Home by Lunch

One night, while scrolling through videos I had no real reason to watch, I came across a clip of Drew Barrymore interviewing the comedian Taylor Tomlinson. Drew said that for a long time she hadn't wanted children, because she was afraid of repeating what had gone wrong between her and her own mother. She is usually quick and easy on camera. This time she wasn't. The words came slowly, as if each one had to be pulled up from a long way back. She and her mother have since made peace, and you could see her trying to be honest about the hurt without being unkind to the person who caused it.

It got me thinking about my own childhood. We didn't have much money, and by most measures there was nothing remarkable about the way I grew up. But it was a lovely childhood, and I am proud of the home my mother made for us.

I didn't have a nanny. I had uncles, aunts, and cousins who took turns looking after me on busy mornings, when my mother went down to the store to help my father. She was always home by lunch. And I had Nanay Pinang, my grandmother, who took to mothering her grandchildren as though she had been waiting all her life for the chance. There was no shortage of love in that old house. It takes a village to raise a child, and we had the village.

There is something to be said for living on the margins. Life is simpler there, and nobody puts on airs. Mostly we wanted to live decently, by the Christian values we were raised on.

Nobody at our table checked whether we sat up straight or held our forks correctly. Three families crowded around one long table, and there was only one rule: eat, and enjoy it.

I had older cousins to play with, though they left me behind whenever they climbed the guava tree or went down to the river to swim. One day, while playing by the dyke, my foot slipped, and I slid all the way down into the water. My cousins were already in the water, and they fished me out. The grown-ups were waiting for us on the bank, angry and frightened in equal measure.

We had no computers then, no iPads, no phones, and I count that among our blessings. People talked to one another and paid attention while they did it. We had a hundred ways to fill an afternoon: jackstones, Chinese garter, tumbang preso, sungka, and other games children hardly play anymore.

Our parents did the best they could with what they had. My mother gave up teaching because my father wanted her home with the children. Running a household like ours was hard work, and I never once heard her say she regretted it.

Still, I share some of Drew Barrymore's fear of repeating history, though for a different reason. I think about my mother's career, the one she gave up. I watched that choice wear down her confidence and narrow her independence, a little at a time. She could have had both. But there's no use dwelling on it now. Half a century has gone by, and my mother made her peace with it long ago. I should make mine too, and be grateful for what she gave up for us.