Letter to My Son , livre ebook

Marshall Cavendish International - Felix Cheong

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109 pages

English

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Every boy goes through several rites of passage as he grows up to become a man. He learns from siblings, peers, teachers and other adults. But perhaps no one has as much influence over him as his parents. This is not surprising as they look after their son from a young age and build bonds of trust and love. In this collection edited by award-winning author Felix Cheong, parents (both fathers and mothers) write letters to their sons about the different roles they will go through as son, brother, husband and father. Here are life lessons about etiquette, manners, school life, courtship, marriage, work, responsibilities and everything else you can think of in-between. These mini-essays will show you, through the eyes of writers from all walks of life, the trial and trails of bringing up boys. Contributors include: P N Balji, Nizam Ismail, Darren Soh, Clement Mesenas, Kenny Chan, Olivier Castaignede, Mark Laudi, Anitha Devi Pillai, Lester Kok, Dinesh Rai, Gilbert Koh, Roland Koh, Christopher Ng, Vicky Chong, Sanjay C Kuttan, Chris Henson, Bernard Harrison, Lee Ee Wurn and Anthony Goh.

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Publié par	Marshall Cavendish International
Date de parution	14 octobre 2020
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9789814928328
Langue	English
Poids de l'ouvrage	29 Mo

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Text individual contributors as credited in each work
2020 Marshall Cavendish International (Asia) Private Limited
Published in 2020 by Marshall Cavendish Editions
An imprint of Marshall Cavendish International

