By Steven Roiphe
I’m walking across the park, head down and pissed at the world. It’s hot for March, which makes it worse, because I’m dressed for winter. So I don’t need the coat, but I don’t want to carry it either. Or put it in the bag with Ma’s gifts.
Ma’s been indoors a long time, so she doesn’t know the weather. But she notices things, what I wear, and she always says she likes this coat. Which is why I’ve got it on.
I hear people enjoying themselves, so I lift my head to smile, nod when I feel somebody looking at me. Because why spread a rough mood? I think I’m a principled guy, and one principle I cherish is if you’ve got nothing nice to say, don’t screw up anybody’s day.
Anyway I’m walking, and mostly my attitude stinks.
It’s late afternoon and so there’s lots of kids. They’re playing and I consider stopping awhile, because I like kids. That’s one thing I don’t get in an office building all day, kids. But I steer clear because my attitude—plus I’m not young, early forties like all the perverts—my attitude might upset the parents, babysitters, who are trying to read in peace, or look at their phones, crap like that.
I’m in this mood because I’m going to the hospital. The doctors think Ma might be dying.
***
Nobody’s ever called me Eddie, or Ed even. I mean of course somebody’s called me it, but it never stuck, because I like Edward. (I thought about calling myself Ward once, when I was doing stand-up. But it wasn’t me, big hulking guy. And I would’ve had to bring up a dictionary and do jokes from it.) I’m only saying this because the orderly, a kid from the Bronx I think, Spanish accent. He always says “Hi Ed,” if I pass him getting to Ma’s room, and I don’t like that. That’s why, this particular day, I can’t perk up my mood with Ma.
Since Pop died, Ma’s had a bad attitude of her own when she’s in the hospital. No, that sounds inane. What I mean is she’s had a harder time making the best of it all. Even though she divorced Pop, my sister and I had no idea why, almost seventy and she went and did that. Even though she erased him, and didn’t go see him during his really sick days. Since then hospitals crush her trademark optimism. That’s why the gifts.
So after she looks over the gifts, which aren’t much, a handkerchief is one, the lady said she’d like it, and Ma’s making a big deal over it. After that, we’re both trying:
“So how you feeling, Ma?”
“Not too bad.”
“How’s the food?”
“Better, since I asked for it cooked extra.” She coughs into a Kleenex that sticks from her fist. “I like that coat, good and warm.”
“Thanks. No more pink, the chicken?”
“No more.” Silence, then Ma again. “Can you believe they’d have pink here?”
“Drinking okay, do they say?”
“The water’s good. City water.” She always says this.
“She call today?” We expect certain family to call.
“She’s pretty busy,” Ma says.
“The kids,” I say.
“Yeah, the kids.”
A couple more like that, and my mood’s pounding, and I don’t want to spread it, of all places, here. So I admire a painting of some woods until she says:
“The nurse? The one you spoke to out there.”
“What about her?”
“She’s very nice.”
“She’s on the ball, yeah.” I know what’s coming.
Ma coughs prettily into the Kleenex. “I just wondered if you thought she was nice.”
“Nice, yeah.” I think that nurse is more than just nice.
Now, I’m ugly, okay? I mean, I know this, the lips. Even without the weight, there’s the lips, they might look okay if I had a chin. The lips, with what they nicely call the Roman nose, the aquiline, and then these ears—they’re too big—and then the weight, which is too much. The weight, and I should’ve kept the hair longer in back; now I look like a tall-hair freak, because I let Ma convince me to cut the ponytail. I told the hair lady just cut it off. It was spite I guess, though I knew the tail had to go because it wasn’t like I was doing stand-up anymore. Still, I could’ve left it longer in back. I know all this, and even if a couple relatives, a guy I talk to at work, he told me to maybe see a shrink. I know this, and I haven’t got much problem with it, so let’s leave it there.
Ma, though. She takes pride in her looks, and I know in mine too. And she’s stopped commenting on mine. I mean, now she just says I’m handsome—or no, what she says is, I look nice. Like with the nurse, except that’s about more than looks. She’d never approve of the nurse we’re talking about.
Ma whispers, “That thing, Edward. In her nose.”
I don’t say anything, just nod.
We talk awhile longer and I’ve got to leave, go back to work to finish up, before the subway rush. I kiss her cheek and go.
***
A lot about this situation with Ma, it isn’t like anybody thought it would be.
