Maternally Challenged

We Do It To Ourselves, Part II

We live in suburbia, in a city which has laws against roaming cats. Nevertheless, like many of our neighbors, we flout the law by letting our cat roam. That is, we used to, until she started coming home with evidence of cat bites, which abcessed, and the vet bills started to look astronomical. The vet said, "She's a hunter, so she'll be miserable indoors. But she's only getting in trouble at night. Let her out  in the daytime and make sure she's in at night." So we did, and that worked for six months or so. Then our cat turns up mysteriously sick again: listless, feverish, growling at all who approach her. I spend several hours at the emergency vet's on Christmas Eve. "Has this cat been in a fight with a cat who's not up to date on its shots?" the vet wants to know. I don't think so, but I call the neighbor who owns one of the two cats I've seen in our yard. (I have no idea who the other cat belongs to) and ask: "Is your cat current on her shots?" The answer is yes.

So far, so good. But then things take a sudden nasty turn. How do you know it's my cat? the neighbor asks. I don't know, I say. All I know is I've seen your cat in my yard, and so has my 10-year-old.

"Oh," my fellow mom says, and there is a new tone in her voice. "This is the same child who sort of watched our cats, and who lost my house key." Yes, it is. My daughter has ADD, which my neighbor knows. My daughter takes medication for it; she sees a therapist; she goes to a monthly support group. She is a great kid. She also has her own pet sitting business, which we have encouraged her in because she loves animals and is diligent about taking care of other people's pets (especially when there is money involved). A year ago, my daughter took the neighbor's (unmarked) house key with her to the movies, where it fell out of her pocket. It's the kind of thing that happens a lot to ADD kids, and, like most ADD kids, my daughter was distraught and angry with herself for being "stupid." We did what we could to make things right, accepted a partial payment for services imperfectly rendered, I talked to my daughter about putting important things in secure places, and then we moved on. Evidently the neighbor has not. "Well," my fellow mom says now, "you go ahead and trust her if you choose to." And then laughs, which is when I feel it: the knife between the shoulder blades. 

A man would not know how to do this. Only a woman would know how to turn a routine question about pet immunizations into an attack on another woman's child. Only a woman would know how to turn something so not personal into something so intimately personal, would know exactly where to stick the knife.  Women know how to do this to each other, and men--for the most part--do not. (Well, maybe Richard Nixon did, but he was deeply weird in so many, many ways.)

If there is to be a Mother's Movement, and I'm not sure there ever will be, this is the kind of thing we have to deal with. Competitive Mothering, I'll call it, for lack of any better name. The "my kids are great and YOUR kids have problems" mindset. It's an echo of the "child-free" movement, in which people say, "Hey, YOU decided to have kids, so YOU deal with 'em"--only this is more subtle. It's a kind of "me first"--or, more precisely, "my kid first"--that excludes kids who are "different" in any way, which is quick to blame the parents (especially mom) for whatever goes wrong, which lashes out defensively at the merest hint of a perceived threat to their well-ordered universe. As it happens, this particular neighbor has two great kids--attractive, intelligent, thoughtful children who get along well with each other. They are a pleasure to have around. Sadly, they won't be around much in the future, because of their mother's attitude toward my daughter.

If there is to be a Mother's Movement, I say again, we not only have to stop snarking on each other, we have to stop snarking on each other's kids. But it won't be happening anytime soon. Not on my street, anyway. And who's to blame? Not the patriarchy. As Walt Kelly once famously observed, "We have met the enemy, and he is us."

Overheard on Christmas Eve

The day before Christmas. Shopping done (exhausting), gifts chosen (after tedious thought), wrapped, hidden.

In the living room, nine-year-old to five-year-old: "Hey! I know! Let's write a letter to Santa telling him what we want for Christmas!"

Thunk. Thunk. Thunk. Sound of mom, beating head against wall.

Text of letter:

"Dear Santa: Suzanne and I have truly tried hard to be good this year. Dad says we deserve it so if we have been bad it is fine if you give us coal because Christmas is about family and love. So if we have been bad it's O.K. but all I want for Christmas is books for the elderly, Polly cruise ship, Tony the walking horse, and to talk to animals and Suzanne wants a Barbie house, a bear maker, an Alison doll and a fur real buttercup horse Mom wants a pink Robotic butt kicker but if we have been bad it's okay so merry Christmas. Rebecca."

