December 8, 2003

• My Mom

  
  

  My relationship with my mother is as complicated as the relationship between any mother and daughter.  We reached our lowest point when she drove to where I was living and working to tell me that I had to stop living the way I was and move back "home" or I wouldn't be her daughter any more.  (I've written about other events that were going on in my life that year here.)   There was a period of about five to six months when Mom didn't call me and if I called home, she would hand the phone to someone else as soon as she heard my voice.  At least she didn't hang up so I didn't lose contact with the rest of my family.  Eventually, a friend of mine called her on my behalf and told her that he was really tired of the way she was acting.  I don't know everything he said to her, but to my amazement, my Mom started speaking to me again.  She refused to ever call my friend by name, preferring instead to ask me how "Doo-Wop" was getting along. 

  
  

  The high point in my relationship with Mom has been over the last couple of years.  I've been in a position to help my mother when she really needed it, and she has made it clear that she appreciates the help and me.  This kind of validation is bittersweet.  I wonder how my life would have been different if my Mom and I had been able to negotiate a more healthy relationship 30 years ago. 

  
  

  When Mom entered her 60's, her attitude about a lot of things began to change. All my life, I've experienced her primarily as angry and unhappy.  But now, she's started buying bright clothes with so many rhinestones that my dad says it looks like she's been shopping Porter Wagoner's yard sale.  (There's a reference that ought to separate the wheat from the chaff in the comments section.  )  She's doing things that she's talked about but never done before.  And she's having fun.

  
  

  Mom and I talked on Saturday and she told me that she'd gotten a "wild hair".  She decided that she wanted to be in the Christmas Parade.  In my little hometown, the Christmas Parade is a HUGE deal.  Churches and civic organizations start months before planning and constructing their floats.  It's no Macy's or Rose Parade, but it's a lot of fun, and people take it seriously.  (There are prizes for floats in different categories as well, so there's a lot of competition.) 

  
  

  Dad being Dad said that if Mom wanted to be in the parade, he'd do what she needed done to get her there.  So he cut a sleigh shape from plywood and bolted it to Mom's golfcart.  She doesn't golf, she uses it to get around her neighborhood.  That's another blog.  Anyway, with packages and stuffed bears piled in the back of the "sleigh," My Mom and my nephew Jordan playing the part of Santa's helpers - all they needed was a reindeer.  So they drafted my other nephew, Jared.  He's five this year. 

  
  

  Jared wore a red blinking nose, and reindeer antlers.  He has one of these little battery powered jeeps.  They decorated it up with tinsel, tied a rope from the Jeep to the golf cart so it looked as though Rudolph had the sleigh in tow, and they were set.  She says that Jared took his job very seriously, looking neither right nor left but straight ahead and with the "pedal to the metal" the whole way.  When she was concerned that he was going to run into the people in front of them, she finally had to apply the brakes to the golf cart to hold him back.  She said his little back tires spun on the pavement the whole time. 

  
  

  Mom didn't win a prize.  But she said that they were the source of the most laughter, photo ops, and "Oh, I WISH I'd thought of that" kind of remarks.  I wish for my mom more and more of these kinds of ideas and spontaneous, fun, events now and for the rest of her life. 

  • 7:37 am
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