She Ain't Heavy, She's My Mother (3 page)

“That’s
it?
That’s your big secret? You’re going to wear a tooty-fruity costume and give flowers to complete strangers, and
that
is supposed to be fun? Whoop-de-do! I’d rather clean erasers.”

Stunned and shattered, I could only muster a paltry retort. “Oh yeah … well, I get to miss a whole day of school.”

“That,” she replied, “could be rather groovy.”

“No duh, but you can’t tell anyone. I mean it. Not Miss Fife. Not even your mom.”

She promised, but said that she found the entire affair “rather silly” and “rather unimportant.”

At quite a significantly early age, Leann had modeled her persona after Kay Thompson’s “Eloise.” She had a little pug dog like Eloise, and a turtle like Eloise, and frequently overused the word “rather,” just like the mischievous, bobby-socked heroine of the Plaza Hotel.

Descending the monkey bars, I felt slightly relieved to have finally told someone, but dismayed by her reaction, disappointed that she hadn’t found my news “rather fantastic and rather extraordinary, don’t you know.” However, Leann always spoke her mind and always kept her promise.

Finally the anticipated day, April 23, arrived, and by the time I woke up, Jay was already on the bus to school, Dad had dashed off to work, and Mom was in the painstaking process of “putting on her face,” while Oralea, now cooking breakfast, had come to help with the frantic preparations and organization of the day. She was a diminutive, speedy, and dynamic cocoa-complexioned lady with
a smartly cropped Afro slightly graying at the temples. The early symptoms of osteoporosis had given her a slight hump and a bowing of the head, so that her dancing eyes always appeared to be looking upward, focused to the heavens. She was the most requested caterer at the finest catering company in New Orleans, and she met my parents while arranging the trays of hors d’oeuvres for their engagement party. They took an instant liking to each other, and had gotten along beautifully ever since. No party or special day was complete without Oralea, and when, in years to come, we moved into a big new home of my father’s design, she decided to work for our family full-time. Although my mother was the “lady of the house,” it was Oralea who singlehandedly ran the entire show. I idolized her amazing coiffeuring skills. Throughout the week, her hair would change in length, cut, and color. I didn’t know then that they were wigs; I just thought she was incredible.

She made the best sunny side up eggs, coddled in a pan of butter, alongside creamy cheese grits slathered with even more butter, and thickly sliced salty Virginia fried ham. While I lapped it up, she reminded me of my manners, telling me to slow down, this home isn’t a barn, to use my fork and knife, that they weren’t put there just for decoration, and then coyly declared, “So, little mister, tonight’s parade’s the big affair, you’re going to get all done up and ride that big ol’ float with your Nan-Nan’s girl LeeLee. Honey child, every eye in the whole French Quarter is going to be fixed on you.”

It suddenly occurred to me that while a minuscule part
of me was a tad apprehensive of the approaching parade, the vast majority of my small soul was consumed with the idea of being the focus of hundreds, possibly thousands, of adoring eyes. With a small dollop of cheese grits dripping from my chin and with a big inhale of the fresh balmy morning air, I sighed deeply and said, “Oralea, I just can’t wait, this is the most important day of my life.”

She suddenly burst into peals of hearty laughter, with a cackle that would have silenced a hen house.

“Ooh baby, I declare, what mess have they got you thinking?”

She stopped for a moment, then smiled just long enough to show a glimpse of her big teeth, nestled down next to me in the breakfast room banquette, gently placed her forehead to mine, and whispered, “Listen to Miss Oralea, you live your life right, and almost every day can be the most important day of your life, you hear me, and you can take that advice downtown on the streetcar and deposit it at the Whitney Bank, for true.”

She always had sage life advice that frequently blew right through my ears, but I loved some of her sayings. If someone wasn’t too bright, she’d say, “That child is dumber than a bucket of hair.” If someone would try to pull a fast one on her, she’d say, “Don’t sneeze on my cupcake and tell me it’s frosting.” Or if something struck her as odd or bizarre, she’d say, “’Tain’t natural, it’s like a chicken dating a dog.” Sometimes, though, I just didn’t get it. For instance, if she felt tired, she’d say, “Put tired on top of tired, and get your dancin’ shoes on.”

