I got off the phone with her chuckling, having assured her this would never happen, and left to have one too many glasses of cabernet at a friend’s house. Now, half a day later, I have determined, in typical contrarian fashion, that I am going to immediately blog about my Mother.
My mom is someone who runs to get her binoculars and Audobon birding guide when she sees a flash of color in the backyard. She loves blaring opera through the entire house on Sunday mornings, has an excessive sweet tooth (it takes a special kind of woman to put away a box of marrons glacees), and adds “pooh-pooh” to the name of animals she is fond of (e.g. our cat Rosie despite likely having an acute personality disorder making her entirely unpleasant unless you catch her in the 20 second period before she thinks you’re going to give her milk is referred to as Rosie Pooh Pooh). She has a PhD and an MBA and earned the latter in her forties. I can’t laud her professional achievements without sacrificing her anonymity but as Joe Biden might say, she’s a “big fucking deal.” She kayaks and skis like a pro. She dapples for amusement in hard science - taking action such as both reading The Fabric of the Cosmos and studying the ingredients of cosmetics and toiletry products to determine their exact composition based on her biochemical engineering background with equal enjoyment. On any given evening you’ll find on her night table, a translation of Tolstoy, Keith Richards autobiography (with little hearts scrawled everywhere and a "Mick or Keithe?" pros and cons list), Twilight (“just to see how it ends”), Mad Men dvds cases, and the New York Review of Books.
In other words, my mom’s interests are varied and her accomplishments impressive. To my mind, this constant exploration and curiosity, this enthusiasm, these efforts to rationally consider and understand an event or process, this drive towards perpetual self-improvement and intellectual growth are things to be emulated.
When I picture her at my age, I conjure a swirling image based on stories and references that have been shared with me, the figure of my Mom (but with long hair), a mythic tanned amazon, adroitly sailing a small yacht across the tempestuous Atlantic while stopping briefly to protest nuclear energy, challenge chauvinism, and eat chicken livers at her grandmother’s. I see that sea-faring captain of olde in the way she leads our family vacations – at the helm of a day spent searching for a pre-historic dolmen, rumored to exist, down a poorly marked maze of trails, tucked somewhere amongst tall grass and disgruntled cows into a farmer’s dusty plot, with only an anicent weathered map to guide us, eventually necessitating a stop for a swig of coffee from the family’s 20 year old plastic ikea mug, un petit gateau to prevent a malaise, and a contented, sweaty sigh, as we pause to gaze at the landscape and feel the way Cezanne probably felt as he emerged from the bush, toting his cumbersome canvas, to discover the perfect sunlight caressing rocky hilltops.
When I picture myself at her age, I want what she’s achieved. I want to be able to know how to make the sort of choices she has, be the feminist she is, give the advice she does, and be the friend, daughter, sister, and wife that she has been. Most of all, I want that drive. When we were younger and I lived at home, I used to hear her reciting Russian sentences and lessons from old school books from her bedroom. She would close the door and practice diligently for an hour or so. I’m pretty sure she hasn’t been to Russia since the 1970s and that there is no trip planned.
I can’t imagine how difficult being a mother is. It’s pretty crazy to look through old photos and see myself as a little girl sitting on my mother’s lap or clinging to her hand while walking somewhere and to realize the sheer level of dependence and physical need that was there. It must be both exhausting and tremendous.
It’s undeniable that my mom has and continues to provide that exhausting, tremendous love, protection, support, and literal and figurative handholding to cross busy intersections. Certainly, whenever something interesting, moving, difficult, confusing, happens, I want to share it with her immediately and I hate to say it but I realize that she has been right at the end of the day a shocking number of times. Perhaps though what I value the most was what she taught me by example about being a stand-alone, curious, person, about what it means to be passionate and desire learning and achievement in a truly varied sense. I’m happy I never got any bullshit lines about how her most important role in life was being a mother (way to ruin your Oscar acceptance speech Natalie Portman). If my Mom never learned to cook and still burns frozen pizzas, it’s because she was too busy developing a litany of other passions and skills (and conveniently secured a life partner with Julia Child-esque abilities). Instead, to my great benefit, I saw her face light up on an architectural tour in Chicago, noticed all of the Napoleonic period nonfiction she read, witnessed a snorkeling mask and ill-fitting flippers being pulled on and her launching herself off of a boat, experienced all of the day hikes she planned whether in suburban DC or in the rainy finistere, the look on her face as she stepped through a Romanesque church entrance trusted guidebook in hand, the manner in which she thoroughly studied a footnoted synopsis before we attended a shakespeare play so she wouldn’t miss anything, and I heard harsh Russians sounds emanating from her study.
In sum, I saw a Do Right Woman. So, Mom, sorry I know I said I wouldn’t blog about you but I never said you wouldn’t be my blog’s muse…
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