Too Good for You?

Last night when we were out, I told my mum that I was clearing my wardrobe.  She was silent in thought for a while, and said, "Don't throw away the clothes that I made for you.  I don't have the energy to sew so much for you like last time, and I cannot sew clothes for you forever".

Somehow, what she said just made me think very nostalgic thoughts.

Back in the days when we were kids, Mum used to sew a lot of clothes for us.  As kids, we put on whatever she made, without any complaints as to the cutting, the colour the length or the fit.  Except, of course, the occasional bickering as to why the other sibling got the nicer dress / why do our dresses look exactly the same.  You know how it is.  As kids, we hate to be told that we look like our sibling.  (sometimes, even as adults too... we still hate it..)

One of the first pieces I played and sang on the piano on my own was this song we sang as children:

新的棉花，新的布

妈妈给我缝衣服

棉衣穿在我身上

妈妈脸上笑嘻嘻

I loved to watch mum stop her sewing and walk out of the room just to watch me sing and play that song on the piano, wearing a newly-made dress that she just sewed.

But as we grew older, we started getting picky.  Call it teenage angst, but we wanted to be like those people in the magazines and CD covers.  We gave her our designs and she did her best to make new clothes that we liked.  Sometimes, when clothes were not 'perfect', we found it hard to stop a word of complaint from escaping our mouths.

I never really gave much thought about how she would have felt as we changed in our attitudes, growing up.  From happy, contented and non-fussy, to 'sophisticated', picky about her skills and even mildly demanding at times.  Has she ever felt that we don't love and appreciate her as much anymore?  Did she feel taken for granted?  Have we grown too sophisticated for her and ever made her felt that she's not good enough for us anymore?  Have we ever made her felt as if we have 'arrived'?

...

One thing that has never changed all these years:  

She loves us a great deal, and no matter how we made her feel while growing up, we are her kids forever.

...

So today, I made a mental note: 

I'm not going to ever pick on anything that she has sewn for me.  I'm not going to throw away anything she made for me.  Ever.

I can live with wrong size, wrong fit, wrong cut and wrong design.

But I don't ever want to break her heart.