I owe you a promise

Also in September, but more than 30 years ago; that day my mother saw me off at the bus station to go to Da Lat city to study at university. I carried a backpack on my shoulder, a suitcase of clothes and books in my hand, preparing for the entrance exam.

I was over 20 years old when I passed the university entrance exam, the first time I had to study away from home, so I was very confused. And since then, my hometown, the fields, the fields, the winding village roads gradually became farther and farther away from my daily life. At that time, my mother was only in her forties, the age of maturity, strong, ready to do any job to take care of life; pay for food and education for the 8 of us. But when she saw me off to study far away, her tears fell, she couldn't hold back because she missed her son. Later, I heard my mother say: Every afternoon, she looked towards the horizontal mountain range, towards Da Lat and cried alone. At my age of 20, I was brave enough and promised my mother: "I will try to overcome difficulties, study hard and visit my hometown, visit my family, visit my mother twice a year during Tet and summer vacation. Then when I graduate, I will return to my hometown to work nearby and take care of my parents when they are old." A very true saying in everyday life, which until today, after more than 30 years away from home, I have not been able to fulfill. During the 4 years of university, during the summer and Tet holidays, I always returned to my hometown and home; but since the third year, the burden of making a living has become heavier because my younger siblings are getting older, at school age, and my family is in financial difficulty, so I realized that I had to take care of myself by earning extra money to support my studies. During holidays and Tet, I often look for extra work to earn money, so I rarely return home to visit my mother. Especially when I graduated, holding a university degree in literature, I returned home to apply for a job, hoping to have a job in my hometown so that I could live close to my parents, and then help them when they are old. At that time, because I did not know anyone and had no money, I could not find a job for myself during the three months I was in my hometown. Returning to Da Lat city, I went to university to withdraw my application and was introduced to a government agency by a fellow Binh Thuan native. I got a job, got married and have been living in the city of thousands of flowers until now.

Time passed quietly, with the virtue of a hard-working, studious country person, I quickly integrated, mastered the job and made clear progress each year. My small family was also stable day by day, the children grew up well-behaved, studied hard. Every year, I often spent a little time during my vacations to visit my hometown and my mother. And, the number of times I visited my hometown became less and less over the years because I got older and was afraid of going far away. And my old mother always missed me and waited for me to come back.

This year, September has come, my second child went to Ho Chi Minh City to enroll in school. Seeing my child off to school, my heart was filled with emotion, tears welling up when I had to leave him. With my current state of mind, I miss my mother so much from more than 30 years ago. Although economic conditions are not as difficult as before, when having to leave their children, which parent does not feel heartbroken? Poet To Huu has verses emphasizing the immense, boundless love, pain, sacrifice, and loss of Vietnamese mothers for their children; along with that is the love, respect, gratitude, and affection of soldiers for their mothers, as well as the heart of filial children. He wrote verses that make the hearts of children ache when they think of their parents: "I have traveled through hundreds of mountains and thousands of streams/not as much as the pain that makes my mother's heart ache/I have fought the enemy for ten years/not as much as the hardships of my mother's life when she was sixty". My mother, now nearly 80 years old, the children are grown up and have their own families and my father has been gone for more than 10 years; so every time the children come back for their father's death anniversary, my mother has to go in and out with difficulty to take attendance of each child and grandchild, and always lovingly curses: "Your father's grave - you're all grown up and I can't recognize you". Returning to the place where I live and work after each trip back to my hometown to commemorate my father's death anniversary, visit my mother during the seventh month of Vu Lan, and show filial piety; I often have sleepless nights because I miss my children who study far away; I feel very guilty towards my mother, because I could not fulfill my promise "... to return to my hometown to work nearby and take care of my parents when they are old". Mom! Please forgive me.

Source