Motherhood, The Second OldestProfession (13 page)

“Do I Have to Use My Own Money?”

When the history of guilt is written, parents who refuse their children money will be right up there in the Top

Ten.

When do you give it to them? And when do you stop? I read somewhere that you should set up an allowance system to instill in your children the basics of self-esteem.

I paid my kids to close their eyes, blow their noses, breathe in and out, clean out their cages, pick up their towels, keep their feet on the floor, and, one New Year's Day, when my head was very sensitive to sound, I offered one of them a blank check if he would stop smacking his lips.

By the time the kids hit puberty, they were filthy rich. The reason they were filthy rich is that they never spent their own money on anything.

Somehow I never got over the feeling of knowing he had $2,500 in his savings account and I got a paper doily basket with three black jelly beans for Mother's Day.

It was always “sticky” as to what they were financially responsible for.

Take the area code 602 with a 1 in front of it mv son once dated. I mean, a 1-602 wasn't across a whole country from 602, but it was far enough away to run our phone bill up to $35 a month in long-distance charges.

It was a marriage made by Ma Bell between two people who shared such insights as:

“What are you doing?”

“Nothing. What are you doing?”

“I don't want to interrupt you if you're doing something.”

“I told you I wasn't doing anything.”

“You sure?”

“I'm sure.”

“So, what are you doing?”

We never had to worry about the physical part of the relationship because they were never off the phone. He would set his alarm to call her in the morning. At night I would go into his room and remove the phone from his ear as he slept. It was like hanging up an umbilical cord. As soon as they left each other after school in the afternoon, he would shout, “I'll call you when I get home.” I offered to feed him intravenously.

One day I approached him with the phone bill and suggested he pay for it with his own money. He smiled and said, “You think this is just some infatuation, don't you? You don't realize this is a person I genuinely care for and want to spend the rest of my life with. She's important to me and very special. There isn't anything I wouldn't do for her.”

“I'm glad to hear you say that,” I said, “because according to this bill you owe us $84.10 in long-distance telephone charges.”

He never talked to her or saw her again.

All parents set their own goals as to when the Open Purse policy ends with their children.

Ours ended the day we knew in our hearts that our son's savings account was the only thing between us and welfare benefits.

We made a speech: “We know you won't understand this now, but someday you will. We no longer want to deprive you of the poverty you so richly deserve. The Happy Days Are Here Again Bank of Prosperity is closed! Money is not related to love. It's only a shallow substitute. What you really need is a ton of self-respect.”

He sat there for a while in silence. Finally he said, “Do I have to buy it with my own money?”

We smiled. “It's the only way you can buy it.”

The Spirit of Christmas... and Other Expenses

Every year, one of my children wants a game for Christmas. It is always one for which the demand exceeds the supply by about 355,000.

Every kid in town has it on his list.

The game is touted on television, beginning in June, with the approach that if it is not under your tree on Christmas Day you are an unfit parent and your child will grow up to rob convenience stores wearing pantyhose over his face.

By September, your child has built up to such a pitch that if he doesn't get this game, he may give up breathing. He assures you it is the only game he wants. Now the pressure is on you to find that game. For the purpose of avoiding a lawsuit, I will call the game Humiliation, fun for the entire family, order no. 170555354, batteries not included.

By October, every store in your area is sold out of Humiliation, with no hope of getting a new order in. But the television teasers go on, showing a typical American family with Mom, Dad, and 2.5 children sitting around a table playing Humiliation until they pass out from joy.

Forget baking fruitcake, buying a Christmas tree, entertaining with wassail, caroling, sending out Christmas cards, or decorating the house. Every morning as soon as the alarm goes off, your feet touch the floor and you give the battle cry, “Find Humiliation today!”

By mid-November, you have driven 1,800 miles in search of the game, following tips from friends that a discount house in the northern part of the state has two left, or a toy dealer has one under the counter that is damaged but negotiable.

Several times you are tempted to get a game that is a rip-off of Humiliation, like Mortify or Family Conceit, but you know in your heart it wouldn't be the same.

If you're lucky(?), just before Christmas you race a little old grandmother to the counter and snatch the last Humiliation game on F2arth from her fingers, buy batteries and put it under the tree.

