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carose59No Matter How Old A Mother Is, She Watches Her Middle-Aged Children For Signs Of Improvement.*
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I was at work, and my mother called to ask me who I got my new central air conditioner from three years ago. Her a/c had stopped working. I gave her the name and number, and reminded her of how quickly they got my new a/c in, and how easy the payments were.
After we hung up, I grabbed my purse and told Angie (who's in charge when Jeanne's not there) that I was running home for a little while.
I have a couple of those tower-type fans that actually cool the air somewhat, and I got the big one and took it to my mother's. She was very pleased by this, and thanked me. Then she said, "I want you to go in the basement and pick your clothes up off the floor." (My clothes are on her floor because it's where I do my laundry, and I have too many clothes.) Then she added, "And while you're down there, get rid of the dead bug, and sweep up the dirt. Oh, and empty the trash can." And she handed me a trash bag.
I said, "This is all about the bug, isn't it?" She has water bugs, and they freak her out. Getting rid of a dead one takes several days of preparation. (When it's a live one, she puts a glass over it and scoots it out of the way until it either dies or she's able to cope with it. Coping consists of sliding a piece of cardboard under the glass to trap it, then throwing the bug and cardboard out in the yard.)
She didn't say anything, but she did laugh.
I went down to the basement and took care of things, then I went back to work.
The a/c guy was supposed to come between one and three, but he didn't get there until about five. (This wasn't bad service; they called her several times to keep her updated about a job that was taking longer than expected, and where he was.) Before he got there, my mother called and asked how I'd like pizza for dinner. Translation: I want pizza and I want you to order it. (I hate ordering pizza. When Pat was alive, she had to order the pizza, and I would go to the door to pay for it.) I thought that with the heat the way it was, she might like something cooler, like chicken salad from Subway, but she didn't sound enthusiastic. So I ordered us pizzas.
I was just about to take hers over to her when the phone rang—the a/c guy was there and she wanted me to come over.
So she's eating pizza while I'm waiting for the guy to come back from looking at the a/c. It ended up being a small thing, a hundred thirty-something dollars.
My mother asked him to look at the furnace—which has problems I can't begin to explain because nobody understands them. Let's just say my father had something to do with them and leave it at that. The guy came back upstairs looking completely baffled. He gave her a quote on a new furnace and a/c, and we said goodbye. She'll probably end up replacing them both in the fall, when she won't need either of them for a while.
We were talking about this, and my mother was eating her pizza. "This is comfort food," she told me. "This is what I needed." Sometimes I forget how much alike we are.
On the subject of food, she's been reading various books about women moving to Italy. This year instead of the Appalachian Trail, she's doing Italy. She bought herself a DVD about the food in various parts of Italy, and we watched it a couple of Saturdays ago (and laughed all the way through it). She told me about how my father's best friend—who's Italian-American—made ravioli one time for them. My mother grew up in a German neighborhood with an Irish father, so what little she knew about ravioli was that it was filled with meat. Only Bob's ravioli had spinach in it, which was a somewhat unpleasant surprise. (She didn't say anything, though.)
On the DVD they kept showing people making ravioli, and they were all putting spinach in them, and we were heckling them for this.
Today she told me how my aunt—whose family is Polish—used to make something like ravioli, only it had mashed potatoes inside instead of meat. "Well, that's better than spinach," I said, and she laughed. "I mean, it's not meat, but still."
*Florida Scott-Maxwell
-:- -:- -:- -:-
I was at work, and my mother called to ask me who I got my new central air conditioner from three years ago. Her a/c had stopped working. I gave her the name and number, and reminded her of how quickly they got my new a/c in, and how easy the payments were.
After we hung up, I grabbed my purse and told Angie (who's in charge when Jeanne's not there) that I was running home for a little while.
I have a couple of those tower-type fans that actually cool the air somewhat, and I got the big one and took it to my mother's. She was very pleased by this, and thanked me. Then she said, "I want you to go in the basement and pick your clothes up off the floor." (My clothes are on her floor because it's where I do my laundry, and I have too many clothes.) Then she added, "And while you're down there, get rid of the dead bug, and sweep up the dirt. Oh, and empty the trash can." And she handed me a trash bag.
I said, "This is all about the bug, isn't it?" She has water bugs, and they freak her out. Getting rid of a dead one takes several days of preparation. (When it's a live one, she puts a glass over it and scoots it out of the way until it either dies or she's able to cope with it. Coping consists of sliding a piece of cardboard under the glass to trap it, then throwing the bug and cardboard out in the yard.)
She didn't say anything, but she did laugh.
I went down to the basement and took care of things, then I went back to work.
The a/c guy was supposed to come between one and three, but he didn't get there until about five. (This wasn't bad service; they called her several times to keep her updated about a job that was taking longer than expected, and where he was.) Before he got there, my mother called and asked how I'd like pizza for dinner. Translation: I want pizza and I want you to order it. (I hate ordering pizza. When Pat was alive, she had to order the pizza, and I would go to the door to pay for it.) I thought that with the heat the way it was, she might like something cooler, like chicken salad from Subway, but she didn't sound enthusiastic. So I ordered us pizzas.
I was just about to take hers over to her when the phone rang—the a/c guy was there and she wanted me to come over.
So she's eating pizza while I'm waiting for the guy to come back from looking at the a/c. It ended up being a small thing, a hundred thirty-something dollars.
My mother asked him to look at the furnace—which has problems I can't begin to explain because nobody understands them. Let's just say my father had something to do with them and leave it at that. The guy came back upstairs looking completely baffled. He gave her a quote on a new furnace and a/c, and we said goodbye. She'll probably end up replacing them both in the fall, when she won't need either of them for a while.
We were talking about this, and my mother was eating her pizza. "This is comfort food," she told me. "This is what I needed." Sometimes I forget how much alike we are.
On the subject of food, she's been reading various books about women moving to Italy. This year instead of the Appalachian Trail, she's doing Italy. She bought herself a DVD about the food in various parts of Italy, and we watched it a couple of Saturdays ago (and laughed all the way through it). She told me about how my father's best friend—who's Italian-American—made ravioli one time for them. My mother grew up in a German neighborhood with an Irish father, so what little she knew about ravioli was that it was filled with meat. Only Bob's ravioli had spinach in it, which was a somewhat unpleasant surprise. (She didn't say anything, though.)
On the DVD they kept showing people making ravioli, and they were all putting spinach in them, and we were heckling them for this.
Today she told me how my aunt—whose family is Polish—used to make something like ravioli, only it had mashed potatoes inside instead of meat. "Well, that's better than spinach," I said, and she laughed. "I mean, it's not meat, but still."
*Florida Scott-Maxwell