1988 Mothering

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1988

I want to go back to the dumb days, before I had something to say. When I was happy washing tomato soup mixed with crackers out of my little girl’s hair after she dumped it there, the whole bowl of it, turned it upside down, flakes of soup soaked crackers stuck to her face.


There wasn’t anything to discover back then, in the dumb days, but get a rag and wash it off, snap a photo if the camera was near. Now, everything has to mean something. Something I ponder and sigh about, write pages about. . . . They levied my account today. The IRS took out all my money and I’m overdrawn.


I used to think there wasn’t anything else to worry about except when the final car payment was and would that Ford Custom last until then. Now I worry about how I put words down on paper, how I spread blue on white. . . I’ve got no credit and the baby got sick. Took her to the doctor and the doctor said, need my money today, Lady    . . . Sometimes I don’t even remember what I was trying to make sense of.


DJ and Johnny are screaming and fighting, carrying on. I holler “I’ve had enough! Your bed time behavior is going to change! You got it! It is going to change, NOW!” I crawl on my hands and knees picking up specks of lint while they brush their teeth and look for pajamas and toss dirty underwear into the garbage by mistake because I moved the dirty clothes hamper. 


mothering 1970-1988

There wasn’t anything to do back then in the dumb days except worry about making more cents, more dollars and more babies. If I had known how many cents are needed to care for a baby, I wouldn’t have made a one. But that’s assuming I would have listened to my intuition. I don’t seem to do that now, so what makes me think I would have listened to it then?


All the preaching and talking doesn’t do a damn bit a good. Your kids are watching your every move. You holler at them, they holler at you, and the bedroom stays a mess. I slam the door, sweep Cheerios off the kitchen floor, throw dishrags in the sink and the telephone rings. I sink down in my chair and quietly, softly say, Hello. Is your mother there? They ask. I AM the mother!