Mother's Love on a Rainy Night

In the olden days, a worn out blanket or a patch work cotton quilt blanket was what most families could afford to keep their children warm on a plank, matted bed, usually without a mattress even.

Mattresses were made from kapok or local cotton, or even coconut coir. The former could be taken out to sun once a year, but the latter could only be air dried. So it was quite often to see whole thin mattresses drying in the sun from windows or on fences.

(The illustration is from Wikipedia, a painting by a famous Chinese artist Gao Yinzhang)

Mats were made from reeds (made in China) or local Sarawakian rattan or bemban (water reeds). The best mats were the soft rattan woven mats from the Kayans which could be folded. Reed mats usually could not last long but they were warm.

On cold windy or rainy nights my mother would wake up once or twice to make sure that of us were warm and under our blankets.

I loved my brown blanket, which I used from primary school, and right through university. I was a little crazy at one time, thinking that I should even bring my brown woolen blanket to a Methodist Workcamp in the ulu. I could secretly put it i a large suitcase! But in the end I did not bring it. How I missed my blanket. I could not sleep.

Recently I bought a fluffy warm woolen blanket from a Japanese shop in Kuching and my mother loved it too. She approved of my purchase and I happily brought it home to Miri, in my suitcase!

My brother was the same too. He loved his woolen blanket, and he must have it at all times. It was with him until he had only a shred of it many years later. He even brought it to Australia.

We are like Linus and his blanket.

So after my mother's passing, I miss her.

Tonight I miss her as it is a cool, windy Saturday night in Miri. Quiet due to the pandemic, the night is for a lot of thinking and writing.

And I can hear her moving about on the wooden floor...and imagine her saying......

- "Don't forget to close the windows. Make sure the blankets are covering all the small ones....."

Thinking aloud ---

And sometime in the night she would wake up to make sure that each of us in the old wooden house was warm......Mother's love on a rainy night.