Sure, with our DNA we can’t expect to escape the Big C. But Ma always did the right things. No smoking (me neither), no drinking, even soda. Gave up real coffee when the doctor told her. She exercised, but moderately, and like me never broke any bones. So everybody swore she’d live healthy into her nineties, become one of those independent older ladies that look like they’re going to snap in two inside the walker. She’d trade the walker for the grocery cart and still push that, maybe hire out chores she can’t handle, but otherwise stay sharp.
This cancer was unfair, I heard that more than once from people. Though Ma herself never said that.
Then there’s what kind of cancer. Anybody she knew only ever talked about breast, ovarian, skin, god forbid pancreatic. The ones you hear nice women, good mothers, talk about.
But liver?
Liver meant one of two things. Two statements, I mean, that everybody who found out would say. One: A question, “She drinks?” Or if we’re lucky, “She used to drink? I’d never have guessed . . .” That’s the ones being nice. And I’d have to tell them, or god forbid Ma would have to if I didn’t get there first, some crap like, “You know it’s an organ like any other, they’ve told us it can happen to anybody,” ad nausea.
Two: Everybody dragging up their lowforms. “Sheila’s ex? He had this,” they’d say. “And that guy who used to teach at the Catholic school, the one everybody thought—him too.” Everybody would say a lowform relative or acquaintance or ex-paperboy who had this kind of cancer, thinking to make Ma feel better.
Worse than lung, this would be, this liver. Worse than testicular, though of course Ma wouldn’t have had that.
***
Another enigma is that I’d be the one taking care of her. Everybody would’ve thought my sister, because Ma and me were still kind of distant since ten years ago, since an argument after my marriage tanked, and Ma spent so much time at my sister’s. (My sister suggested the blond wig, which is now like glued to Ma’s head, not one nurse can get it off her.) But that explained it, in part. My sister’s kids. They were at a loud age, and why should Ma have to deal with that, too?
And then, when it got worse much faster than anybody expected, and her doctor on the Island suggested a specialist in the City, it was decided. All of a sudden I, who’d moved to have a bridge, a tunnel in between. I, Edward, am now geographically desirable.
Don’t get me wrong. I’ve got a special closeness to Ma. To people that knew us as kids, it was always Pop had his daughter and Ma had her son. (Though by the end there, let me tell you, Pop did a number on my sister.)
Take this that I remember, I’ve got a good memory, from childhood. The woman and me washed dishes. We’d be finished dinner, and Pop would take my sister to the living room, to watch the tube. They’d laugh and make a racket, and meanwhile I’m dancing around Ma, asking can I help with the dishes. I’m five, maybe six years old.
Ma would give me this secret smile, which I loved. And we’d stand at the double sink, her with the soap and me with the rinse. I’d smile too, because I know the rinse. I’ve got it to where the moment there’s too many suds, I quick pull the drain and refill my side to just the right level. She never had to tell me. I mean, she’d drilled it into me early on, but after that I’d get it right every time.
So maybe now we’ve got problems, after the argument and all. But the family history is Ma and me just worked. It’s why I tell people, tell myself, I’m the one going to see her so much again.
***
The morning after the park and the pierced nurse, that’s Saturday. And since I have more time I take the bus, which is emptier than usual, a few old people. Then I walk a different way than the park to get to Ma.
I hadn’t intended to go that day, thought I might shop for a few things for my apartment. (Ma had suggested a few.) Have a real day off. But I wasn’t surprised when I woke up late and listened to the message from her I’d kind of slept through:
“Edward, I’m not sure if you’re planning to come today, but I decided I’d check. Not important, hope you’re enjoying your day.”
Loosely translated, this from Ma was like her saying I’m in pain. I’m hurting and I’m afraid, come now or you will miss me. Thing is, Ma never says what she means. I know that, not everybody knows it but I do, and I’m okay with it. Better than I thought I’d be when she came to the City to be sick.
So I gulp a strong coffee and call, tell her I’ll be there by 11:30.
11:20 the elevator opens to her floor at the Cancer Center. I check in with the nurse at the desk, a new guy. (Good, no piercings.) I ask him to page Dr. Singh, then go in a corner with my phone. Stick a finger in one ear and call for my work messages, maybe I’ll get a jump on Monday.
“A very good doctor,” Ma had announced about Singh, soon after he’d taken over from Dr. Feldstein, who she’d never felt required, I guess, to praise. “Though I’m not sure he studied in this country.” Nobody was in the room with us when she said it; she’s lucky a lot of ways, the bed next to her is busted or something. There’s tape across where the curtain should be.
