and Sis and me got up an hour early. For breakfast, Sis boiled two eggs and boiled water and we made Nestleâs Quik. Mom had just a cup of coffee, then drove Sis and me to seven oâclock Mass. Mom prayed extra-hard those days. You could see her trying. From the minute she walked into the church, everything about her was trying to get Godâs attention. At the consecration of the Mass, when Monsignor Cody held up the host, Mom beat her breast and said,
Lord, I am not worthy,
but you could tell. Mom didnât really mean it. Or mean it like she wanted to. Some mornings you could hear Mom crying in the confessional, and one time she came storming out and slammed the confessional door. Mom had to take me home with her because God the Father had settled hard in her head. The migraine was so bad on the way home I had to help her hold the steering wheel.
One night, after
Lassie
on TV, we all knelt down on the new turquoise flowered carpet in the living room to pray the rosary. Mom was just about to make the sign of the cross, when Sis said: Why donât we ever pray the joyful mysteries? Why do we always have to pray the sorrowful ones?
Mom kept on making the sign of the cross, but while she was making the cross she didnât say, In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. The way her face looked right then, I couldnât have told you who my mother was. What Mom said, she said quiet: There is no joy here, she said.
Even the new piano Dad bought her didnât do much good. It was a new Steinway with a walnut finish. Looking into the surface of that piano was like looking into a pool of dark walnut water, or a piece of walnut-tinted glass. The piano sat in the corner of the living room, always shined up, on the new turquoise flowered carpet, against the wood paneling on the wall, just left of the folds of orange drapes on the aluminum window. Mom hadnât ever played that piano, not even once. One afternoon when I came home from school, I caught Mom sitting at the piano. She was staring down at the piano keys. Like it was a deep mystery that promised some answers. But Momâs hands were at her sides. She didnât even see that I was looking, and I was standing right there.
Gradually, slowly, Mom did seem to be coming back. She was up and about more and more anyway, so Sis and I didnât have to do so many of the house chores. Sometimes, Iâd come home from school, and there would be the old familiar smell of cookies coming from the kitchen. A few times I can remember some fresh-cut flowers on the kitchen table. But I still couldnât find my motherâs eyes, and there was something new about her, real differnt, a brittleness, as if she was a piano string strung too tight, and a finger coming down on a key a bit too hard could make her snap.
Adding to the troubles were the bills. With the new house and Dadâs new â57 Buick and Momâs new piano, plus the new hi-fi, Mom had something new to worry about. How were we going to get all those goddamn bills paid?
All she did, I mean besides pray the rosary and go to Mass every morning and try and cook and clean, was sit at her new kitchen table, hair flying, her head buried in a mountain of pink slips, her new black horn-rimmed reading glasses down on the end of her nose, cussing a blue streak, her rough, red farm hands, her cut-to-the-quick fingernails pushing a pencil around on a piece of paper, her tiny Catholic numbers adding, subtracting, and dividing, always coming up with not enough.
With Mom like that, Sis and I tried to keep our distance. I donât know how Sis felt about it, but I didnât like it. Mom had always been the person who let me know who I was and how I felt. So keeping a distance was something I had to learn, and the lesson was a tough one. Our second Christmas in our new house, Uncle Pat gave me his Lionel train set. It was complete with everything â the tracks, the engine, boxcars, the red
Lord, I am not worthy,
but you could tell. Mom didnât really mean it. Or mean it like she wanted to. Some mornings you could hear Mom crying in the confessional, and one time she came storming out and slammed the confessional door. Mom had to take me home with her because God the Father had settled hard in her head. The migraine was so bad on the way home I had to help her hold the steering wheel.
One night, after
Lassie
on TV, we all knelt down on the new turquoise flowered carpet in the living room to pray the rosary. Mom was just about to make the sign of the cross, when Sis said: Why donât we ever pray the joyful mysteries? Why do we always have to pray the sorrowful ones?
Mom kept on making the sign of the cross, but while she was making the cross she didnât say, In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. The way her face looked right then, I couldnât have told you who my mother was. What Mom said, she said quiet: There is no joy here, she said.
Even the new piano Dad bought her didnât do much good. It was a new Steinway with a walnut finish. Looking into the surface of that piano was like looking into a pool of dark walnut water, or a piece of walnut-tinted glass. The piano sat in the corner of the living room, always shined up, on the new turquoise flowered carpet, against the wood paneling on the wall, just left of the folds of orange drapes on the aluminum window. Mom hadnât ever played that piano, not even once. One afternoon when I came home from school, I caught Mom sitting at the piano. She was staring down at the piano keys. Like it was a deep mystery that promised some answers. But Momâs hands were at her sides. She didnât even see that I was looking, and I was standing right there.
Gradually, slowly, Mom did seem to be coming back. She was up and about more and more anyway, so Sis and I didnât have to do so many of the house chores. Sometimes, Iâd come home from school, and there would be the old familiar smell of cookies coming from the kitchen. A few times I can remember some fresh-cut flowers on the kitchen table. But I still couldnât find my motherâs eyes, and there was something new about her, real differnt, a brittleness, as if she was a piano string strung too tight, and a finger coming down on a key a bit too hard could make her snap.
Adding to the troubles were the bills. With the new house and Dadâs new â57 Buick and Momâs new piano, plus the new hi-fi, Mom had something new to worry about. How were we going to get all those goddamn bills paid?
All she did, I mean besides pray the rosary and go to Mass every morning and try and cook and clean, was sit at her new kitchen table, hair flying, her head buried in a mountain of pink slips, her new black horn-rimmed reading glasses down on the end of her nose, cussing a blue streak, her rough, red farm hands, her cut-to-the-quick fingernails pushing a pencil around on a piece of paper, her tiny Catholic numbers adding, subtracting, and dividing, always coming up with not enough.
With Mom like that, Sis and I tried to keep our distance. I donât know how Sis felt about it, but I didnât like it. Mom had always been the person who let me know who I was and how I felt. So keeping a distance was something I had to learn, and the lesson was a tough one. Our second Christmas in our new house, Uncle Pat gave me his Lionel train set. It was complete with everything â the tracks, the engine, boxcars, the red
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