I Remember Mama

Seems like my mother has been on my mind a lot lately. Maybe it's because the holiday season is where her talents really shone. She was the first person in her family to achieve a higher education, much less a MFA- and she outdid herself this time of year with dinner parties, decorations, and all that stuff she held so dear.

I remember especially poignantly this year, when I am in the health center, in an 8' X 10' cubicle, dreaming of home. On Christmas Eve, every year, we decorated the tree. Mother and I did, Dad supervised, criticised, and drank wayyy too much eggnog.

The tree held her treasures, hundred -year- old glass ornaments from Germany, and wax- dipped folded-paper creations only a kid could make, and only a Mother could love. I remember being endlessly fascinated by those little lights filled with colored water that bubbled . One year, she invested in a white flocked tree, and decorated it with nothing but huge red velvet bows. Dad and I did not usually agree on such things but that year we presented a united front- it was hideous!

We went to Midnight Mass every year. Before we went, I was allowed to open just one present, my choice. The rest of the loot had to wait, theoretically, until after breakfast on Christmas. but in practice we usually couldn't wait. and opened presents while we were enjoying Mother's 4 alarm chili- cooked all afternoon every Christmas Eve. Back then, When God was a Boy, we had to fast before Mass, so we were pretty hungry by the time we got home from church, being tantalized all day by the odors of cooking chili and stollen (a light coffee-cake-type bread ). That was for breakfast.

I remember my fifth birthday. I was born in January, so I guess all the Holiday magic had not worn off yet. Mother transformed our living room into an Italian restaurant, complete with card tables set up with candles in wine bottles and red - checked oilcloth table cloths. All the guests were served a spaghetti dinner as well as cake and ice-cream. We did not have a perspiring accordionist, but if she could have found one, he would have been there. That kind of attention to details was her genius.

I remember my thirteenth birthday, I met a fellow who became my first teen - age crush, He wowed me by wearing a white dinner jacket to the party. We played a lot of kissing games that night. His first gift to me did not bode well for the relationship, however. He brought me a rattlesnake skin mounted on a piece of fibre glass.

We lasted through the Summer. Then, I bowed to social pressure and broke off with him. He had a reputation for being "wild". In those days, my own reputation was at risk because of his. Wherever you are, honey, we both missed good bets, and I hope you are happy, and still a bit wild.

I remember hearing tales of what a practical joker Mother was. When she was newly married and Dad was at sea, she wrote to tell him she was considering dyeing her hair blond. Dad thundered back that he forbade her to do any such thing! He could not have picked an approach more calculated to get Mother's 'Irish' up. but. he was young too, and from a family where Papa was BOSS. Mother said nothing more about it, but right before the ship was due back in port, she cut the long blond curls off an old doll of mine, and tucked them under a babushka tied over her own hair,just the white-blond wisps peeking out. Then she went down to the pier to meet Dad's ship. I don't know what Dad said when he saw her, but I do know Dad never said 'I forbid you' to Mother ever again!