Anyway, I get to her room 11:25, 11:26 and Ma’s sitting up in bed, bearing the wait best she can. Our talk’s more pointed than usual:
“This new pain Ma. It’s where?”
“My back. It starts in my back.”
“They offer you anything for it?”
“Yes.” I almost think she’s not going to continue, but I wait, because I want to know if it’s the same problem again. “It’s an opioid.” Nobody’s nearby, she has basically a private room, the tape. But she whispers this.
Ma’s sworn off opioids, after the newspaper. I’ve been telling the docs, the nurses, please only say morphine, because I don’t think she knows that’s the same thing. Somebody’s mentioned one of the new ones, though, and Ma can’t get past all the spam in her AOL about it. After she says about it being an opioid, she changes the subject:
“Cheryl coming this weekend? The kids?”
“I dunno, Ma. She’s busy. The kids.”
“You could have brought them.”
I let that one go. “What, did Cheryl call you about maybe coming?” Ma’s silent, so I say, “She’ll bring the kids tomorrow, probably.” Still silent, and I’m hoping Dr. Singh shows up, so we have somebody to gang up on.
I hear Singh coming, talking to the nurses, so I tell Ma I’ll be a minute. While Ma pretends to read a menu I slip out into the hall and mention to Singh about the nurse who said the drug. He nods and notes it down, somebody will talk to that nurse, then pulls me further from Ma’s door and says—this is the first time he’s said it, Feldstein never said it, and it feels like I’m on a TV doctor drama—says we’re close now, to the inevitable. It’s not might be dying, anymore.
***
The rest of that visit goes well enough, until the last hour.
I haven’t told Ma what Singh says. Wouldn’t think of telling her until I speak to my sister, and she never answers during the day, even when she’s got minutes. First, it’ll only upset Ma, and when she’s upset she should have her loving family around her, not just her fat divorced son. Second, she’ll say she wants another opinion, like this isn’t our second hospital already. She’ll whisper Dr. Feldstein’s name, hound me until I get the receptionist to roust the poor schmuck from retirement.
So we talk politics a little, leaving out the awful parts, talk about a movie she once saw. No TV, because Ma doesn’t watch, except Yankees games. Then we listen to a game on the radio, which Ma likes best, better than the tube, not the Sox but what can you do. Well, she listens, I don’t, the Yankees are losing to some team while I talk work. I like to talk about work when she’s got a game on. When Cheryl comes in the game’s not over, but Ma won’t mention this. And yes, she’s brought the kids.
I’m getting ready to go—honest I am—and that’s when they come in. Cheryl does that open-door knock people do and then shoots me the usual look, and the kids approach Ma, endure her hug and kiss. (I tell ’em how bad my grandmother was, on my father’s side, with the pinches and squeezes, but still they hate Ma’s prim attentions.) Though they’ve likely seen Ma more recently than they have me, to me they give the silent treatment. Roy, the twelve-year-old, doesn’t even look at me. Essie (ten and a half) does the too-tight hug at least, and I get to hug back. Hopeful, these hugs between Essie and me. But still me, their father, gets not a word.
Yeah, I know. You thought this was my sister, her kids. No, it’s my ex. And that’s why it’s worse. My sister is Rose, she has boys. Cheryl’s the ex. If it had been Rose I could’ve pulled her aside while Ma’s working over my nephews, told her what Singh said, wait while Rose broke it to Ma. Then I could’ve gone home, had my day. But it’s not Rose, it’s Cheryl.
Ma says Cheryl looks nice, the kids look nice, though she hands Roy a Kleenex because he’s picking. The second husband, Marcus, he likes the weight Cheryl’s put on. This is what Cheryl says.
After the preliminaries, Cheryl sits in the corner examining her nails, levering a fleece-covered leg. It’s true, she looks nice. Anyway, the kids, they’re answering Ma’s questions:
“How’s Boy Scouts?”
“Good, Gramma.”
“Are you still swimming with Team Flamingo, dear?”
“They make us wear shower caps, Gramma.”
“What are you playing, Roy sweetie, on that?”
“A game, Gramma.” They have to call her Gramma a lot or she gets upset, because she’s heard about Marcus’s parents, the first-names basis. And it has to be that—not Grandma, not Gram, but Gramma.
“Those shoes fit you, Esther? They look tight.”
“Dad says they’re fine.”