“Now let’s get cookin’ with gas, Little Lord Fauntleroy,
eat them eggs ’cause we got to get you all hosed down and dressed, then your mama’s taking you with her to the Hair-etage Beauty Salon to get all slicked up for tonight, and take those elbows off the table … Now where did your mama put them little pink roses for her hair?”

With a flash, the room was filled with an asphyxiating blast of Lanvin’s signature fragrance, Arpege, as my frilly-robed mother swirled in. Restraint was not her forte, especially in the use of perfume; more was more, as was also true of my father with Dior’s Eau Savage cologne. It must have been the last remnant of French ancestry in their blood. In the car, the excess of aroma could prove lethal; we had to have my brother’s window rolled down, his round face to the wind like a pup, despite the raging heat or the gas-guzzling Cadillac air-conditioning system, in order to prevent an asthma attack.

She had clearly interrupted her makeup ritual, because I could literally see only one eye and one brow painted on the blank canvas of her bisque-toned base. In one of her manicured hands she held a switch of black hair that matched her own color perfectly, and in the other a pair of white-ruffled pantaloons.

“Lea!” the one-eyed woman exclaimed. “Where did we put the hoop skirt? I thought it was under the bed, but now it’s nowhere to be found, Bryan needs a bath, I look like a Cyclops, and our appointment with Philippe is in less than a half an hour, please Jesus don’t let it rain tonight.”

Panic had obviously set in.

“Now don’t get your liver in a quiver, keep your bees in your basket, and the dogs won’t bite.”

“What?”

“Keep your girdle on, missy. Go and finish up your pretty little face, I’ll bathe the boy and find that hoop before you can eat a biscuit, and as for Philippe, let prissy-man wait. It ain’t like he got any more important hair to do all up today but yours.”

“Dawlin, you’re an angel on earth, I Sewanee you are.” She blew kisses and whisked herself away.

After my quick rinse, as Oralea went out back to the carport to sleuth the missing hoop, and while Mother was affixing eyelashes, a procedure that demanded the utmost concentration, I slyly retrieved the hoop skirt from underneath my bed. It’s strange, I had absolutely no inhibitions or insecurities about playing with the contraption, or wearing it, whether as a skirt or a giant mushroom-like costume. It was a fascinatingly fun new thing that, although linked to the wonderful world of historic feminine lingerie, could be so much more. But in the end, I unquestionably knew better than to enter my parents’ quarters and amuse myself with their personal effects without permission, so I stealthily returned it to its proper place.

From the beginning, my parents made it clear that I could always confide in them. They were my parents and they loved me, no matter what. They were repeatedly tried and tested by both sons, and for the most part, they remained true to their promise. But in this case I remained silent. Later, when it was discovered in its proper dwelling back under my parents’ bed, no one bothered to wonder at this miracle amid the scurry and confusion.

Like the winds of Hurricane Betsy, we were soon racing
southward to the famed beauty salon and antique boutique called Hair-etage, owned by Mr. Philippe. While the ladies waited for their cherished appointments, they could browse and purchase old Staffordshire porcelain figurines, silver Corinthian-column candlesticks, Louis XV crystal chandeliers, or, when seated under the streamlined, state-of-the-art hair dryers, they could experience the comfort of a newly upholstered and puffed-up bergère or a Queen Anne wingbacked chair. The only drawback to this mecca of beauty and art was the presence of a precocious boy dragged by his mother to witness and partake in an afternoon of hair-washing, combing, setting, teasing, and shellacking.

“Now, doodlebug, when we arrive, please put on your best manners and behave like a good little gentleman, sit next to me and don’t run around the salon like a wild Indian. Mr. Philippe’s store is filled to the gills with very expensive things that we don’t want to break and have to buy and make Daddy very angry, do we?”

“I promise to be good. Can we go to the Camellia Grill on the way home?”

“If you wait patiently while I get my hair done, and sit still while Mr. Philippe cuts and styles yours, we will go to the Grill for hamburgers and chocolate freezes.”

She should have known that even the tempting bribe of Camellia’s was not sufficient to ensure my complete cooperation; nothing on earth could be incentive enough to constrain my bull-in-the-china-shop reputation. These were the days prior to the mass dispensing of Ritalin. I know for a fact that as an infant, tiny shots of bourbon
were mixed into my bedtime bottle, so I would not have blamed my parents if they had attempted to further medicate me. In retrospect, I was a super ball of energy, a Tasmanian devil on speed, and my boundless antics often elicited my mother’s highest curse: “Judas priest, son, can you sit still for a cotton-pickin’ minute, is that at all possible? I Sewanee, you and your brother are driving me to distraction!”

