Way too late. We’re led to a patio dining area edged by a picket fence and locked down like inmates under rutabaga-striped woven flax napkins. Prisoners of Lunch. We live in drought-ridden California, so the waiter interrogates us about our commitment to hydration before filling our glasses with water. We’re handed menus listing $20 rations of locally grown chard and raw root vegetables. I hunger for Skippy Super Chunk. I hunger for the day before yesterday, when I could have told my friend I had other plans.
I take one try at the conversation I thought we were going to have today:
“How was your trip to Paris?” I ask hopefully.
“WE CANCELLED PARIS!” my friend bursts back.
I knew it.
“WE DECIDED TO HAVE A STAYCATION INSTEAD SO WE COULD ORGANIZE OUR WHOLE HOUSE! I DROPPED THE LAST BAGS OF STUFF OFF AT GOODWILL ON MY WAY HERE!!” she exudes, plucking her iPad from her tidy purse. She clicks play. Not only did she spend her staycation organizing her whole house, but she organized the photos of the organizing. Before and after shots set to soaring victorious music. Liberation of the Linen Closet. Arc de Underwear Drawer. A slide show of the Trip Through Stuff that she and I have been cheering each other on to take the last few years but neither of us could ever stand to start. We’ve pored over “Simplify Your Life!” articles together as if they were exotic travel brochures. Laughed about trying to scale the mountains of belongings we no longer need. Laughed with relief that there was someone else we could count on to never actually do it.
“Look! That’s my kitchen cabinet!” She points at the iPad and exclaims, “My spices are in alphabetical order!” . . . “Look! I redid my whole bathroom!” . . . “And my closet! I got rid of every single thing that doesn’t fit!”
“Wow,” I say. It’s the only word I can get out. I was prepared to feel a twinge of envy when she showed me shots of her wrapped around her sweetie under the Eiffel Tower in the moonlight. I was braced for lovebird selfies on the Seine. This is worse. Abandonment extraordinaire. I want to get rid of everything that doesn’t fit in my closet! I want to travel to the bottom of my bathroom cabinet! . . . I . . .
I take a gulp of my precious California water, then another. And another. Something besides jealousy is stuck in my throat.
My friend taps the pause button long enough to glance up at the waiter who just arrived and deftly order a red quinoa and oak leaf salad with persimmons and cashew ricotta crumbles, pomegranate vinaigrette on the side, warmed buckwheat bun—tapenade, no butter—without even asking me what I’m having. Without rummaging through all the menu choices together like we always do, trying everything on ourselves and each other before we decide to wear the exact same thing in our stomachs and on our hips. Without turning the menu into a Great Big Food Closet like girlfriends do, which is half the fun of lunch. She’s moved on from ritual. Moved on from me.
I glance around the patio. I could still escape, except if I try to leave without finishing my water I’ll be arrested. I grip the menu and order the kale and shaved Brussels sprout special in as defiant a voice as I can muster, pretending that I too have decision-making skills that don’t include the other person at the table. But that other person is too busy showing off her simplified new world to care that I’ve just chosen food without her input.
“Look at my T-shirts!” she exclaims as her slide show and music soar on. “If I hadn’t worn one in six months, it went out!” . . . “I got rid of boots! Can you believe it?! Boots!” . . . “I tossed out old files, greeting cards, pens with no caps, plastic food containers with no lids!” . . . “I feel so FREE! I got rid of all that STUFF! I have so much SPACE!!” . . .
“Wow,” I say again. Her happy pictures hurt my eyes. But why? The lump that isn’t jealousy is still stuck in my throat. What is it? My friend and I have spent hours coaching and counseling each other to get out of ruts. “You have to let go!” we tell each other. “Free yourself from the past so you can move on!” This is exactly what we dreamed of doing. Why aren’t I thrilled for her?