Silence. Because now it’s going to start. Roy’s being nice a minute, but Essie’s given him an in. Roy will wait before asking, “Can I call Dad?” or saying something nice about Marcus, like “Dad’s got two car chargers,” and Ma knows how much I hate that. Hate that they call him that, and they call me—well, they don’t call me anything. I suppose they’d call me Dad too if they had to, but it’s hard to remember them saying much to me.
And that’s not the only reason for the silence. Marcus had taken Ma to task a few weeks ago for her negativity, especially around the kids, which is probably why it’s Saturday and he’s not here. He actually said, “Melissa, try not to be so negative.” When anybody could see Ma was not complaining about anything, while Cheryl’s free to complain. Complain about her work at the charity, how she hates that she has to join the union there, when she knows that when Ma was working Ma loved the union, went to all the meetings.
So Marcus is on the outs, and I can’t help but wonder what Ma’s going to do about it. In the will, I mean.
I break the silence by mentioning the Yankees, which makes Ma antsy, the game’s been close, but gets the kids talking. And keeps Cheryl quiet in the corner, because like me she doesn’t follow sports. I try not to sneak looks at Cheryl, or make eye contact.
Of course, Cheryl beats me out. Every time our visits overlap she does this, gets mad at the kids touching things and says they’ve got to go. Leaving’s pretty much the same, like a tape rewind of when they came in, the kids submitting to Ma’s cheek kisses. They don’t say much to me, no “Bye Dad” or anything, just the kiss on the mouth. I always try to avoid that, the kiss on the mouth. I’ve never thought that was right, Ma neither. Though until the ten years ago argument, Ma was good enough about it. Until the argument, which was (no surprise) at her house, in her kitchen, she’d say it must be their people do it, that I don’t have to. But it’s hard to say no, so we end up, me and Roy and then Essie, brushing lips, and if I don’t wipe my mouth I’ll feel it with Ma after.
They exit, we hear Cheryl’s heels and the kids scuffling down the hall, then the elevator bumps closed and Ma and me can talk. We talk about nothing much for a minute, thirty seconds maybe. Then the commentary.
We talk a few minutes about Cheryl and Marcus, how their house is supposed to be a mess Essie says, how they go out so much and leave the kids with that babysitter Essie says has tattoos. About Cheryl’s weight, Ma says something about the sweatpants she was wearing. Nothing about Marcus specifically, which is good, because I’m not up to it today. And then I can go. I kiss Ma’s cheek and I can go.
Rose—my sister, with the boys—she’s told me more than once. By way of gratitude, I suppose. How Ma’s always saying, “Edward’s been a rock through all this.” Which is just what Ma used to say about Rose, when Rose lived closer. Though as far as I saw, we weren’t through anything, yet.
***
After, on the Saturday afternoon subway, there’s a couple women I’m trying not to ogle. Or compare, which is something I do. Anyway, I realize I’ve left my book at the hospital. I do that a lot, leave, like, books. There’s construction we get stuck in, and me with no smartphone yet. Not our cup of tea, Ma and me, those phones. So I get to thinking.
Like I said, I’ve got a strong memory. For details. When I’ve got time, like on the train there. I used to work with that, for the stand-up. So I start this memory and it’s me, I don’t look half bad, before I took off the ponytail, gave up my dream. I hadn’t been what you’d call handsome, but it worked. Something about the kooky mix of Ma’s fine features and Pop’s solid ones, and then I’m tall; a shrimp with my mug, with the tail, would’ve come off squirrelly.
When we’d argued, which I’m remembering on the train coming back from the hospital, I was like thirty, thirty-one. Full head of hair, a beard I kept nice and trim. (Shaved that off for the promotion Ma wanted.)
Ma and me avoid arguments, and here’s why: emotions. For Ma and me, they’re persona non grata. And it’s none of that macho man, children of immigrants—Ma’s like fourth generation.
If I could’ve kept free, on the subway this day after seeing Cheryl, this day of Singh’s news about Ma, kept free of the emotional crap, I’d have had no reason to remember the argument in her kitchen. But it’s been a long day, what with the kids coming in like that, that always gets me. If Ma had let me have the day off, like I wanted, I might be home free, just like if she hadn’t pushed we could’ve avoided that kitchen argument.