All rights reserved
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner. Requests for permission should be addressed to the Publisher, Marshall Cavendish International (Asia) Private Limited, 1 New Industrial Road, Singapore 536196. Tel: (65) 6213 9300 E-mail: genref@sg.marshallcavendish.com Website: www.marshallcavendish.com/genref
The publisher makes no representation or warranties with respect to the contents of this book, and specifically disclaims any implied warranties or merchantability or fitness for any particular purpose, and shall in no event be liable for any loss of profit or any other commercial damage, including but not limited to special, incidental, consequential, or other damages.
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National Library Board, Singapore Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
Names: Cheong, Felix, editor.
Title: Letter to my son : words of wisdom, advice and lessons on life from parents / edited by Felix Cheong.
Description: Singapore : Marshall Cavendish Editions, 2020.
Identifiers: OCN 1184758487 | e-ISBN 978 981 4928 32 8
Subjects: LCSH: Fathers-Correspondence. | Mothers-Correspondence. | Parent and child. | Men-Conduct of life.
Classification: DDC 306.8742-dc23
Printed in Singapore
Cover design by Adithi Khandadai
This book is dedicated to all parents, in the hope that these shared experiences will inspire and shape your own parenting journey.
Contents
Foreword
F ELIX C HEONG
To Be, Is To Believe
D INESH R AI
Hey Son
C HRIS H ENSON
For My Son, Christian
D ARREN S OH
Wheatfield With Scarecrow (or how to study your way to success)
O LIVIER A HMAD C ASTAIGN DE
Tips For Lining Up The Ball In The Greatest Game Of All
M ARK L AUDI
Lessons I Learned From My Son
A NITHA D EVI P ILLAI
Mastering Yourself: Lessons From A Car-Crazy, Martial Arts Fanatic Dad
L ESTER K OK
The Man In My Family
P N B ALJI
Life Lessons From Kindergarten (or not)
N IZAM I SMAIL
Catching Up On Lost Time
C LEMENT M ESENAS
My Dear Sean, At 31 Years Of Age
B ERNARD H ARRISON
Stay Crazy, Stay Weird But Don t Let The Sergeant See
K ENNY C HAN
Life At Work, And Beyond
G ILBERT K OH
Letter To My Best Buddy
R OLAND K OH
Lessons In Career Management: Why We Have Always Been Working For Ourselves
C HRISTOPHER N G
Marriage Lessons
V ICKY C HONG
Living In Love And Life
A NTHONY G OH
How To Take Care Of Your Wife
D ANIEL Y AP
Absence
F ONG H OE F ANG
From A Simple Heart
S ANJAY C K UTTAN
Foreword
Felix Cheong
What cannot be said sometimes has to be written down.
On paper, emotions can be contained, measured within margins, fed line by line to the reader. That discomfort of saying exactly what you mean, without the hedge of filler words, is quarantined, for a time at least, between periods.
You can re-read the words, relish the will it had taken to bring them to pen, and remember them fondly afterwards.
That was what I felt-and still do-when I first read my father s final words. I could not have known then, in mid-December last year, that those little notes he had scribbled in bed would be something of a letter to my three brothers and me.
Two days into his admission for pneumonia at Changi General Hospital, Dad was robbed of his voice. His breathing was laboured; the oxygen level in his lungs had dropped dangerously to 60 per cent, a critical beat away from collapse. He had to resort to writing notes to communicate with the ward staff and me.
By the end of his fifth day at the high dependency ward, he passed away. I had visited him that afternoon; his ward doctor had told me Dad was getting better and was, in fact, planning to transfer him to the general ward. But it was not to be. Talk about a false dawn.
As with men of his generation, reticence was the better part of his valour. Although Dad had, on occasion, told us he loved us, he had never written down anything that could pass as life lessons, his manual on how best to lead your life. I recall he had written me a few aerogram letters when I was living in Brisbane between 2001 and 2002. But the content was all reportage, with little insight on the cards that life had dealt him and how he played them.
Dad s last scribbles did, however, contain some lessons-or so I would like to believe. Although his handwriting, which I used to admire for its cursive flourishes, was unsteady and staccato-like, I could still discern between the lines what he was trying to put across.
In two instances on separate days-written on the reverse side of recycled paper-he referred to God. He and Mum were staunch Catholics. Mum was in the same hospital at the same time with pneumonia and died three weeks after Dad.
I will go in peace the Lord, one note said. Another note said: I am old if God will I will (indecipherable). (The word looks like have but in this context, does not quite make sense.)
In essence, if I could percolate a lesson from these words: Put your life in the hands of God. If it is His will, He will lead you down His way. That philosophy gels with what I know of Dad: Trust that what the Lord hath giveth, He will know when it is time to taketh.
In two instances, he talked about Mum. In one note, he wrote: Mum might be discharge 2/3 days. How to tell her. She cried every day. Please look after her.
Another note said: Don t Mother. Don t Mother nothing serious. From the context, it is clear the missing word here is tell .
(Following Dad s wishes and a mini-conference among ourselves, we kept the news of his hospitalisation from Mum, lest she be so distraught that it affected her recovery. We merely told her he was down with a bad cough at home. Our strategy backfired when he died without the two of them seeing each other again. Mum would lament this all the way to her death. After all, they were married for 57 years.)
Here, I am guessing what his parting (or departing) shot was: Do not let your loved ones know the bad news, especially when they might not be in a state to receive it.
I am not sure if necessity should be the mother of invention of half-truths. Given my hindsight now that keeping the news from Mum had not made her any better but, in fact, might have weakened her emotionally, I would have let them meet, many times over, in their last days.
A few notes Dad dashed off had to do with money. First, he revealed the PIN for his ATM card. Then, in two instances, he referred specifically to our Indonesian domestic helper, Arini. Arini is running short of money. 300 for her, said one note. Another said: Give 100 for Arini expenses.
And the last, a request that could perhaps double up as a lesson about life: Please look after the family finances.
As head of the household, even right to his last breath, Dad was naturally worried about money. As I am now, as all of us with families are. What strikes me is also how concerned he was with taking care of Arini, making sure she was still paid on time and had enough money for her meals while shuttling back and forth between his ward and Mum s.
His lesson, if I could glean it as such: Take care of those who take care of you.
And finally, the one note that still tears me up: I love four of you very deeply.
No indecipherable squiggle, no missing words, no ambiguity. Seven words in a simple sentence compressing a father s love of a lifetime, hours before his death.
***
Letter to My Son is an anthology that follows in the literary tradition of fathers penning letters to their sons. Letters that are rich in detail of why we do what we do, how do we get out of a tight spot and what we could have done to make things right, or perhaps better, in the hope that our sons do not make the same mistake.
Instead of a lengthy sermon or an I-told-you-so story, these letters are an opportunity for our invited writers to muse on their philosophy, after a lifetime of being knocked and schooled by life. (Whether our sons take heed of these lessons-or take to their heels-is another anthology for another day.)
Our 20 writers come from a diverse field, from a lawyer to an editor, from an academic to a photographer. But they are all converged here for the same purpose, to light the same bonfire, as it were: Bring their experiences to bear in heartfelt letters to their sons.
And the advice they offer run the gamut of human experience: From dealing with studies to living with being different, from National Service to mid-career change, from finding the one to managing finances.
I wish my father had written me such a letter in my younger days.
You will also notice I have invited two mothers to the conversation-Vicky Chong and Anitha Devi Pillai. This is not a thumbing-of-nose at patriarchy, or any misguided sense of tokenism.
I wanted the mothers perspective to play off against the fathers . Through juxtaposition, we become wiser for being privy to another perspective.
Perhaps after reading this anthology, you might, too, be inspired to put pen to paper-or fingers on the keyboard, if old-fashioned writing is not your thing-and begin your own letter to your son.
It is never too late to start.

FELIX