mother knows BEST...

I would like to share with you one of my favorite short story about our mothers. This story entitled: “Mother’s Letter Trick” and it goes like this: there are two sisters who live in the same part of town but they hardly ever see each other. Whenever their mother writes to her daughters, she would always ask, “When did you last see your sister?” The daughters would answer three months ago, so the mother decided she was going to do something about it. And so, shortly afterwards, each daughter received a strange kind of letter. Their mother wrote a letter to both of them but sends to one of them pages one and three while the other received pages two and four. Ever since then they each get a half a letter a month. And now they are glad about it because it makes them take time out and spend evening together. Only a mother could do that!

This short story struck me because even though the mother was far from her daughters and the daughters are far from each other, the mother had found a way to make the two sisters meet even though they had difficulty to see each other at last. The mother shows her love to her daughters because in a little way, she helps her daughters to overcome their difficulty.

This story is most likely the same as my conversation with our Mother, Mary. She always has a way of reminding me even if sometimes I forget pray to her or neglect her. I remember when was in second year high school; I started my devotion to her by praying the rosary. I pray my rosary everyday. Since my first period in high school was at 6:45am, I would leave home at around 5:30am and after saying goodbye to my mother and kissing her, I would start praying rosary. I prayed even if I was walking or while I was on the jeepney going to school. Whenever I’d meet my friends while walking they usually say, “Ang seryoso mo namang maglakad!” then I’d just smiling at them saying to myself, “Di nyo lang alam nagdadasal ako ng rosary!” I find it weird praying on my way to school because there were a lot of nuisances that I encountered during this time like the noise of the jeep, the noise of the people in the jeep I’m riding on, and many more. But despite of this I realized that this is the appropriate time for me to reflect and pray because it is morning and my mind is still fresh. And this is the only time that I could talk to Mary because I usually don’t have any time after school because I had to do my assignments and my projects and also help my brothers in their assignments.

I got this tip from one sister with the name of Sister Soledad, during our formation as Altar Server, she said her story to us and I noticed that kind of habit and I started imitating her. I guess Mama Mary made sister Soledad an instrument for me to remember God through her words. I experienced change in my life. I can say that I am more dedicated to our Mother Mary than I was before. I start offering my days today, and I give her a minute a day. I think this is the challenge for us in these novena days in honor of Mary Assumed into Heaven, to really deepen our devotion to her. To pray to her seriously and with love. Our daily rosary is a means of communication to her. And I guess she doesn’t neglect our petitions. Let us always remember that whenever we have problems in life, or in our vocation, she has always a solution to our problems because Mary is our mother and mothers definitely know best.