About the kitchen argument. I’m still spending a lot of time with Ma back then, after the split with Cheryl but before the cancer, before Marcus even. That particular week I was doing like high school: running to Ma when the love life turns south. Because I knew (ha! LOL!) there’d be no arguing, because we’d stifle the emotions. Rereading that sounds kind of bad, but the truth was we didn’t need to argue much. Because once I got past adolescence, once I was fully formed, we looked at things so much the same. Like back when we’d done dishes together. It was like a pact, arguments get uncomfortable, and they’re also pretty useless because we think so much alike.
So Ma and I aren’t arguers. But ten years before Singh, at that kitchen argument, the time was ripe.
***
How it started was, I asked the wrong question. Dumb, I know, but I asked her it because I didn’t want to talk about a woman that just dumped me, the only one I managed to hook after Cheryl, so I asked about Cheryl instead. I said: “Ma. Why do you think you never liked Cheryl so much?”
I meant, other than the obvious, which is Cheryl started being rude to her halfway through the marriage. I didn’t have to say that, because we’d been through Cheryl’s behavior. Ma had put it down to hot blood, and we’d left it there. Before the very end of the marriage, they’d pretty much made do.
Ma was taking time answering. She was cooking an omelet, I heard the sizzle and thought maybe I hadn’t spoken loud enough. So I asked again about Cheryl, why she and Ma weren’t close. And this time I added, “I mean, other than the obvious.”
More sizzles, and I shifted my chair to show I really wanted to know. I think I sighed really loud or something. I needed my mind off this other woman.
But Ma’s not answering. Just sizzles.
This omelet. It’s the kind of thing only Ma makes, with real butter. Lots of salt, a couple vegetables here and there. It’s essentially, for Ma, a defense tactic, or maybe I should call it offense. Preemptive strike, I’m thinking, as the subway scrapes forward slow. She figured she’d trick me into abandoning this question, this one she hoped I’d never ask, by larding me up, pouring calories down the gullet of her son, the slob.
So she wasn’t answering, just heaping omelets onto this enormous plate. She knew I’d want seconds, so made two without asking. And then shaved off vegetables for her, a broccoli floret from one, found a mushroom to nibble. She’d shovel omelets into me, and I wouldn’t question her rectitude. She wouldn’t have to answer anything, I’d be like a pig in shit. Satisfied.
I should’ve known. Certain people talk over something—interrupt, I mean—when they don’t want to hear. Not Ma. She’d never interrupt anybody speaking, that wouldn’t be polite. Ma, she clams up, doesn’t answer, and that means she wants you to kill it.
But I was broken up about this other woman. So I asked again. I mean I said, “Ma?” Figuring she can’t ignore her one son completely.
Three asks. Unheard of.
It had been a long time since Ma clammed up this bad, not since I was, like, thirteen. (Lots of silences, puberty.) I was hurting, too, partly because I was worried now. Worried she’s losing her hearing.
She’s scraping the spatula. “It wasn’t easy for me.” When she finally answers, she’s scraping.
“Whaddaya mean?” Though I already knew. Ma’s brow was scrunched.
“What, you thought it might not cause problems?” She put down the spatula. “For anybody other than yourself?”
Now I was really hurting, like physically. I was gutshot, because of her tone. Lots of times after, during, before me and Rose hit puberty even, she’d had this tone. I hadn’t heard it in years. The kind of tone she’d say things like, “You kids’ll find out. I hope your children do this to you.” And like she’d just said with the spatula, this “anybody other than yourself?” It’s like I was eight again, listening to this in her kitchen.
That word I used a minute ago. Rectitude.
I’m remembering this on the subway. How it’s like a fountain burst in Ma, she’s not looking at me, but she’s crying. Going on about all the problems the marriage to Cheryl—and the kids, her own grandkids!—how hard for her, Gramma, driving Black kids around, knowing what everybody’s saying. And I’m putting down my fork, getting ready for I don’t know—I’ll either fight her on this, or leave, just kill it.
I never asked for Ma’s approval to marry Cheryl, or even to date Cheryl. Ma, outside that kitchen argument, Ma’s like a liberal.
And now here she was, with the spatula again. Scraping and scraping that pan she’s had forever, regardless how many I’ve got her since, for Mother’s Day ad nausea. Spouting crap, about how her friends had to console her, and not only because Cheryl isn’t Jewish. No, she’s going on about her friends always saying how wrong Cheryl was for me, maybe we’d split before having kids. And in temple! Ma was sobbing now, and saying how it was in temple all those years. (Two years tops, Roy and Essie only started the High Holidays when Ma was like sixty-five.) Going on about having to stare straight ahead at the rabbi. Having to avoid people, as if she didn’t already.
