La Trace vermillon

Every day of her life, my mother stands before her mirror and marks her forehead with a red streak — the sign of the Indian woman she has become. Forty years ago, she chose to leave for India to devote her life to a human cause. She never truly came back. The void left by her absence fed my child’s imagination, and stories blossomed. Later, I realised I knew nothing about her. In my mind, my mother had become this heroic figure, a model of greatness whose story reached me only in fragments. Today I pursue this woman, avidly. Behind her words on commitment and solidarity, I see emerging not the face of the woman, but that of the mother.