Take Me Now, Jesus, I'm Ready to Go

Fans of musical theater will remember the scene in "The Music Man" where con man Prof. Harold Hill, forced at last to produce some music in exchange for all the musical instruments he has conned the citizens of the town into buying, stands at last in front of a group of young men with tubas and cornets and clarinets they've never played in their lives. "Think, men," he implores, "about the Minuet in G." A moment later a sound comes from the band that vaguely resembles the sound a truckload of tubas would make if it were hit by another truckload of tubas--and the parents in the hall are ecstatic. "Play it, honey, play it for Momma!" says one mother, and another screams, "That's my boy!"

Keeping this in mind, I went to my daughter's choral concert/band concert tonight. Now, let me preface this by saying that anytime a person learns an instrument the early effects are nearly always painful to hear. I produced my share of godawful noise learning to play the piano (not well) in my youth, and these days when I sing I sound like Tallulah Bankhead imitating Johnny Cash. Still, throughout my journalistic career, I have always wanted to give a truthful and honest account of one of these kind of events, and tonight I'm gonna do it.

The chorus was okay. This is because the instrument in question is the human voice, which kids have been practicing since the day they were born. They have a natural upper hand over the band.
The band concert was as follows, with my notes in italics:

1. Mozart's Melody (a.k.a. "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star." If a five year old could write this, why can't 10 year olds hit the notes?

2. Beethoven's "Ode to Joy." Mercifully brief.

3. "Jolly Old St. Nick." Wounded walrus.

4. "My Drydel." Wounded walrus with a back beat.

5. "Up on the Housetop" Featured clarinet solo in key entirely unrelated to what the rest of the band was playing.

6,7,8,9: "Lightly Row," "Processional," "Musette," and "Greensleeves." Moderately painful.

10. Something called "Galactic Episode." WTF?

11. "We Wish You a Merry Christmas." OK, with occasional bleat from the woodwinds.

12. "Jingle Bells." A train wreck.

Naturally, they got a standing ovation. We were home by 8:30.

There'll Be Scary Ghost Stories and Tales of the Glories of Christmases Long, Long Ago

Every family has its legends, and mine includes the Flaming Christmas Tree. Here it is:

I grew up in suburban Atlanta, and the year of the Flaming Christmas Tree was about 1964, which would have made me about eight. My Aunt Mabel was visiting us from Gadsden, Alabama. She was a short, stout woman with bejeweled glasses, white hair and tiny feet who arrived at the airport wearing a full-length mink coat and matching mink hat--an outfit which in Atlanta, even in December, could induce heat stroke. But it was mink, goddammit, and that was the important part to Aunt Mabel, who was the kind of person for whom Neiman Marcus (a.k.a. Needless Markup) was created. Aunt Mabel had been married to my dad's Uncle Bud, and, as my mother was fond of saying, "Mabel could throw it out the back window with a teaspoon faster'n Bud could bring it in the front door with a shovel"--the "it" in that sentence being money. Uncle Bud had died not long before this and my dad, concerned Aunt Mabel would be disconsolate and alone, had invited her to spend the holidays with us. So she came, with her mink, and ensconced herself in my sister's room. My sister, who was then 10, was exiled to a sleeping bag on the living room floor.

A couple of days after Christmas, my sister and I noticed the tree was looking kinda dry and puny, so we decided to take it down. It was festooned with all kind of tinsel and popcorn strings and adorned with those big-bulbed lights which you can buy these days for a retro look. Today's bulbs burn cool. These bulbs burned really, really hot. (You can see where this is headed.) My sister decided the first thing to do was to roll up her sleeping bag, and while she did that, I leaned over to unplug the lights behind the tree. Between the two of us, somehow the tree got jostled and started to tip, and from somewhere there was a spark--a loose bulb, perhaps, or a break in the wiring, or just some static electricity. Whatever the cause, the tree suddenly tipped over and, as it did, shot up in a great big spectacular burst of flame.

I screamed and ran out the back porch door, leaving my sister trapped in the living room. My mother screamed and ran for the kitchen phone. Aunt Mabel screamed and ran on her tiny little feet past the living room to my sister's bedroom to rescue her mink.

My father, who was at that moment making use of the very last of the hot water to take a long-awaited shower (we had one bathroom--yup, just one), heard the screaming. He came up the hall, leaving the water running, with a towel draped around his middle and discovered a) four screaming females (one of them--me--outside the front door by this time) and b) a bonfire in the middle of the living room. He did what a man had to do: he grabbed the bottom of the Christmas tree stand (which, being metal, was not on fire), flung open the front door and dragged the flaming tree out into the front yard...losing his towel in the process.

Passing cars slowed perceptibly. I can still imagine the conversations: "Ed, did you see that naked man?" "What man?" "The naked man with the flaming Christmas tree." "Shut up, Lois, the Bulldogs are at third down and ten."

