Marijean Oldham: My Mother is the Last Cigarette in the Pack

Flash by Marijean Oldham
MY MOTHER IS THE LAST CIGARETTE IN THE PACK

Accidentally lit the wrong way ’round, the burnt filter acrid in the morning air. I wait for her on doorstep. On playground. After ballet, I watch the clock tick, Madame keeps an eye on me as the sun sinks in the sky.

At home I open cans. I imagine that Chef Boyardee is my father. That he comes home and makes ravioli from scratch in the evenings. That I help by chopping the onion, the tomatoes. He has an overblown Italian accent even though he’s American through and through. He makes me laugh as his mustache tickles my ear when he hugs me goodnight. My memory of my real father is a smear of dark hair and the smell of cinnamon gum.

I learn to make eggs scrambled and graduate to omelets. My mother cries behind her bedroom door while I eat in front of the television.

My mother is prayer after the school shooting in another city, kneeling hand clasped in the front of the church, posting and sharing graphics and emojis. She is full of faith, as I suffer the heartbreak of bad boyfriends and worse friends. I adopt the school counselor, Mrs. Morse, (like the code), second semester junior year, arriving in her office every study hall to ask the questions I imagine the other kids’ parents answer, and with patience she finagles scholarships, manages applications, steers me toward a place I’ll be accepted. I imagine she invites me to visit over Thanksgiving break, that she’ll make turkey and pumpkin pie, that I’ll sit at the table with the husband and two young children I see in the photo on her desk. After, I’ll help with the dishes.

My mother is the milk jug forgotten while unloading groceries, spoiling in the car in the summer sun, the residual smell lingering months later. I lug the baby back and forth, the toddler still buckled while bag handles cut into my palms, until I can deposit her in her seat, usher her brother inside planting them both in front of Ms. Rachel, the internet-based nanny. I imagine that Ms. Rachel is their mother, how much better off they’d be, with her endless cheer, her boundless energy. Perhaps if I wore headbands. I put away the cans, the vegetables, and the frozen meals while they’re enthralled, the baby chirping along with the video. It’s near dinnertime when I realize about the milk and I crumple, realizing how hard it is to do it all alone, how we’re not meant to, how ill-equipped my mother was, how she did the best she could.

Marijean Oldham is a public relations consultant and writer. In 1998, Marijean set a Guinness Book World Record for creating the largest bouquet of flowers. When not writing, Marijean is a pie enthusiast and competitive baker. Her most recent pie, a slow-roasted strawberry, might be her favorite. Find her work at www.marijeanoldham.com