Her slide show zooms dramatically into a shot of the pristine pencil drawer in her kitchen. Six nice fresh pens—with caps!—all pointing the same direction, cute compartments full of untangled paper clips and rubber bands, a fresh roll of tape, two pairs of scissors. It isn’t that she cleaned out a kitchen drawer and I didn’t, I think. Isn’t even that her whole house looks like this and mine doesn’t.
It’s what else I see when I look at her pictures. My mind zooms in like her camera. It goes right through shots of my friend’s perfect kitchen drawer, through images of my own jumbled kitchen drawer . . . to a mental view of the desk drawer in my daughter’s bedroom: broken kindergarten crayons mixed with souvenir pens from college tours, butterfly stickers, tearstained SAT practice quizzes, Professor Snape’s wand, a class photo with all the boys’ faces scribbled out. One drawer in a roomful of drawers full of a thousand goodbyes to my child’s childhood that I know I have to face but am still nowhere near ready to start.
My friend’s slide show has moved on to a slow pan of her tidy linen cabinet. It makes me think of what’s waiting in the overflowing linen cabinet in my parents’ house: “perfectly good” towels from 1955, afghans crocheted by my great-aunt, Dad’s stiff olive-green World War II army blanket, doilies from the village where Mom was born, the chenille bedspread from my grandmother’s house that can with one touch transport my sisters and me back to being five years old. Shelves packed with things too special to use, too precious to give away, that will all have to go somewhere else, sometime in the near future. One cabinet in a houseful of cabinets, in a lifetime of cabinets full of a million goodbyes I can’t stand to think about.
That’s what I see when I watch my friend’s slide show—the giant job ahead. The huge rearrangement that starts with a kitchen drawer and leads to the dismantling of life up until now. Now I know what that lump is that’s still stuck in my throat—it’s What Comes Next.
I take a $3.50 mouthful of the kale that was just delivered, hoping to dull the overwhelmingness of it all. Big mistake. Kale doesn’t dull anything. Chewing all these superfood nutrients to the tune of my friend’s super-healthy ability to streamline her world just makes me hyperaware of every sense. The more antioxidants I swallow, the more ill I feel.
I can’t watch her show anymore. For all my talk about wanting to organize and simplify, I’m not ready to look at the big picture my friend just opened up. The great big closet full of changes, decisions, and goodbyes. The Big Life Closet. I know how to buy trash bags, plastic storage boxes, and cute trays full of little compartments. I know how to turn up dance music on Saturday morning and make in and out piles. But I don’t know how to do what she did—undo a life I’m nowhere ready to have undone.
I don’t want my daughter’s room to ever look like she didn’t grow up in our house. I don’t want to downsize my parents’ big, wonderful lives into a shoebox of special things. I don’t want to face the nice clean empty shelves of the future—drawers without Mom’s scarves in them, closets without Dad’s neckties, a room without twenty stuffed animals on the bed. I know the people I love need me to help escort them to the next stage, and I will do anything for them. But I can’t stand what else that means: that I’ll be helping them disappear. I can’t stand facing the great big pristine blank pages of the calendar ahead when they’re gone, when I’m not needed to help with anything, not necessary for anyone.
Where are the books on this? I want to ask my friend. Where are the cheerful magazine articles on how we’re supposed to sort out all this??
I don’t ask. I’m too afraid she’ll answer with the truth. Will say what we’ve always said to each other: You have to let go! Free yourself from the past so you can move on!
She’s too busy humming along to the grand finale of her presentation to answer questions anyway. “Ta-da!” she sings to the last shot of her bathroom cupboard. “I even got rid of all the half-us
ed shampoos and conditioners!”
She clicks the end of the slide show, beams, and tucks her iPad back in her purse. I squeeze my friend’s hand and tell her how proud I am of her. Kale remains are carefully boxed up to throw out at home. Water glasses are drained and surrendered. The check is split and paid. Dessert menus are rejected.
“No dessert for me!” my triumphant friend says. “I fit into every pair of jeans in my closet!”
“No dessert for me, either!” I announce.
