[James] New motherhood in Trynidad

Any subject dealing with my parents is never an easy one to dissect: they were enigmas and riddles wrapped in a mystery. I mean, one never really can say that they knew their parents completely, but as one grows older and wiser we begin to understand what they were trying to share with us, especially after they're gone.

Top left to right -  mother Imelda, father Steve
and their kids

My mother in her own seemingly insignificant way broke barriers, traditions and boundaries. She was a traditional homemaker and she was an independent working woman. In her younger years she felt her calling to God and joined the convent. After five years as a nun, she left and met my father, who as fate would have it, once was a Monk with aspirations for the priesthood. After five years however, he decided that the monastic life was not for him. They married and started their family. 

With three children six years later, one finds that Mummy had already obtained her driver's permit, managed my father's store and was raising her children. A decision to close the store and move the family closer to the capital city opened up a new outlook for my mother: she got into the world of work as a key punch operator, while at the same time juggled managing the household. When a series of mishaps with our various housekeepers had taken its toll, my mother decided to become a full time home maker, something she excelled at until we were old enough to take care of ourselves and each other. Once we were old enough, she opted to head back into the world of work, managing the accounts of the convent's High School of the order that she had left all those years before, and then moved on to teaching first year students until her retirement in the Preparatory School.

Though she had embraced the new tradition of the working wife and mother, she was very much at ease being the old traditional stay at home mother and wife. As she straddled both traditions, she was took great pains to prepare her three children for life... Something that she also reminded us of when we became adults.

We were all taught to some degree "Home Economics" not just the management of our own households, but how to take care of ourselves. She insisted in ensuring that no spouse of ours would ever be able to take advantage of us (especially her boys): today, my brother and I can hold our own in the kitchen, and though we live alone, our homes are pristine. My sister, who is the youngest of us, is a home maker, home school teacher of five children, and who once was the sole bread winner while her husband was between jobs.

There is a new stereotype of motherhood today that still embraces the old traditions: one where the wife and mother maintains independent control of her own destiny while at the same time having a working knowledge of the traditional aspects of our parents, raising children, cooking, cleaning, sewing and ironing. Maybe our, or at least, my mother saw it coming and prepared her boys to do the same. Many of my friends who are married have spouses who are able to embrace all the roles and share the duties of the household.

James B. Solomon from Trinidad and Tobago