and action. Tonight is a full moon—the "Poya" moon we loved to celebrate so much in Buddhist Sri Lanka. And we look towards festivals of light: Hanukkah on December 20; Solstice on December 22; Christmas on December 25. I hope we can support the nurturing growth of a new generation of children to lead us out of the darkness beginning now. It’s their future really—and the future of our children’s children. I think we can best help them by carefully re-thinking meaning and holding a new kind of space for them where there is justice for all. This in memory of my mother and Swastika Sharma.