Mother Break the Plate
My mother told me this story of her when she was buying ceramic plates in one of the department store here in our place. This was the time when our family was very unstable financially that a centavo of our Philippine peso counts.
One day, my mother earn about 60 pesos from selling a certain good. I forgot what it is. This was around 1990’s and 60pesos is not that much. She was happy to earn even if it is just a small amount, and that she decided to buy ceramic plates.
My mother is very fond of buying things even until now. Well, maybe because she have not enjoyed it when she was young because after graduating valedictorian in Elementary school, she worked to support her younger siblings to finish their schooling. Although she was second to the oldest, the responsibility of supporting their family was given to her because their oldest sister married very young.
Back to the story, my mother went to a department store to buy the ceramic plates. She have chosen a good quality that each one cost around 30pesos each and therefore she could ONLY buy two (2) pieces. So she tried to check for the quality of the plates. She was very focus on the checking the quality of the plates that she have not noticed that the top of the CLOSED carton box where she had put the plate that she had just finished checking is not CLOSED and is empty. When she had set aside the first plate she had chosen on top of that carton box, the top of the box opened and the plate slipped down straight to the floor and broke into two (2) ppeices. With the little amount of money and an expensive plate that is broken, my mother was very frustrated. She planned to buy the plates to reward herself but only to end up like this, who won’t get frustrated. With this feeling that had build up in an instant, she grabbed the two (2) pieces of the broken plate and held each piece on each hand. With all the force from the built emotion of frustration and dismayed, throws each piece on the floor. And those two broken (2) pieces were broken into hundred smaller pieces, even more, and ended up scattered throughout the floor. Having heard the crashing sound produced by the converted kinetic energy of the inelastic collision of the pieces of the plate to the floor, sales ladies of that department store rushed to the scene. My mother looked at them and said, “I will pay for it.” And my mother went to the cashier right away and paid the two (2) plates. One plate in very good condition and the other one broken into the hundred pieces of frustration.
Cost of one plate in good condition: 30pesos.
Cost of one plate broken into smaller pieces of frustration: priceless.