I saw all this from my vantage point in the front yard, where I had run like a chicken fleeing the ax, more than halfway expecting to see my home go up in flames. Instead, I saw my dad drag the tree a safe distance from the house. Then he turned around, picked up his towel, re-draped it, and stalked back into the house down the hall to the bathroom. By then, of course, the last of the hot water was gone.

At the time, I was scared witless, but it wasn't long before the story became hysterically funny: Naked Man Drags Burning Christmas Tree Around Front Yard. It was years before I saw other aspects: the fact that my dad, as Rudyard Kipling would say, kept his head when all about him were losing theirs, that he saved the house and possibly my sister's life. I didn't see the stoic endurance required of a man living in a house with four females and one bathroom who couldn't buy a simple hot shower. I didn't see the pathos of a stout, elderly lady running on her teensy little feet to save the thing that she valued more than anything else--some dead animal skins.

This is a story I plan to pass down to my children, and with it I will attach a few morals. One: we can be called on to exert extraordinary heroism in the most unexpected and humble of circumstances. Two: this heroism may be not only overlooked, but laughed at. Three: mink coats are a ridiculous waste of money. Four: for God's sake water the Christmas tree.

Anyway, if my dad were here, I'd give him a long overdue thanks. And I'd tell him something I never got around to saying in real life: that he always was my hero.

Warning: Incoming Cupcakes

Just when we thought maybe hostilities were winding down in the Mommy Wars, comes this dispatch from the front lines, via today's Washington Post: as schools become more aware of the problem of childhood obesity, they are beginning to institute policies against banning sweets from school--and parents (i.e. moms) are fighting back. It seems nothing is more sacred than the right to take cupcakes to your kid's class on his/her birthday. The Post article, written by Brigid Schulte, notes that "when Texas tried to ban cupcakes in schools last year, the furor was so deafening that legislators passed the 'Safe Cupcake Amendment' to protect the right of parents to tote cupcakes to school. After the vote, one lawmaker remarked, 'We didn't realize how important cupcakes were.'"

Honey, you have no idea. I didn't either, but I'm educated now.

I confess to having taken cupcakes to school for my kids' birthdays, but it was under duress. My oldest daughter has a sweet tooth the size of lower Nevada, and last month as she left for school on her 10th birthday, she said, "You ARE bringing cupcakes today, aren't you, Mom?" This happens every year. Every year, I am shocked into realizing that this is expected of me, and that planning for this event was a thought which has not crossed my desolate brain pan. "Oh, yeah," I said convincingly, thinking, Oh shit. I dutifully went down to the Giant, surveyed the paltry cupcake offerings that day, and opted for orange pumpkin cookies instead. For my stupidity I was punished by the gods of commerce: cupcakes were about $2.50 per half-dozen, but the orange pumpkin cookies were 99 cents each. For the amount I spent on those goddamned cookies I could have baked a cake for every class in the school. What made the whole thing truly farcical is that it's not as if my daughter--or anybody else in her class--is suffering from a sugar deficit in her diet.

But I am, as we say in the South, just eat up with the dumbass when it comes to stuff like cupcakes and Being a Good Mom. Because this is what it's all about--as Schulte noted in her article, kids don't seem to care about cupcakes (my daughter excepted) one-tenth as much as mothers do. For parents (and, again, I sense we are talking here mostly about moms), bringing cupcakes to school is proof that you are a Good Mother. So is volunteering at the school, which I am also eat up with the dumbass about. This isn't about casually mentioning to your child's teacher that you'd be glad to pitch in from time to time; this is competition, baby. I volunteered this year to be Grade Mother for my daughter's kindergarten class. "Sure," the teacher said. I let a day or so go by and by the time we talked again, there were three other Grade Mothers and nothing left for me to do. Ditto with my older daughter, who was in the school play this year. She brought home a form asking us parents what kind of help we could volunteer. I checked off two or three items, sent it back to school, and waited to hear the when's, the where's and the what's. Nada. At the last performance, the director asked the parents who "so selflessly volunteered their time and effort" to stand for applause, and a whole cadre of moms stood up. It was clear from the smiles on their faces that they were in full bore Good Mom mode--and that, once again, I had been consigned to that category known as Slackers.

Which, really, is okay with me. I know that I don't rate with these women, but engaging in this kind of meaningless one-upsmanship is such a waste of time that I can't bring myself to care. What boggles my mind is the fact that women--these mothers--are so imprisoned by cultural expectations that they DO care. What is UP with that? Do they not have any books to read? Any gardens to till? Any immigrant families to help? Anything else to do that does not involve their children? Beats me.