Sometimes I thought that it might have helped release some of her mounting frustration and stress if she could just cry out the occasional
fuck, shit
, or
piss
, which I had mastered so effortlessly. Now I know that vulgar language is a nasty addiction for anyone, especially a preschooler, but I’m not completely to blame. Since my birth, I had repeatedly overheard alarmingly florid vocalization flowing from my father after his third J&B scotch on the rocks. He was a handsome, thunderous, imposing, manly man. Sentimental, he drank J&B scotch in honor of his two sons, Jay and Bryan, and by the ripe age of three, I had mastered gutter vocabulary. I didn’t understand the meaning of these words, but I fully grasped their dramatic impact on others, especially my big brother. He would frequently wrestle me beneath his husky frame and tickle me mercilessly until I’d expel a litany of expletives.

“Shit, fuck, piss … shit, fuck, piss … damn it to hell … biiiiiitch!!!”

When this would happen, Mother would explain that even though Daddy sometimes spoke like that, it was not proper language for a polite young boy.

When she was a little girl, she never heard language
like that. Her father, who had unfortunately gone to his reward long before I was born, on no account ever raised his voice, much less cussed. Never. Ever. Ever. “You must do as I say, doodlebug, and not as he does. Learn to control your mind, your tongue, and various other parts of your anatomy, and you’ll grow up to be a fine young gentleman, like your papa,” she reminded me. Those conversations never did much to curb my cussing, and I still think the occasional expletive would have done my mother good. But it’s possible her rosebud of a mouth was simply not capable of forming, much less verbalizing, the necessary sequence of consonants and vowels. Besides, if she did use such language, there probably wouldn’t be enough concealer to hide the cracks.

S
OON OUR BEIGE
station wagon screeched into the manicured parking area of the Hair-etage’s sky-blue Victorian cottage. The scent of Confederate jasmine that enveloped every balustrade of the filigreed wrought-iron entrance stairway, coupled with the potted gardenia topiaries, topped by my mother’s overpowering perfume, made the air dizzying, and I was forced to hold her hand not just for parental assurance, but for sheer physical support.

Upon entry, Mother was escorted away by salon minions to be shampooed, conditioned, and rinsed while I was fawned over, patted on the head, and seated in an armchair that was obviously a reproduction, along with many
Highlights, Vogue
, and
Modern Salon
magazines. All of these were entertaining, but soon I felt the instinctual
desire to explore, and later was discovered with perm rods up my nose, imitating the walruses we had recently witnessed in the Audubon Zoo. Unlike the respective floral and spice smells of my mother and father’s toiletries, I preferred the strident chemical smells of perm solution, turpentine, or, better yet, the pungent and exotic aroma of gasoline. When confronted with a look that seemed to say,
Silly monkey, what are you into now?
I had no response but to pull the perm rods out of my nostrils and stammer, “Mom, you look beautiful.” To which the room of ladies collectively released an adoring sigh, all except the shampoo wench, Miss Amber, who had just about had it with my antics all afternoon. Mom did look stunning, though, even if she was my mom. Her raven hair was piled high, the swirls punctuated with baby pink sweetheart roses, and cascading down the left side of her neck was a cluster of sausage curls. It was the perfect marriage of antebellum and Vidal Sassoon. As she was seated to have her makeup retouched for the evening, Mr. Philippe swaggered in and made a musky appearance in the doorway. He was the model on which Warren Beatty must have based his character for
Shampoo
. He stood six foot two, with longish shaggy brown tresses, piercing blue eyes, tight, bell-bottomed, lace-up-crotched suede jeans, and open-shirted hairy chest. He was the antithesis of every woman’s husband in the room. They all secretly lusted for him. He knew it, and worked it. After circling around me at least three or four times, messing and tossing my bangs, his deep voice rasped, “So this is Mr. Bryan. How are you, little man? Fab hair.” He stopped dead in his tracks and
started to shake his mane. “Oh, Gayle baby, I can’t do it, please don’t make me, I can’t cut it, you’ve just got to let it grow, grow, grow. If he were mine, this thick hair would graze his shoulder at the least.” He bent down and fixed me with a knowing stare. “You’d dig that, little man, wouldn’t you?”