Chai Hung Yin is a sometimes bubbly, lately swollen colleague who is about to burst in the most dramatic - and delightful - way.

How apt then that, with baby akan datang, she helms our parenting page (at least until she pops in November). How proper that she delivers, today, news that Singapore's babies are being born bigger.

As Hung Yin waddles Daisy Duck-like about the newsroom, we share her excitement at being on the cusp of a great adventure.

But mostly, we envy her the bonus of paid maternity leave after the deed.

Her pregnant state also leaves us men to ponder about that special creature, without whom the human race would cease to exist.

Everyone who is anyone has been known to have a mother, including, allegedly, Hitler, Osama bin Laden, Muammar Gaddafi and the US Republican party.

Her sheer hold over everything we consider important can be seen in the fact that Nature, that most powerful, unpredictable, sometimes benevolent, sometimes inexplicably violent force, has "Mother" prefixed to her moniker.

The traits are remarkably similar.

As with Mother Nature, mothers have their moods. (And Mother Nature's current mood can best be described as malevolent, given global warming and the extreme vagaries of the weather that the world is experiencing today.)

As with Mother Teresa, mothers are largely saintly, self-sacrificing, kind and gentle. And, as with Whistler's Mother, every mother is a work of art.

That perfectly describes, too, a woman of the 40s who, as a mother, continues to inspire a man who is today in his 50s.

Tan Swee Neo is long gone. But she lives on in the memory of her son for her delicate demeanour, her tenacity in striving to survive despite odds stacked against a single mother in pre-independence Singapore, and her tenderness in the love and care of her children.

Today is not Mother's Day. This is being written because a large portion of your newspaper is about mums - mums who are popping bigger babies (Page 36) and new-age mums who party, play and choose to be pals with their teenage children (Page 6).

Madam Tan Swee Neo would be aghast.

Back then, emotion was understated and love never uttered. Love was conveyed in deed. The man who was a kid then suspected he was loved simply because he lived it, felt it and misses it still.

She'd been a strong single mum, raising four children on the salary of a clerk, on the resolve of her generation and on the back of self-sacrifice.

She was a pioneer of the independent, driven working mum at a time when a woman's role was expected to be exclusively maternal.

Yet she had none of the self-pity and extravagant expectations of today's working woman.

She was handyman, driver, provider. And even in the most trying of times, when pay cheques were unpredictable and food was scarce, she never once lost her optimism.

Her son, a reckless, Woodstock-worshipping wastrel, would severely stretch her patience. Yet, not once did she resort to the rod.

Her intuitive strategy was emotional blackmail. Often, for example, she would return from wedding dinners bearing, for her son, peanuts wrapped in paper napkins.

It was a routine borne of thrift, motivated by love, and fondly remembered every time complimentary peanuts are served at pubs or restaurants.

The punk was not worthy. That punk is now a dad whose teenage son's only memory of granny was that of a once-proud woman dazed and robbed of recollection, ravaged by Alzheimer's in the months before her death.

That punk wants his son to appreciate the enormity of his granny's legacy, to know of Tan Swee Neo, my pal, my saviour, my mother.

This article was first published in The New Paper.