So: the next time the classroom needs cupcakes, or a field trip chaperone, or somebody to man the bake sale table, give me a call. I'm here; I'm usually available, if you give me some notice. But I'm not gonna fight anybody for the privilege; I don't have to prove that I love my children, and if other moms are there plugging in the gaps, that's great. That leaves me time for all the other things on my to-do list. And, as my friend Devra notes, "Parenting is not a competitive sport." So go ahead and run up the score, ladies--I'm sitting this one out.

One Year Ago Today

My mother died one year ago today.

The phone rang at 2 a.m. on December 7, 2005--my sister calling to tell me that Mother was back in the hospital and had been moved to hospice care. I made them put the phone to her ear. "Don't go," I said. "You don't go anywhere until I get there." I know she heard me. I got there at 11 a.m., after frantically navigating the security line at National Airport (and getting "profiled" for my pains). My mother was by then in a coma, having terrific trouble breathing. The last stage of congestive heart failure is not pretty; her heart was working so hard her earlobes vibrated with every pulse. She would hunch her shoulders forward and take in a breath with what looked like all her strength, and then exhale noisily. It was the death rattle I’d always heard about. Once you've heard it, you never forget. It is a hellish sound.

And yet, to me, it was heaven to be there. I was in that cramped room for the next 31 hours, leaving only for brief periods to go down to the cafeteria or talk to someone in the hall. I touched her. I held her hand while I slept. I stroked her face. I talked to her. I sang lullabies to her. I sang her old hymns that I knew she loved. She talked very little, and what little she did say was mostly unintelligible. From time to time she would get noticeably uncomfortable, and I’d tell the nurses, and they’d give her more morphine. “Every 15 minutes, if she needs it that often,” the hospice nurse said. Thank God for hospice. 

My sister and her husband left about 10, at my suggestion. I finally fell into a deep sleep about 1 a.m. When I awoke, it was 4 a.m. and Mother’s eyes were open. Her face was livid and her hands were clutching at the sheets. She did not answer me when I spoke her name. She was looking into the face of something I could not see; I think it was the face of death. I rushed out for the nurse and we gave her more morphine, and after a few minutes she seemed to relax, and then her eyes closed again. I dozed again, and when I woke up it was daybreak—a cold, gray, rainy day, her last day.

Her window looked out onto a parking lot bounded by pine trees; not much to catch the eye there. Otherwise, it was just me, the TV, the newspaper. The mundane took over. I showered and changed clothes and after awhile my sister and brother-in-law came and brought me breakfast, and the day began to pass. Mother’s breathing became even more agonized and slower; by mid-afternoon, she was taking three breaths a minute. And that, of course, is when company came. I was unable to bear the chitchat between my sister and the minister. A woman is dying here!! I wanted to scream. I left the room to call David (my cellphone didn't work except by a window at the end of the hall), but he wasn’t reachable. On the way back to the room, I ran into the hospital chaplain--a woman about my age named Joanne. She was a godsend. I poured everything to her--every family dysfunction, every hurt, every unresolved conflict, and she seemed to have an intuitive grasp of things; I didn’t need to go into detail or explain. Finally she said, “Let’s go back in and ask for a private moment with her," which we did. We unceremoniously evicted everybody and Joanne took my hand and Mother’s hand, and prayed. She told Mother that it was okay for her to go; that my sister would be okay, even though there was unfinished business betwen them; that I was taken care of; that she had fought a long and gallant fight but that it was time to let go. I sobbed, my face on Mother’s chest.

And that gave me some peace, at least. For awhile then Mother and I were alone, and at one point Mother opened her eyes and looked into space and said, “Tracy.” I leaned over her. “I’m here,” I said. “What is that?” she asked, looking at something I could not see, and then immediately closed her eyes. The only other thing I heard her say was, “How far---?" And for that I had no answer.

And then my sister and brother-in-law came back in, and things got mundane for awhile; I turned on “Dr. Phil” and watched it, holding my mother's hand. My brother-in-law did the crossword, and my sister read a book. And then, about 5:30 or so, I asked them to get me some dinner. “It’s too early for us to eat,” my sister said, missing the point as usual, and I said, “Well, it’s not too early for me,” and my brother-in-law got up, glad of a chance for something to do. They left. I busied myself for a few minutes tidying up the room. Then I realized Mother needed more morphine, and while the nurse was there, she said, “Has she been turned lately?” “No,” I said. “Not for about 12 hours. Let’s turn her.” So they had to get another nurse in to do this, and there was a lot of bustle. Mother cried out once as they moved her, and I told them she had to be on her side, that lying on her back made it impossible for her to breathe. So all three of us worked to get her comfortable and then I had to move my sleeping chair to the other side of the bed in that tiny room, so that I could see her face while I slept that night, and all this took time. But finally it was done, and it was just the two of us in the room again. I was about to settle back in my chair when I suddenly noticed Mother’s breathing had changed: instead of long, agonizing breaths, it was coming in short little puffs. I hit the nurse’s button and asked for the chaplain. They said she would come, and then, not quite believing what I was seeing, I threw myself across Mother’s chest and said, “Mommy, are you going? Are you going now? Are you leaving?” She gave three more little puffs, and then I lay my head on her heart, and there was nothing to hear.