So I killed it. I always killed it for Ma. I was headed for the door by the time she got to suffering in synagogue, and after that I moved off the Island. My job, the one Ma wanted for me, it’s in the City, so there wasn’t much to explain. We didn’t talk as much after that, definitely not about Cheryl. And I didn’t think about the argument really until this day on the subway, the subway scraping—like that spatula, the noise, so she didn’t have to hear me crying and saying fuck fuck fuck under my breath.
Until this instant. Not back when we argued in her kitchen, the omelets day, I’m not talking about that day because I really did kill that. Killed that argument deader than dirt. Killed it in me too, before it went too far, dead as she wanted it. (Well, maybe not like she wanted, because I didn’t hear her out. She would’ve liked me to stay and agree, I suppose.) I’m talking about now, this instant when the subway’s back to scraping and it’s all coming at me. I’m spending so much time with Ma at the hospital, and Cheryl’s in and out with the kids, and it’s all about the very nice nurses and where everybody studied medicine and crap.
Rectitude. Look it up. It’s in the Constitution. Until this instant, Ma’s rectitude, to me, is pure. Iconic. Mythic. Until this minute on the train her rectitude is unassailable, unquestioned.
***
I always knew Pop was a racist. Chalked it up to the Weiner side, and even worse, the Plotskys—Ava Blattsavitsplotsky, the old bigot herself, my great grandma on the stoop. Chalked it up to the second-generation immigrants, competing with Black people for jobs, for Section 8, for a place on Jones Beach even, to lay down one’s towel.
Impossible this was something Ma shared with that man, Arthur Weiner. Pop and Ma, they’d been like vaudeville, she’s the straight man and he’s the cutup, and it just worked. That’s why everybody covered their mouth in astonishment when Ma split them up like seven years into AARP, when they’d finally started reading the free magazines. Nobody knew, but I suppose we all figured it was that Art Weiner was crude, and she couldn’t stand the crudeness anymore, the voting for Republicans just because they’re white. I mean, Pop got along with Cheryl, hugged his grandkids like they were puppies, but always had a couple crude jokes.
And Ma’s this paragon, with her quiet embraces and kisses on the cheeks. Always on the cheeks.
I’m sick of the subway scraping, so I’m up two stops early, walking in the rain without my coat even. My life is ruined. I mean, what am I supposed to tell my kids? Now they have to worry about jokes from Gramma?
***
The point of all this, omelets, jokes, whatever. The real point is that Ma and me, we were always on a raised plane together. Like Masada, with cliffs all around. Even when Rose was her rock, when I was mostly on the outs, Ma and me stood up there. Dropping boulders on anybody coming up.
And since the subway scraping, I don’t see that anymore. Even when Ma started dying for real, and I’m ashamed about this, I wasn’t seeing Masada anymore.
Since the subway scraping, when I think about what I had with Ma, the woman isn’t even in the picture, it’s that bad. It’s just me now, and I’m standing underneath this cliff, and I realize it’s made of all these little stones. More like a stone pile, a wall-of-stones behemoth, and I’m pushing frantically against the bottom ones (the science doesn’t make any sense), trying to keep the whole mountain from tumbling down.
***
Cheryl says she always knew my mother was a racist, but she couldn’t bear to tell me. Imagine that, she couldn’t tell her husband. But then Rose, too, she never said until after the funeral. About Ma loving her boys more than my kids, because of something stupid and arbitrary. Now Rose brags, says she’d figured it out by herself.
Ma managed to keep it from her own daughter. Her own son.
Anyway, I told Cheryl not to come anymore. I told her I’d bring the kids, then I didn’t bring them. I told Cheryl it was because Ma looked awful, we’d wait until she could get up and shower. And then it was wait until the mortician got to her.
Ma withered to a stick in that hospital, to where they had to sponge-bath her. And she hardly ever complained, and we didn’t argue, but then we’d never argued again after the omelets. There wasn’t any point.
I’ve cried a lot about Ma, though not at the funeral, the grave. It was still too new. But now, whether it’s when the job’s going bad, or if I see a good comedian on cable. Or if it’s just that I’m feeling bad about my weight, or about the hookers.
I always thought, since she was so right about little things, Ma must be right too about the big. I mean, the woman was immaculate. The cleaning lady used to complain, Ma left her zero to do.
But no. Turns out the biggest thing of all, Ma got wrong.