“I may never eat dessert again!” she proclaims.
“Me either!” I echo “I am done with dessert forever!”
I drive home. Open the front door. Eat dessert.
I would have eaten dessert on the way home but for fear that my friend would have, by some horrid coincidence, stopped at the same 7-Eleven and seen me in line with a frozen ice cream sandwich. I’ve had all the girlfriend input I can take for now.
I walk through my house—past the closed door of my daughter’s intact bedroom . . . past pictures of Mom and Dad in front of the home that’s still packed with their lives . . . past all my own cupboards and cabinets full of decisions I’ll make some other time. I change into my sweat suit, toss my lunch outfit on the bed, clip the leash on my dog, and leave the house for a nice long walk without even opening the closet door in my room.
I got a good look in the Big Closet over lunch. I’ve seen enough for one day.
14.
NO COMMENT
No. I do not wish to rate my latest transaction.
No. I will not take your short survey.
No. I will not help improve customer service by commenting on my experience.
No. I will not remember to go online when I get home and share my thoughts.
No. I will not write a few words about how it was to receive or try your product.
No. I will not tell you if I’ll be recommending your product or services to friends.
No. I will not give any hints on what you could do better.
No. I do not want to earn bonus points or even 5 percent off my next purchase by volunteering a few moments of my time to share my views on the last person who assisted me.
I do not have enough moments left on earth. I need all my moments to try to convince someone I already know to accept my opinion on anything. My child rejects my opinion. Other family members argue with my opinion. Friends act as if they need and agree with my opinion, and then go off and do something completely different. Overhaul their whole lives with no input from me whatsoever. Based on my track record thus far, getting someone I know to appreciate my opinion will take all the time I have left. The rest of you are on your own. I am 100 percent finished spending time giving opinions about anything to anyone else.
And that, I think as I get into bed, is exactly how I feel about all of that.
I lay my head down on my pillow and close my eyes. I’m about to scroll down to Sleep when I pause to open the self-survey of how I think I did today in my mind.
I click the little box on the far right: “Extremely Satisfied.”
15.
HELICOPTER DAUGHTER
Don’t climb on that! You’ll fall and break your neck!
Don’t walk with that! You’ll trip and poke your eye out!
Don’t go downstairs without holding the rail! You’ll slip and crack your skull!
Don’t cross the street without holding my hand! You’ll be run over!
Don’t go outside without a jacket! You’ll catch pneumonia!
Don’t wear socks on the wood floor! Your feet will go out from under you!
Don’t touch the hot pan! You’ll scald yourself!
Don’t walk with scissors! You’ll stab yourself!
Don’t take such a big bite! You’ll choke!
Don’t read in the dark! You’ll go blind!
AND DON’T ROLL YOUR EYES! THEY’LL STICK LIKE THAT!
As exhausting as it is to be a helicopter parent, it’s even worse to be a helicopter daughter. Hovering over a stubborn two-year-old was child’s play compared with hovering over two stubborn ninety-year-olds. Like supervising twins. Cherished, challenging Mom and Dad Twins. They’re bad listeners, both of them. They say NO! to everything. My sisters and I make rules to keep them safe, but as soon as we aren’t looking, our parents do whatever they want.
There’s very little my sisters and I can do except worry when we all live far away in different cities. After our last unproductive visit, we talked many times on the phone and finally agreed on one simple solution that’s helped lots of families. We decided to order an emergency alert call system so Mom and Dad could simply press a button on a pendant if help was needed. My sisters and I cried together, so sad that we’d reached this point in life, but grateful there was something we could do. We pledged our love and support of one another, and then hung up and began our own online research from our own homes.
After way too many hours on our own, squinting at way too many options, reviews, and testimonials, trying to guess which “Number One Bestseller!” would actually get help there in time to help Mom and Dad . . . After all that, my formerly unified sisters and I reemerged as rivals. Came back at each other on a long distance conference call as the opposite of how we started: three exasperated experts on emergency alert systems; three advocates for three completely different ones.
