I grew up living with my mother, and sometimes my father when he
wasn’t underneath the ocean in a submarine. I wasn’t the only
child at home, but it often felt that way, and not just when I
would lock my sister in the basement, either—my mom was good at
making me feel like the best pumpkin in the patch.
My mom was a working mom. She scrubbed the floors and washed our
clothes and sometimes even finished my science projects for me.
I don’t remember her ever just sitting around. If she wasn’t in
the house, she was at the blood drive or the elementary school
or outside crying because she had just put another dent in the
car. Our car had lots of dents.
She was a woman who wore lots of different faces. I called them
“looks,” and I knew all of them. Being the kind of kid that I
was, this was a handy thing to know—especially if her look
involved my rear end and her left hand.
When the kids were gone and Mom’s house was empty, she got
herself a “real” job in town. Although it was a respectable
place of employment, I never had any desire to visit her there
while she was on duty. One day, though, I had to. It wasn’t what
she did that bothered me; rather, it was that look on her
face—the one that I knew I would have to see when they brought
me in. My mother ran the ER desk of the local hospital.
She saw lots of things every day—the kind of things that would
land on the counter and make a mess. Things like blood and
throw-up and tears. She was good at her job because she was a
strong woman. Even I knew that. She had beat up Billy Whitehead
for me in the fourth grade; he was a bully. My mom was tough and
could take a lot, except when it came to children. Then she
acted like every little one carried through those mechanical
doors was hers. I had even seen her tell great big blubbering
men to sit their butts back down and grow up, if they complained
about having to wait. Mom was no one to mess with—I remember
what she used to do with those thermometers.
I tried to put on a smile for her that day, as I slid down the
wall of the emergency room, desperately fighting the effects of
shock. My pale white appearance couldn’t lie to her, though—the
concern in her eyes told me that. Though the injuries to my hand
were not that severe, I still wondered as the world around me
began to darken.
My mom isn’t that much different from anybody else’s mother,
although I’d like to say that she is. I’d like to say that she
is the best mother in the world, but then where would that put
my wife? Married guys hate this dilemma, because even broaching
the subject means only one of two things—sleeping on the couch
or going into one of those little “card shops.” Ugh.
As I grow older I notice that my wife has those same looks that
my mom does, and it scares me. I thought I had seen every look
that there was to be seen, at least once. I have a mother, I
have a wife, and for extra torture in my life God saw to it that
I have a thirteen-year-old daughter whose face is ALWAYS twisted
into some kind of look or another. Of course, I am wrong about
knowing all of the looks, but I’m ALWAYS wrong, and old and fat
and bald—just ask my daughter. Or don’t ask her; she’ll tell you
anyway.
I know looks better than most folks, and I’m pretty good at
calming down tense situations. I’d even say that I am an expert.
If a woman is sad, I can do a little cheering-up magic, or, at
the very least, just make her mad enough to want to kick me.
Face it: I’m blessed. But the problem with being an expert is
that sooner or later you’ll get humbled.
There is a certain look on a mother’s face that a child will
never see, and I’m glad for it. I saw it for the first time the
other day at a funeral, and it nearly broke my heart. Children
see all the looks that a mother has to offer, except one—the one
they wear when you die before they do.
I could find no words to speak to this woman, nor could my eyes
find the courage to stay off of the ground. I wasn’t alone in
the shadow of cowardice, which told me that she was. And though
there were others who have shared her experience, she would
remain alone. Time would heal—that’s what the preacher said—but
nothing would be the same. Everyone knows that.
As I consider my own fragile relationship with my mother, it is
clear to me that this distance will ultimately separate us. Who
of us, I wonder, will cross this void first? Never will I hold
the look that the woman at the funeral bore, for I know nothing
of the bond a mother feels between herself and her child, only
that which a child feels for his mother. Is the look that a
child carries different from what I have seen? I do not know and
do not wish to. Denial lends but weak hands where reality lives,
yet softens its bitter edges none the less.
Do I prepare myself for this face to come? Will being prepared
enable me to avoid another slide down a wall into the black?
Perhaps, but I fear that this embrace may take me further into
the darkness that I hope to avoid.
If I listen to my heart, I know that there is but one path in
this life. The path is of the present, where I know my mother to
be, and I will walk with her as far as the trail leads. Anything
else would be a lie—or perhaps a sin—if I did not appreciate
what life has given me: my mother.