Thanks for Family Relationships

family relationships and family parties are like oil and water

Although Thanksgiving is almost two months away, I’m going to blog about last year’s Harvest Hurrah (a wonderful alliteration coined by my eldest daughter, Suzie).  Maybe if I do it now I’ll have the right mindset for the end of November.

I arrived early at Mum’s to help her with the preparations and carried my diet supper to kitchen. Mum, surrounded by piles of paper plates emblazoned with cornucopia and fall vegetables, handed me the turkey salt and pepper shakers to fill and asked: “Honey, do you think I’ve baked enough?”

Every surface was covered with cookies and cakes. All it needed for the magazine cover was a cutline of ‘Decorate Your Home with Carbohydrates this Holiday’. No doubt, the afternoon’s sampling would aggravate her diabetes. She looked at me pleadingly.

“Now, sugar, please. It’s a holiday. I wouldn’t feel appreciated if you didn’t eat my special foods. Food is my love offering.”

Suzie breezed in carrying a huge pumpkin decoupaged with tissue paper and placed on the table. I was given the pot of pathos to take home.

My cousin Cyndi barged in fashionably late, breathless and accompanied by the rattle of an armload of clanking bracelets. Mum beamed as Cyndi hugged her while Cyndi took the opportunity to check her reflection in the china cabinet mirror and push her jet black hair even more severely away from her face. Finally, she tore her gaze away to look at my preteen daughter, Miranda.

“Miranda, you look just like me. I can’t believe how attractive you have grown.”

They disappeared and when they returned I screamed.  Cyndi was wearing Miranda’s clothing.  And Miranda, Miranda was draped in Cyndi’s tatters.

“You’re not wearing that!” I said as Miranda, my darling baby, wobbled into the dining room on platform shoes designed by a bondage foot fetish. My innocent child was tying the laces on Cyndi’s turquoise bustier. Only this morning, she wore a heavy sweatshirt, three sizes too big, to hide her chest.

“But mom, its real pseudo snakeskin,” said Miranda adjusting the buckles of the scarlet shiny pants to further expose her thighs.

I glared at Cyndi. Mum, who reverses words and letters when she gets upset, grabbed my arm and whispered in a staccato voice,“Shame! Shame! How could you treat your poor cousin like that? Water is thicker than blood. You have no right to cast nasturtiums. How many times do I have to tell you? Children don’t listen to their mothers as they become older.”

My mother lowered her voice. “If you swallow a watermelon seed, a watermelon will grow in your stomach. Shame! You harvest what you decant.  Maybe, Cyndi looks prettier than you. I have never told you this but you are just as pretty as Cyndi. You just refuse to make the same effort. Vicki, you’re not listening to me. I’m not just talking to hear myself talk.”

I rearranged my face to look like I was listening. Mum continued, “This hurts me more than it hurts you to say this…you’re not perture picfect either. Remember, pretty is as petty does. Don’t be swamped by your own bootstraps.”

I was still trying to decode her syllable swaps when she turned toward me and said, “Te ipsum crede.”

And that stopped me cold. Because my mother, as usual, was absolutely right. I didn’t know myself. I felt a tiny shift in my fat armour. Not a cataclysmic earthquake, just a tiny shift.

I joined the family dinner table and looked closely at my family. Miranda and my husband Joe were methodically eating corn with neat rows of shucked kernels. Without their front teeth, my grandchildren figured out how to spit the corn across the table. Miranda had changed back into her little girl’s clothing and buried her head in another book. Cyndi was cutting her kernels off the cob with a knife and flicking each niblet to the side with a long pointed fingernail.

This was my family and I loved them. When Joe brought out his camera for a family picture I surprised everyone. For the first time, I wanted to be included in the picture.

Family Relationships Blogging Day!

“Today I’m participating in a mass blogging! WOW! Women On Writing has gathered a group of blogging buddies to write about family relationships. Why family relationships? We’re celebrating the release of Therese Walsh’s debut novel today. The Last Will of Moira Leahy, (Random House, October 13, 2009) is about a mysterious journey that helps a woman learn more about herself and her twin, whom she lost when they were teenagers. Visit The Muffin to read what Therese has to say about family relationships and view the list of all my blogging buddies. And make sure you visit Therese’s website to find out more about the author.”