I write this without tears, because the tears come at odd moments—while I’m cleaning out the back room, or driving the car. It’s not that I want her back—not in that suffering and disabled body, not for one nanosecond. But still: it's the loss of love that floors me—the unconditional motherlove that was upholding me even when I did not know it, when I was not thinking of her, when I was peeling carrots or writing or riding the MARC train. Now it’s gone—at least gone in the sense that I cannot detect it anymore, I can't call her up and hear that voice on the phone. I am bereft. And will be, for the rest of my life--until the time comes when I have to take leave of my own daughters, and they will face this moment themselves.

When I came back into the room after she died, the gurney from the funeral home was there to take her away. Joanne had her arms around me. “This is the reality,” she said, gravely, holding me up, because I felt my legs weaken and go numb. I went into the room. The hospice nurse had cleaned her up, unhooked all the tubes, washed her, combed her hair, straightened the bedcovers. I marveled at her face. The suffering was gone; the puffiness, the purple blood veins, the jowls, the bulging eyes—all had disappeared. Her eyes were closed, her face peaceful. Her skin was like alabaster; her hair fell away softly from that clear, high forehead. She had always been a beautiful woman--breathtakingly so in her youth--and now, in death, that youthful loveliness had returned for one last brief visit. “So beautiful,” I said, brushing her hair back with my hand. “So beautiful.” And then I kissed her goodbye, and I left.

One year ago today.

 

The Old Fogey is Me

December 1, 2006

Matthew D. Serra, CEO
Foot Locker, Inc.
112 West 34th St.
New York, NY 10120

Mr. Serra,

I was a customer in your Lady Foot Locker store in Westfield Shopping Mall in Annapolis, Maryland two nights ago. While I was waiting for the manager to get some shoes for me to try on, I couldn’t help but hear the store’s soundtrack. This is what I heard, in part:

I told her to drive over in your new whip
Bring some friends you cool with
Imma bring da cool whip
Then I want you to strip
See you is my new chick
So we get our grind on
She be grabbin, callin me Biggie like Shine home …

Fullfilling our every temptation slow jamming having deep sex
You ready for the world girl
Come on over make me touch you all over your body baby don't say no to me
An every moment you controllin' me I'm lovin the way you be holding me when I be
listening to Jodeci
And when I come over and bend your ass You be bumpin Teddy Pendergrass
I'da hit it from the back to the melody to roll it slow
Now I gotta go up in it fast, but imma finish last
(Slow Jamz Lyrics, by Twista)

There’s more, but I think you get the idea. I am no prude, nor am I ignorant of music history; I know Ray Charles used to get banned from the radio for his “dirty” lyrics. But there is a difference between risqué and explicit, sexy and vulgar, suggestive and pornographic.  This couldn’t have been more explicit than if it had been a sound track giving detailed instructions on how to change a tire, and frankly I found it about as sexy as automotive repair. I said to the manager, “I couldn’t bring my 10-year-old in here. This is unreal.” She said the soundtrack was a mix chosen by higher-ups, and that she had no control over it.

Well, somebody is in control of it, and since you’re the guy at the top that would be you. Perhaps teenage boys love this kind of music, and perhaps they are an important part of your clientele—but they can pipe this garbage into their heads with their Ipods on their own time. I cannot imagine that anybody else wants to listen to it. 

The track prior to the one I quoted—and this is the reason I started paying close attention to the soundtrack in the first place--was all about somebody being in prison, and moaning “they won’t let me out.” I have no idea if you are white or black, Mr. Serra, but if this is your way of catering to a black clientele, it’s insulting. I happen to be an authentic Southern Redneck, but if somebody told me Rednecks spent all their time screwing or getting locked up, I’d be pretty offended. The fact that this music is popular with many young black people is testimony only to their tragic lack of self respect. But that’s their problem; I don’t see why you should enable it or cater to it.

Isn’t there a better way of  making money? Like, maybe, just selling quality merchandise?

Sincerely,

Tracy Thompson