Mom would never wear one that looks like the one you picked!
I spend a lot more time with Mom than you do. I think I know what she’ll wear!
Can I help it if I have a job and kids at home and you’re more free to travel?
I’m busier than you are and I make time! I call every day!
Dad’s not going to wear a necklace! I picked a system with a wristband!
It’s a pendant, not a necklace! You always make things worse than they are!
Me?? You’re the one who ruins everything!
Etcetera.
In our quest to keep Mom and Dad safe, we threw one another under the bus. Every ancient sibling grievance relaunched and magnified by the current grief of knowing Mom and Dad are now at this stage of life. The sadness that should unite us mixed with worry and guilt and all the other things that tangle families up . . . until finally the loudest, bossiest, and most obnoxiously self-righteous sister won.
I enjoyed the thrill of victory for five full seconds before I realized winning meant it was now my job to present the Emergency Call Button System to the Twins. Our beloved, belligerent, noncompliant nonagenarian Mom and Dad Twins.
Which is why I’m sitting at their kitchen table in Florida today with a package hidden under my chair. Outnumbered and all alone.
“Come sit at the table, Mom and Dad!” I call cheerfully. “I have a surprise!”
“WE DON’T WANT ANY SURPRISES!” comes the stereo response from the other end of the house. I forgot they’ve gotten a little sensitive about the S word after the series of “Surprise!” home health care interviewees one of my sisters arranged for Mom and Dad to meet.
“It’s not really a surprise!” I try again. “It’s a gift!”
“WE DON’T WANT ANY GIFTS!” they yell back.
Right. I also forgot the G word was ruined with the “Gift!” of a raised toilet seat my other sister wrapped and had under the tree last Christmas . . . also the “Gift!” of a nice new set of bathroom safety bars the three of us tried to give them for their anniversary.
I need backup. I pull out my phone and start to dial, but who? My sisters are mad at me and my dog never answers when I call. I put the phone away and gather all my grown-up resourcefulness, all my finely honed take-charge life skills. I summon all my strength and steely will and funnel it into one loud wail:
“I NEED HELP!”
It would be total manipulation if it weren’t so true. I do need help. I need my parents to help me take cha
rge of my parents. I hear them drop their guard, just as they’ve always dropped everything to rush to my sisters’ or my aid. As though I’d been stung by a bee just now, not stung by the frustration of trying to be a mom and dad to Mom and Dad.
Dad scurries the length of the house without shoes, socks, knee braces, or his cane. Mom hurries down the hall in slippery slippers, balancing a cup of coffee on top of a stack of newspapers. The sight of so many pending disasters terrifies and empowers me. They need the system I’m about to present to keep them safe. So many, many things could happen when my sisters and I aren’t here.
“What’s wrong??” they ask, coming right up to either side of me, “What can we do??”
I look from one to the other, overwhelmed with love for these amazing people who have spent their lives keeping my sisters, our children, and me safe. Even with pacemakers, hearing aids, hip surgeries, and all the other life-altering events of the last several years, they’re still the guardians of our family. Everyone’s training wheels came off decades ago. Mom and Dad, in every possible way they can, still run alongside all our bikes.
Mom still reads the newspaper with a pair of scissors in one hand so she can cut out articles that might help one of us. She spends days trying to research things on the computer for us, writes long, thoughtful notes of advice by hand if her radar senses someone’s having a problem. Greets us at the door with her sewing kit, file folders full of guidance, and a kitchen full of goodies to help fix anything that might be wrong.
Dad worries about everyone’s tire pressure, every smoke detector battery that needs changing, and every dead bolt that needs tightening. Even now, when we’re old enough to have grown children of our own, he slips a twenty-dollar bill in our hands each time we leave for the airport “just in case,” and will not sleep until we let him know we’re safely home. Even now, in this moment when I’ve come to protect them, they’ve both rushed to protect me.
Fifty Things That Aren't My Fault Page 8
