A very Heart touching story! Must Read
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My mom only had one eye. I hated her... she was such an
embarrassment. My mom ran a small shop at a flea market.
She collected little weeds and such to sell... anything
for the money we needed she was such an embarrassment..
There was this one day during elementary school.
I remember that it was field day, and my mom came. I was
so embarrassed.
How could she do this to me? I threw her a hateful look
and ran out. The next day at school..."Your mom only has
one eye?!" and they taunted me.
I wished that my mom would just disappear from this world
so I said to my mom, "Mom, why don't you have the other
eye?! You're only going to make me a laughingstock. Why
don't you just die?" My mom did not respond. I guess I
felt a little bad, but at the same time, it felt good to
think that I had said what I'd wanted to say all this
time.
Maybe it was because my mom hadn't punished me, but I
didn't think that I had hurt her feelings very badly.
That night...I woke up, and went to the kitchen to get a
glass of water. My mom was crying there, so quietly, as
if she was afraid that she might wake me. I took a look
at her, and then turned away. Because of the thing I had
said to her earlier, there was something pinching at me
in the corner of my heart. Even so, I hated my mother who
was crying out of her one eye. So I told myself that I
would grow up and become successful, because I hated my
one-eyed mom and our desperate poverty.
Then I studied really hard. I left my mother and came to
Seoul and studied, and got accepted in the Seoul
University with all the confidence I had. Then, I got
married. I bought a house of my own. Then I had kids,
too. Now I'm living happily as a successful man. I like
it here because it's a place that doesn't remind me of my
mom. This happiness was getting bigger and bigger, when
someone unexpected came to see me "What?! Who's this?!"
...It was my mother...Still with her one eye. It felt as
if the whole sky was falling apart on me. My little girl
ran away, scared of my mom's eye.
And I asked her, "Who are you? I don't know you!!!" as if
I tried to make that real. I screamed at her "How dare
you come to my house and scare my daughter! GET OUT OF
HERE! NOW!!!" And to this, my mother quietly answered,
"oh, I'm so sorry. I may have gotten the wrong address,"
and she disappeared. Thank good ness... she doesn't
recognize me. I was quite relieved. I told myself that I
wasn't going to care, or think about this for the rest of
my life.
Then a wave of relief came upon me...one day, a letter
regarding a school reunion came to my house. I lied to my
wife saying that I was going on a business trip. After
the reunion, I went down to the old shack, that I used to
call a house...just out of curiosity there, I found my
mother fallen on the cold ground. But I did not shed a
single tear. She had a piece of paper in her hand.... it
was a letter to me.
She wrote:
My son...
I think my life has been long enough now. And... I won't
visit Seoul anymore... but would it be too much to ask if
I wanted you to come visit me once in a while? I miss you
so much. And I was so glad when I heard you were coming
for the reunion. But I decided not to go to the
school.... For you... I'm sorry that I only have one eye,
and I was an embarrassment for you. You see, when you
were very little, you got into an accident, and lost your
eye. As a mother, I couldn't stand watching you having to
grow up with only one eye... so I gave you mine...I was
so proud of my son that was seeing a whole new world for
me, in my place, with that eye. I was never upset at you
for anything you did. The couple times that you were
angry with me. I thought to myself, 'it's because he
loves me.' I miss the times when you were still young
around me.
I miss you so much. I love you. You mean the world to me.
My world shattered!!!
Then I cried for the person who lived for me? My MOTHER !