Scars

1. The first time my mother packed me off to day camp (because it was good for me) I was 6 and I got mumps. One of the group leaders shouted at me for being a big baby, but wouldn’t you have cried in a corner too if you’d had mumps?

2. It was my mother’s belief that nothing builds up character like camp. Day camp, summer camp, skiing camp, just camp. She herself had been sent to many camps as a child, and look at her! I felt deep inside that if camp had forged her character, I wanted nothing to do with it.

3. To this day she’s still knee-deep in denial about the shoeboxful of pathetic postcards sent to her own parents, dictated by the nazi camp leaders. They all go something like: dear parents, I’m having fun; today we had pasta for lunch. Last night we went for a hike and I hardly got lost in the woods at all. Then she would sneak in a PS : please send money and a file in a loaf of bread.

4. (I’ve kept the shoebox for possible blackmail opportunities.)

5. The second time my mother packed me off to camp, (because it was good for me) history repeated itself; I was forced to take a hike at night and I got lost in the woods. It was written, mother.

6. The third time my mother packed me off to camp, someone stole my brand new copy of the Famous Five and my packet of marshmallows. To this day I can’t think about this incident without clenching my fists. Fuckers.

7. Later came the Language Trips. She didn’t call them camps, because she’d taken a course in slyness by then. So she packed me off to England when I was 11, because she had done the same thing at 13 and she had decided I was precocious. The family I was staying with were great; in order to not embarrass me with language too sophisticated for my level, they ignored me and left my packed lunch on the steps for me to pick up on my way out every morning.

8. Afterwards, things got better, because I learnt enough English to go to McDonald’s and buy myself some food. I went to Dublin many times, decided I hated everything English; then I went to Cambridge and loved England again. I knew many host families; I was robbed of my pocket money and called a frog by the children in the family, and almost adopted in Cork. I had home- made apple pie and strong tea in Ireland, and fish fingers and orange squash in Salisbury.

9. That bit was good for me. Thanks, mum.

10. I’m packing myself off to camp! I’ve turned down the host family option, though.

Visa card versus 1500 miles

1. Since my mother can’t eat for the next two weeks or so, I thought I would send her something to smell instead; so, some random bunch of colourful flowers is on its way to her. I don’t think they smell of anything, because that doesn’t come into the description, but it looks pretty on the interflora site.

2. Do you know, blogfolks, that out of the bouquets and plants and flowers out there, the priciest ones are for funerals? I suppose people would feel too stingy and guilty not to shell out for a funeral. And it’s not like after the ceremony you feel like taking them home with you and use them as a centrepiece at dinner, or anything.

3. I’m finding that fact rather wrong, somehow. But then again; I’m feeling rather fragile at the moment, and I burst into tears typing the little note that gets stapled to the bouquet.

Mater

1. One day when my brother was 6 or 7, my mother found a little booklet under his pillow, with the title ‘Girls that I have loved’.
Inside were four or five names, the inevitable hearts. She laughed and showed it to me. I didn’t laugh. I made her promise to put it back where it was and never, ever mention it to him. Even when he’d grow up to be 20, 30, whatever – just, never.

2. My mother has never been good at either respecting her children’s private life, or taking them seriously. Growing up was a painful business. I will always remember my 12th Birthday party, when she came back from the shop with a packet of sanitary towels and placed it on my dresser with the words ‘you’ll be needing these soon’. In front of all my friends. She didn’t want to humiliate me; she tried so hard to play it down she made it huge.

3. You’re right, in Californian psycho lingo, I think it’s called a lack of boundaries, or something.
She would read my letters instead of ask questions, then bring up the finer points at dinner: ‘what’s that about buying condoms?’ she’d drop, out of the blue, with a snigger. She would smirk a bit, use euphemisms. ‘That boy friend of yours’. I learnt to keep my letters well out of reach; and not under the pillow.

4. There has been progress though: from never knocking before coming into my bedroom, she now gives a perfunctory rap, and immediately barges in. Just before you ask if I’m still living at home, no I’m not; I left 12 years ago, and burnt all the old letters.

5. Six months down the line, I still haven’t told her that, yes, I have met someone, and that it’s good. I wish she would ask, but she doesn’t. I can’t just volunteer the information. I’ve tried. I’ve done role-plays. How can I drop it casually enough, but not so casually that she doesn’t smirk? Why doesn’t she ask, for the sake of Pete?

6. It’s the sniggering. It’s the euphemisms. I could defend my brother, but I can’t seem to be able to defend myself from her embarrassment at realising that her daughter has a life.

7. Six months, and it’s good. Mom, can you hear me? And no, it’s not a man with a good job, who knows lots of things and can teach me stuff.

Communication and my mother

1. People of blogland, my flat feels like it has shrunk overnight. My life is about to be suspended for ten (10) days. My mother is visiting, you see.

2. Huh? What did he say? she asks of the train conductor's announcement.
She makes me repeat every word, just to make sure.
How do you spell 'Clapham'?
Now can you do that with a Scottish accent?
I do my best; she's in hysterics.

3. What's that noise? she says as my mobile gives its discreet beep.
I have a text message, I answer sheepishly.
Oh, who from?
I have friends, you know, I offer tentatively, and knowing perfectly well the text is some wonderful filth from my lover.
Not again! she exclaims later and with each beeping noise. What does it say?

I switch the phone onto silent mode and put it in the back pocket of my jeans. I''ll check it in the loo later.

