Today would have been my mother's birthday.
She would have been 76.
My mother was a force to be reckoned with.
For someone who claimed to a Midwesterner, she was as New York as they come.
She drove as if she had diplomatic immunity.
She was the Mario Andretti of the tri-state, all the while lighting 2-foot cigarettes, in between changing radio stations, and crossing over three lanes of highway traffic, like Sully landing on the Hudson.
She spoke to random strangers as if John Gotti was in her back pocket.
She spoke to people she knew, as if she had the protection of Jesus himself.
The woman never hesitated to share her opinions.
With strangers, and family alike.
Even if her thoughts weren't asked for.
If you didn't have thick skin, stay the hell away.
Yet, the woman was always on point.
To a T.
A bastion of truth you never wanted to hear, but she always ended up being validated, at some point, somehow.
The woman who crashed a brand-new car into a telephone pole, took out a whole power grid, and left the scene, to walk home to smoke a cigarette.
As I showed up to the scene, crying, the police told me the area was shut down.
I exclaimed it was my mother who was in the accident, so they let me park my car two blocks away.
After sprinting to the house, with tear filled eyes, I was met with a woman who aptly told me to, "get over it", as she exhaled her cigarette at the kitchen table.
Meanwhile two days later I spent 6 hours at an emergency room in Boca because she now couldn't move.
I had two kids at the time and may have been pregnant with a third as well.
The woman who lacked basic compassion, but who set out to look for me in the midst of a fire.
The woman who wanted us to relive my childhood summers , and decided after my dad died, we should bring the kids to a cabin in Maine.
Well we all got cocksackies.
And I was pregnant.
Did I mention my mom was not exactly the "babysitting" grandmother type?
So, I drove 8 hours there and back, practically dying.
My mother never once volunteering to drive.
She did however, love to offer up critiques at MY driving skills at any pass, thanks Evil Knievel.
She was, and still is, the most complicated person, I have yet to figure out, besides my own father.
Man, was I blessed with an enigma of a family.
The most intriguing people I spent my formative years with, I am still trying to discover.
The debutante, and the musician, and the many lives they lived in between.
The woman who possessed a college degree, a sailor's vocabulary, and a sage's knowledge, all the while a dyslexic, who was turned from left-handed to right by the nuns.
A person who was stronger and braver, than I could have ever imagined.
One whom, I never aptly gave the appropriate credit.
A royal pain in the ass, that I miss terribly.
A person whom I cry about, more than I like to admit.
A person, with whom I saw Jersey Boys, and left the theater blasting the soundtrack with the windows down, and singing while car dancing with abandon, 25 years after she brought me to my very first Broadway Play.
A lady whom I danced with, more than once in public, when there was no actual dance floor.
A person whom I laughed with, until I cried.
The same woman, who said things, that made me cry.
She was stiff, and fluid, all at the same time.
A good time Charlie, who made me cringe, and whom I would seek out in a moment of need.
The same person whom, after I shattered my elbow, indicated I should drive to my childhood home from my apartment in Hoboken, NJ, because I was a dumbass.
She could be as soft and cuddly as a cactus when she wanted to.
She was also a teddy bear who had a tremendous bark and was nippy at best.
A best friend, mentor, scholar, and dictator all wrapped into one.
Yet so much of me wishing I could take my various degrees of attitude, back.
My terrible words.
Temper tantrums.
So much of me wishing she would have acknowledged how much I was trying to help, and throw her endless life rafts, as she began to drown after my father passed.
In between having three kids, and a spouse who was rarely around, because of his profession, I was doing my best.
And trust me, that is more than most I know do, without the outside stressors.
Feeling myself practically drowning, because I wasn't afforded someone to try and save me.
Trying to steer a ship, without direction, with a seriously important cargo, blindfolded, and no immediate assistance.
Feeling so frustrated and angry, I forgot all that she had given to me.
All that she had sacrificed for ME.
But at the moment feeling so conflicted, and resentful, I couldn't discern a damn thing.
So here is the most meager apology I can conger mom
And I know, it's not enough, it never will be.
The woman who delivered a 9-pound behemoth, via emergency c-section because I was super late, and spent more than two weeks in the hospital recovering, because she had lost so much blood, which just happened to be the rarest blood type.
But I can only hope that now she can see now what I gave up, trying to save it all.
To repay her.
To return the many favors she granted me.
Only in the end to lose it all, despite my efforts
But hoping deep down she knows that I gave it my all, whatever that might have looked like to her.
Miss you and love you mom.
Xoxo,
C.
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