My mother’s castle
Mom and I went to Mandina’s today after a few weeks of not getting together for our Saturday ritual. She hadn’t been there in ages and she was thrilled to be going after our efforts to go to Parkway were thwarted by them being closed. When we walked in two very elderly ladies were seated in the bench by the door, one of them asked mom if she wanted to sit down. Later mom said she was glad the woman didn’t say, “Do you NEED to sit down.”
Mom had a photo of herself that was taken twenty years ago after she had been out partying all night and had come home at 5 AM. She looked terrific and she said more than anything, she missed that neck.
We talked for the first time in total honesty about how symbiotic she is with my sister. And I told her she had the power to thwart that negative downward spiral especially since she believes she foresees my sister’s next moves. I dared her to go with me once a month to a nursing home and read to the residents, maybe the newspaper, maybe InStyle, maybe their horoscopes, but just to engage and in return be making a contribution. She took me on, but time will see if this has carry through.
Meanwhile the woman who moved in temporarily across from her, who asked her to give her stuff like sheets and anything else she might want to give away is now moving to Marrero. Thank god. Not that mom wouldn’t give her anything, but she has a tendency to be a sucker – in a good way, a big heart sucker who has a soft spot for the downtrodden – but a sucker in a bad way in the sense that she doesn’t recognize herself in that picture.
There was a guy working at Mandina’s who is a friend of a guy I went out with just over a year ago. I asked mom if she thought he was gay, and she looked and looked and then she said, uh huh. One move she said told her. I said well a friend of mine was convinced the guy I went out with is gay and that was what was “missing” and then we saw these two together one night. I said, “And last I saw my date he was sporting not one, but two pierced ears.” Mom said, “Zero to sixty.”
I said, “Whatyagonnado?”