4. Guess what I brought you?
I don't know. Chocolate? Presents? Real cheese?
The entire Project for the European Constitution document.
Yay.
175 pages. It's quite heavy. I would have posted it but then I would have had to pay for a stamp.
Oh, thank you so much. I was so looking forward to reading that.

5. Oh I see, you haven't tidied up although your mother was coming over..
She does the fingertip-on-furniture thing, looks in the fridge and frowns, gets the hoover out. I collapse. It's been a long day, yet it's only starting.

6. So, get me the A to Z; shall we make plans for the next ten days then? Are you sure you don't fancy the Chelsea flower show with me ? When can we go to Fortnum & Mason's?
I sigh and try procrastination.

7. Now, can I have your laptop; I have some communicating to do, you know',, she said.

She settles down to some frantic email typing, peppered with swearing about this weird English keyboard.
Oh.
Maybe she's got a lover.
Ah!
Maybe it'll work out.
Yay!
So that next time she comes over, well, she could bring him along, and they could stay in a B&B, and get really really busy together, and I wouldn't have to put my life on hold for ten (10) days?!

I leave her to her typing and cross my fingers.

8. Send vitamins. Or alcohol. Or both.

Homophobia and my mother

1. 1987, April, Kitchen at home
A stranger told me she liked my style!, I chirp excitedly.
Really? You should be careful; it was probably a lesbian. my mother replies.

2. 1989, September, same.
Mum, if I’m understanding properly the theories in Introduction to psychoanalysis, and if we consider the lack of positive male role models in our family, [my brother] and I should both be gay homosexuals. I blurt out.
Where did you read that drivel?
It’s only Freud. I reply, with a detached air of superiority.
She sniggers. What rubbish. Go finish your homework and stop being so disgusting.

3. 2004, December, on the phone
What you need is to meet someone else. I don’t care if it’s a man or a woman, but you need someone. she said as a feeble and frivolous attempt to galvanise me out of depression.

4. 2005, April, on the phone after a week holiday with a long time friend of hers
She’s nice, but so close minded, and she says such stupid, offensive things..
like what? , I prod.
A slight pause. Well, like ‘he’s such a fucking fag’, ‘bunch of faggots’, you know.. she trails off, embarrassedly. I know she won’t have challenged her friend. She won’t. Not just yet.

But don’t you think she’s really made an awful lot of progress?

What?

Today’s highlight: I made brownies. Moist on the inside, crunchy on the outside. Just like armadillos.

I also had a conversation with my mother, except it took place inside my head. I was blaming her for my inability to throw myself 100% into anything, (making art, dancing at gigs, being in love) for fear that she’d laugh. I can’t report it in any more detail, cos I’m still a little sore from her jibes. Inside my head.

I know. Not getting any better.

Tis the season to be jolly

-I’ve tidied up your closet, and the drawer under your bed, says my mom.
-You have? [mind races as to what she may have found in there.] You have. Ok.I can deal with my mom stumbling on my things. I am an adult now, aren’t I?
-There’s so much strange stuff in there, and I needed space to put away my summer things, so I got rid of some of your old stuff.
- Can’t you wait til I get home and do that myself? And how do you know what to throw out anyway?
- -Oh, but I’m not throwing anything out. Guess how much I got for your old pairs of goth boots?
- My boots. You didn’t. They were relics!
- Well it’s not like you were going to wear them anymore.
- Maybe I was!
- Oh well, they’ve made someone happy now. Maybe they were putting a show and needed costumes. And! I managed to sell your stereo! First I used the speakers to put flowerpots on, but I thought they were still good, so I took them down to the flea market too.
- What am I going to do for music now, then?
- There’s always my cd player
- The old piece of shit in the kitchen. Right.
- So when you come home, you might want to think about what to do with the huge stack of magazines. Oh, and, there’s that bundle of exercise books all tied up together, I didn’t have a look at those, but we can have a bonfire when you’re here.

At least I was spared the ultimate humiliation. That carefully tied up bundle of books are my early teenage diaries, complete with details of sorrows and tears and crushes and ponderings and tampax experimentations. Not pretty.

I wonder why the sudden urge for clearing, and why my room.
Everything else in the house remains untouched. My brother’s room in particular is a mausoleum of his 19 years of life. Books on the foreign policy of Guatemala or the changing geographies of the Finnish-Russian borders or a political and historical assessment of the middle East; his posters of tennis players; and his collections: coins, notes, vials of sand from all the deserts of the globe, cigars, 19 Century lead soldiers.
I never collected anything, and I’m still alive. Maybe that doesn’t grant my old room any sort of special status. I’m not really bitter about it; but I am considering the bonfire. Except that I’ll be the one to do away with my stuff. Get your matches ready, mom.

Get cultured with your mom


'I've dusted your library', my mom says on the phone.
'oh no', I think.
'You have some interesting things in there', she adds, tentative.
'I do?'
'Yes, all those erotic novels, and erotica anthologies you have!'
'shitoh yeah, those old things...'
'If they''d been put on the shelves properly and not with their spines facing in, I would have spotted them earlier!'
'precisely oh hum?'
'Quite engrossing really; oh and I also learned some new words!'
'please don't tell me which ones you have? I mean, you have. Has it been cold recently? Any snow yet?'
'The ones I didn't really enjoy were all a bit too violent though, with whipping and things like that.'
'ok. Look mom I've gotta go, dinner is getting cold.'
'Do you have anymore?'
'No. I don't think so. I just have.. the classics. Really. Nice talking to you, mom.'

It's not quite as bad as your mom finding your porn stash under your bed. Mainly because I'm older now.

I don't think she would enjoy Pat Califia.