On Christmas night, while you're picking up all the paper, ribbon, and warranties, your eyes fall on Humiliation, still in the box, the $49.95 price tag shining like a beacon.

The kids are playing with a cardboard box and snapping the air pockets of plastic packing material. Humiliation had its minute and now it's gone.

Why do we do it?

How are we manipulated into buying toys we cannot afford and are interesting for a matter of minutes? Several reasons: For one, parents are basically insecure and have to buy affection, and second, we are cursed with short memories.

We refuse to stop and reflect on toys past that have been discarded.

Like the horse. Remember him? He was brown and sucked up eighty gallons of water a day through his face. He was a lot of fun and lived with us for three years, Every time the farrier came to shoe him, it cost $45. No one wanted to pick the manure out of his feet because it was “gross.” He attracted flies and disliked the sensation of anything on his back. He was ridden twelve times.

Or the ping-pong table. It was a big table that held books, coats, dirty laundry, lunch bags, stuff that had to go to the cleaner, and stacks of old newspapers. You couldn't see the TV over it, and it eventually went to the garage, where it warped.

From Christmas past came a full set of leather-bound, gilt-edged encyclopedias containing 3,000 illustrations. These were supposed to bring a new level of culture to the family, and I recollect were used twice: first to point out pictures of Eve, who was naked in Volume V, and second, to hold open the door when the new sofa was delivered.

I recall the plastic inflatable swimming pool that was to bring the whole family closer together. It was officially dedicated on the morning of July 5 and officially closed on the evening of July 5, when it was noted that a small boy in the neighborhood had drunk five glasses of grape drink and had not left the pool in twelve hours.

The ice hockey sticks were biggies and are still in the closet awaiting the arrival of the Canadian Salvation Army. They fell from favor when it was discovered they did not have training wheels on them and worked only when someone stood upright on ice skates.

I try to be a good mother, a loving mother, a considerate mother, who wants to see her children happy.

That's too bad. Shallow and unfeeling is a lot cheaper.

What kind of a mother would...

tell her children if they didn't come home for Christmas, she'd be dead by New Year's?

Mary

The four of them had been poring over the luncheon menu for fifteen minutes in total silence.

It was a waiting game to see who would ask the question first. Iris broke the ice. “Is anyone going to have the popovers?”

The question was ludicrous. Does Zsa Zsa Gabor refuse a proposal of marriage? No one in their right mind would come to Neiman Marcus's tea room in Atlanta and not order popovers.

“I don't know,” mused Mary. “I'm cutting back, but maybe I'll have one just to be sociable.”

The waitress shifted to the other foot. “You want your usual two baskets?” Everyone nodded.

How long had they been coming here? Twice a year for the last twelve or fifteen years? They gathered every June 3 on Jefferson Davis's birthday and January 10 lo commemorate the birth of Robert E. Lee.

A lot had happened in those fifteen years. Their roots had gone from black to gray and back to black again. Their children had gone from home to husbands and come home again. Their husbands from office to retirement to home, and their cars from station wagons with bad clutches to coupes with bad clutches.

“Another round of sherry from the bar?” asked the waitress.

“Why not?” said Charlotte. “After all, this is a festive occasion.”

“Has anyone heard about Evelyn Rawleigh?” asked Iris.

“What happened?” asked Bebe.

“Well, she went through a series of the most awful allergy tests ever, only to discover she's allergic to ultra-suede.”

They gasped as a quartet.

“I'd get a second opinion,” said Bebe.

“How tragic,” said Charlotte. “Is there nothing they can do for her?”

“Nothing,” sighed Iris. “And the worst of it is she won't leave the house. She thinks everyone is looking at her.”

The waitress returned with the sherry and Bebe made the toast, “To Robert E. Lee, who won the war. So, did everyone have a good Christmas?”

“I know Iris did,” said Charlotte. “As usual, your Christmas Newsletter was inspired!”

God, how they all hated those Newsletters. Iris should have made The New York Times best-seller list for fiction. Who»else had kids who were toilet trained at seven months, guest conductor for the Atlanta Symphony at six, and sent thank-you notes in French? Their family picture on the letter made the Osmond family look depressed. Was it their imagination, or did their teeth get straighter every year?

“Well, I had the best Christmas ever,” volunteered Bebe. “Dede had us all over at her house. What a dear she is! I couldn't love her more if she were my own daughter. What about you, Mary? Any of your children come home?”

