delusion

writers workshop for 5/9: one word prompt: Mom. i think i am quite possibly the only person i know that is really in no way fucked up with mommy issues. my mom is ever patient, encouraging, kind and gentle, fiercely strong, independent and intelligent, successful and feminine, weak and human, she never pretended that she knew everything yet we were never afraid that she didnt have all the answers. Even as very young children we were allowed to question, she never sufficed to say because I said so. We were never spoiled yet we never wanted for a thing. We were not rich but if you asked me as a child I would have thought we were. She has four children yet each of us knew, and still know that we are secretly her favorite. she is a Stanford graduate, a prominent professional. She slides across the kitchen floor in her socks and sings silly songs that irritate me first thing in the morning. Her children are all grown yet she still whispers when she tells dirty jokes. She can afford a hotel room, but when she comes to see me, she sleeps in a sleeping bag on my floor in my one room apartment, eats pizza off paper plates and still acts like she is on the greatest vacation ever. she is ivy league educated, hard working and well respected, she could be rich beyond reason. She chose to go to mexico to teach, to learn the language and the culture. now she is the principal of an elementary school in an LA neighborhood most people take freeways to avoid. . Growing up, weekend trips to the movie theatre or bowling alley or rollerskating at the park usually included a fifth kid, a stranger with brown skin and a story that pricked her eyes with tears at its horror (his mom abuses him/dad got shot last week/brother is dying of aids). She couldnt enjoy a Saturday of luxury knowing somewhere there was a child who would never know the simple naked delight of rollerskating fasterfaster, wind blowing hair over eyes and seeing your silly mom in a red faced hysterical pile after she tangles her skates up and falls. At the time I never imagined the absurdity- seeing your silly principal in not-business-suit jeans in a red faced hysterical pile, skinned knees and breathless after falling off her rollerskates. These things were not are not absurd to her. She has an endless store of tears often released for stories about work, AT&T commercials and romantic movies. When I was diagnosed with cancer, I never saw her shed one tear. She had her Sunday afternoon scrubbing toilets face, slight frown, yes this is unpleasant but after its taken care of we will have a picnic at the beach, ok?. She got into the hospital bed with me, gingerly, arranging all my tubes and fixing my hair. She smashed her face against mine with an intimacy mothers & daughters lose (yes, even us) when daughters are not babies anymore. She knew the morphine drip betrayed my normally intense sense of humility. She shooed away nurses, sat me in a plastic chair in the hospitals shower and bathed me, tubes and staples and all. she lied to me. every time I half awoke and she was still there, months of sitting on the foot of my bed, I would say mom im okay, go home, go back to work. there was always a half day at school or else a meeting ended early. She can spend hours online comparing prices, planning trips to places she cant afford to go, will never see. Summer always held one vacation, camping because hotels are too expensive. She wasted months obsessing on one charming lake in Canada. It was her screensaver picture, she reserved a jet ski 6 months in advance online. July came, I asked are you excited mom? Your trip is in a few weeks right? She didnt look up, vaguely murmured affirmation, mmhmm. A little sister, still too young to understand the intricacies of lying, counters I thought we werent going anymore mom? Didnt you say you used all your vacation days when Julie was sick? she would hate the words im typing now, too showy, sappy. She has never wanted tribute, recognition. It defeats the very nature of sacrifice. She listens to eminem in her car. She bought herself a dashboard confessional cd & she sings the words. Loudly. She calls me at night and whispers into her cellphone, confides in me like a girlfriend, talking shit about my stepdad when he bugs her, without the faade of maturity. Sometimes life and passing days trap me & I forget to call or return calls for days or weeks. One message is enough and all she says is miss you, hope youre not too swamped, call me when things die down never guilt, never reminders. But I remember. Weekend mornings with pancakes shaped like mickey mouse heads, she cooked, washed dishes, we ate, watched cartoons, she took one pancake folded in half & ate it with her hands while she vacuumed. She didnt sit, didnt watch cartoons. She always understood why we needed brand name Keds (because you tell when theyre fake, Mom, they dont have the little blue tag on the back and thats EMBARRASSING) but her pumps are all from Payless and her best dresses are all leftover bridesmaids frocks from years ago friends weddings.
I always thought, as children do, that some day, after the unseen mysteries of life and living had been unfurled, that I would be like my mom. That I would shake loose the hard fragments of selfishness and vanity, do away with anger, desire and lazy resentment that grow out of responsibility and being underappreciated. 23 years I hopefully, then vaguely then skeptically held this hope. Some late nights now, I sit and write or study or read and the blank noises of silence scream awareness of the home shaped hole in my house. I crave the t.v. noises and the sister voices and brother sounds of metal skateboard trucks grinding concrete in the front yard, but mostly the rhythmic click-clack-click of mom high heels and girlish mom shout dinners on. I feel a stab of shame somewhere deeper than it is comfortable to feel anything. Most nights the sister conversations and homework frustrations and brothers tackling the dog while pretending to be the crocodile hunter and yelling shes a beaut! Crickey! would distract us and she would yell dinners on! over and over while we ignored her or idly called coming! when we really werent. then after dad and an odd sibling or two had begun eating we would invariably go to the kitchen only to complain about what she had cooked. Now I realize, I will never be like my mother. I am too lazy, too self involved. Anyway,.ya right like someone read this far but Appreciate your momma today you selfish cunt..