A Mother’s Day Apology from a Bad Son
Dear mom,
I’m sorry for stealing Valium from your medicine cabinet during those difficult post-graduate years. And I apologize for, when you confronted me with the evidence, accusing you of being judgmental and unloving, and suggesting that if you had been more accepting of me when I was teething, I wouldn’t have been so anxious all my life and in need of pharmaceutical relief. I’m pretty sure I’m right about this.
Also I apologize for informing you that possessing a prescription for Valium suggested a deep weakness in character, and saying that if you practiced Transcendental Meditation more, like me, you would be more in tune with the universe. And more compassionate. Especially toward your youngest son.
I’m sorry for starting a fire in my bedroom closet with the heat lamp when I was 15, trying to dry out the wet marijuana. It seemed like a good idea at the time.
Sorry for telling you, when I was six and a half and Ann was barely one, that she had knocked over and shattered your favorite vase. Sorry for all the times I disobeyed your strict and explicit instructions and bounced my basketball in the living room, including the time it broke the vase.
Mom, I’d like to formally make amends officially and in writing for banning you from coming to hear my 8th grade speech for junior high school student council president, and then, hours after I had spotted you lurking on the periphery of the school gymnasium — in a large white hat and Jackie O sunglasses — informing you that you were “weirdly intrusive.” I think I demanded to know “why can’t you be like other mothers?” I feel bad about that.
I’m also sorry for having rolled my eyes whenever you whipped out your camera to take pictures of me and Don and Ann. I feel bad about muttering “Jesus Christ, Mom, will you stop? ” when you said, “You will thank me for this one day.” (You were right about that. Thanks).
While we’re on the subject of amends, I want to put it on the record that I regret not sending you more Mother’s Day and birthday cards (though I stick to my five and a half year old purple Crayola etched sentiment that you were, at least at the time, in my mind, “the best cooker in the whole world.”
Also, jumping ahead to some particularly moody teenaged years, maybe I shouldn’t have bought you, for your 40th birthday, incense and the collected works of Carlos Casteneda, even if I did think it showed a sensitive reading of who you were and what your spirit hungered for. And when you said, “Thank you, that’s such an interesting present,” I could have done better than screaming, “Why don’t you appreciate me? Why doesn’t anyone appreciate me?”
And speaking of insufferable, when you confessed to me, less than a decade ago, long after your divorce from dad, that you were sort of lonely, and that sometimes you wished you were still married, and I told you that you should “own your feelings,” and “take responsibility for your life”? Sorry.)
Even though you have always been my greatest fan and biggest supporter (and still have the incense and the books, and the Best Cooker card, framed), I suspect I might have done some things better. Sorry for the countless days I begged you to let me stay home from school when it rained, because I was afraid of stepping on the worms that crawled onto the sidewalk. When you suggested that I step around them, part of me (the best part) regrets strategically placing old bits of apple that I had saved for just such an occasion in the toilet bowl, and, after closing the bathroom door, making retching sounds during family breakfast. That part of me also regrets pouring a glass of water into the toilet, for auditory authenticity, then staggering back to the kitchen, brave and frowning and allowing you to tuck me back into bed, and to spend much of the day patting my brow with a cold wash cloth. (When you weren’t in the room I read Green Lantern comics, which I had stashed under my mattress).
Also sorry I threw up on your lap that one time we circled Miami Beach in a jet. But that wasn’t really my fault.
Sorry for not thanking you more for all your cooking, and driving, and washing, and cleaning and mopping up puke and singing lullabies. Sorry for saying, when I was 16, after you told me we would be having roast beef and potatoes and green beans for dinner, with chocolate cake to follow, ‘Ewww, that again.” Really sorry about that.
Sorry for not listening more to my friends, who always informed me that you were the coolest mom on the block. Sorry for not picking up my dirty clothes more often, or mowing the lawn more carefully. Sorry for all the sighing and sulking, the moping and malingering. Sorry I haven’t been a better son. I will try more. I will do better.
Happy Mother’s Day, mom. To help you celebrate and show my love, I’m thinking of stopping by later, to personally make amends. In case I do, you think you might cook my favorite apple pie? Some ice cream would be nice, too. Please make sure you get my favorite brand.
Love,
Steve