Home! Jeff had sent her a plastic salad spinner that you put your lettuce into to twirl all the water out. He called on Christmas Eve from Vail, where he'd gone with his family to unwind. How tightly wound could a thirty-four-year-old salesman of after-shave lotion get?

Jennifer had sent her an expensive executive organizer handbag with eighty-three compartments for the woman on the go. The only problem was she wasn't going anywhere.

Robin had been the biggest disappointment. She had sent salt and pepper shakers shaped like unicorns and a note that said, “These remind me of you and Dad. I love you. Robin.”

The group was waiting for her answer. “You know how busy they are, but as usual they were too extravagant. Imagine designer chocolates when I told them I was counting calories.”

Bebe summoned the waitress and ordered another round of sherry. Then, turning to Charlotte, she asked, “So how does Walter like retirement?”

Charlotte forced herself to smile. She had married Walter for better or for worse, but not for lunch. From the day he retired he had taken over her kitchen like a carpet-bagger. The first week he was home she entered her kitchen and asked, “What do you think you are doing?”

He said, “If God permits me to live long enough, I am going to clean your exhaust fan. If I had run my office like you run your kitchen, Charlotte, we'd have starved to death years ago.”

So Walter had alphabetized her spices and she drank to “festive” occasions, which in recent months had included National Foot Health Week, the dedication of a sewage plant, and the day she got her fur out of storage.

“I never knew retirement could be so wonderful,” she said and whispered to the waitress, “Bring the bottle.”

“Is everyone as bored with TV as I am?” asked Iris. “I mean, you can't turn on a show anymore without all those disgusting people kissing with their mouths open.”

“They're all doing it,” said Bebe. “Even Carol Burnett.”

“By the way, Iris,” said Mary, “how's your daughter?”

Iris winced. At thirty-two, Constance had racked up two marriages, two meaningful relationships, one child, and a state of bankruptcy. On the Christmas Newsletter, this was translated as “Connie is in St. Louis working on a novel.”

Charlotte nearly knocked over a glass of wine, catching it just in time. She put her finger to her lips, signaling secrecy. “Don't tell Walter. Did I tell you the other day he met me at the door and shouted, 'You have exactly three hours to do something with this yeast before the date on it expires'? I told him to take that yeast and ...”

“Popovers, anyone?” asked Iris.

“You think you got problems,” said Bebe. “That Yankee daughter-in-law of mine doesn't even trust me to diaper the baby. She said things have changed. The plumbing looked the same to me.”

Mary spoke slowly and deliberately. “Do you ever get the feeling that none of this happened? That we put in thirty years of our lives and have nothing to show7 for it?”

“I love my children,” said Iris defensively. “Even the ones who are shacking up.”

“Mine never really knew me,” Mary mumbled, as if talking to herself. “I never let them. I couldn't. I had to set the example. I had to make sure they saw only the best. I never cried in front of them. I never laughed when I wasn't supposed to. In all those years they never saw me without hair spray. What do you think of that?”

“That's wonderful,” said Iris.

“That's lousy,” said Mary. “Do you know what a unicorn is? It's a mys . . . mystical . . . weird animal with a horse's body and a horn on top that everyone needlepoints. Sort of aloof and unreal. There's nothing there to love. That's how Robin sees me. A unicorn. I was never real.”

“What are we supposed to do with the rest of our lives?” mused Charlotte. “One minute there weren't enough hours in the day to do all I had to do. And the next thing I know I'm dressing all the naked dolls that belonged to my daughter and arranging them on the bed. Did you ever iron a bra for a two-inch bust? We're too young to pack it in and too old to compete for our own turf.”

“Would we have done things differently if we had known then what we know now?” asked Charlotte.

For a full minute no one spoke.

“I'd have talked less and listened more,” said Bebe.

“I'd have eaten more ice cream and less cottage cheese,”

said Charlotte.

“I'd never have bought anything that had to be ironed or was on sale,” said Iris. “How about you, Mary?”

“I'd have been more human . . . and less unicorn.” Mary filled her wine glass and made a toast. “10 the sainted mother of Robert E. Lee, who on this day gave birth to a legend. What do you want to bet that for Christmas she got a plastic salad spinner?”