It’s Really No Trouble
“That would be nice, but I don’t want you to have to go to a lot of trouble.”
My mom instantly sent that RSVP - when I invited her to her own birthday party.
“It’s no trouble. It would be nice to do something ‘normal’ again,” I said.
I meant it.
When I say, “birthday party,” I really mean that I had suggested inviting her five sisters for a casual little evening: Dinner and birthday cake on my patio. It’s not every year that my mom’s May 20 birthday falls on an eighty-six-degree sunny day in Pennsylvania. It’s also, thankfully, not every year that we have gone without even those kinds of get-togethers for over a year.
For as long as I can remember, birthdays, holidays, and all manner of random Sunday afternoons have been filled with the love and laughter of my mom, her sisters, and the great big family they have all created. Always a soft place to land; I have never known a time when I, my brothers, our cousins – and now our children – have ever walked through the door of any one of our aunts’ homes without receiving a genuinely loving welcome.
That, as a way of life, makes yet one more thing we took for granted until 2020. My mom and her sisters are a tight knit group. The complete absence of their get-togethers for any occasion at all was something I had never seen in my life – until 2020.
When I considered what my mom might most enjoy doing for her birthday this year – it really felt like an easy decision.
The thing is, when she said she didn’t want me to go to any trouble – I know she meant that, too.
Moms freely give, and give, and give – and want nothing in return.
I knew what I wanted to do for her birthday, and I sent out a message inviting each of her sisters. It only took a few hours for all five of them to reply, happily accepting the invitation and asking how they could help with the celebration.
With it now officially time for me to make the plans, I couldn’t help thinking about her worrying that it would be any “trouble” for me. I especially thought about that in terms of all of the “trouble” I have put HER through by comparison…
I know this will come as a great shock to anyone who personally knows me today, but apparently, I was not the easiest child.
The story goes that I wanted my mom - and only my mom - all the time. That anyone who tried to babysit me soon regretted it. “This baby has cried ALL NIGHT,” seems to be the report most recall having given when they finally got to hand me back over.
Kids usually outgrow that sort of thing.
I guess maybe I should have earned some sort of gold star for perseverance, because I kept it up longer than most.
I attended ½ day Kindergarten - in the afternoon class. I distinctly remember sitting on the teacher’s lap crying more days than not. That usually resulted in a phone call to my mom (I can still picture the wall phone where I went for someone to help me make the call…) to come and get me early. From ½ day Kindergarten…
My mom eventually put her foot down and told me I had to stay “all day”. No calling her to come and get me. So, I didn’t. I sat on the teacher’s lap and cried - until she let me call my GRANDMOTHER. I remember as plain as day: Sitting in Grandma Alice’s kitchen having some Hershey Kisses, pretty generally happy now that I had been rescued from school, until I saw my mom come storming through the yard with her lips clenched in that way that left no doubt that somebody was in TROUBLE….
Eventually, with my Kindergarten year almost OVER, I finally agreed to try riding the bus. (A bit of bribery and a baby doll who had her very own bathtub might have been involved…) Finally, my mom could stay home with my little brother like a normal person, and get her kid off the school bus like a normal person, right? Wrong. I was little. I was quiet. I was shy, and I didn’t often speak up for myself. So when the poor bus driver, unaccustomed to my actual presence on the bus, forgot to notice me and blew right by my house, I just sat there. Hidden in my seat. I waited until the next stop, nearly a mile out our country road, to make my presence known. I bet the driver might have figured out by then that something was up. My mom chasing the bus might have provided a clue…
I’d like to say that, as I got older, I made things easier for my mom. But I didn’t.
My high school years were filled with “mean girl” drama. Often viciously ugly stuff. As a mom myself now, I know how hard it had to have been for her to watch that stuff, feel generally helpless, and to stay out of it. We survived it, though. I know – having really lived it ourselves - we both have extra empathy today when we encounter girls and moms in the thick of it.
At least I became able to ignore most of that kind of stuff once I got a boyfriend. I got a good one. So good, in fact, that I now call him my husband, and have for over twenty-six years. I don’t think we ever caused my mom too much trouble per se…
But: There was that one time when I set out to get an Easter gift for him, driving what I believe I correctly recall as the first brand new car she had ever had. I ended up bringing that car home missing one entire driver’s side. A neighbor followed me up the driveway to explain to my mom about how his car and her new one had met on our narrow country road – and that instead of paying attention to the road, he had been checking out his cattle in the field. I had gotten as far off my side of the road as I could – but it wasn’t far enough. He graciously wanted my parents to know that they should blame him – not me. That car poor new car was never the same, but my mom never blamed me. As a matter of fact, the story just came up again a month or so ago, and thirty-two years later, she still defends me.
Property damage indirectly related to my boyfriend included more than cars. Back in those days, talking on the phone required a cord tethered to a wall. How far that cord could stretch mattered. A lot. One evening, while babysitting my three-year-old brother, I figured out that I could stretch it far enough to talk to my boyfriend and still stay within earshot of baby brother playing in the bathtub. If I could hear him playing; splashing around; running water; I knew he was fine and content. My life was good. Then, suddenly, I realized I could hear water running someplace else. Someplace that didn’t sound quite right… Turns out, the little rascal had stayed so occupied by stuffing a washcloth up the running bath faucet, causing the pressure to build up until it finally blew the pipes apart. That someplace else I could hear water? The kitchen ceiling. The newly remodeled kitchen now included a waterfall! By the time my parents came home, I had taught my very shriveled up little brother – almost like a parrot – to say, “It’s not Sissy’s fault. It’s the water’s fault.” That really didn’t work…
I remember in detail not only those stories, but also so many others.
Like the time I slammed my mom’s arm in the car door. (Repeatedly. Because I just couldn’t figure out why the door wouldn’t close, and she, after the first slam, hadn’t yet caught her breath enough to scream…)
Or the time when she tripped and fell going into the mall, and I laughed too hysterically to even ask if she was OK. The time she fell over a load of newly delivered lumber, in the pitch dark, while carrying full grocery bags? Same response from me. (I can still see a head of iceberg lettuce rolling across the floor when we finally found a light switch…)
I laughed at other inappropriate times, too. Like when a customer in our store stepped in a bucket of soapy water I had left while washing shelves, and then – slightly angrily - hopped around the store shaking his foot in an attempt to dry it. Or when the little girl in the church pew in front of us lovingly doted on her Easter bonnet throughout the entire service, but got distracted during an “all rise” moment – so that when the “you may be seated moment” came – she sat right on that hat. During such inappropriate fits of laughter, my mom would grit her teeth and try to tell me to get control of myself. It never worked. (If I’m honest – it probably still wouldn’t.)
When I grew up, the troubles I gave my mom became the Real Life kind:
The unseen sacrifices she made to give me the wedding of my dreams. The support she gave us, and the worry she must have felt, while I spent a total of 63-days in the hospital to have a total of two babies. All the worries they have gone on to give her in countless ways. The babysitting, the dog sitting, the saying “yes” to anything we ever ask of her – to this very day.
Through every phase of my life, my mom has supported me and believed in me.
At this point, I hope it goes without saying that planning a special evening to celebrate her special day did not feel like any “trouble” to me. Even if it had, it would pale in comparison to all the “trouble” I’ve caused her.
Moral of this story:
If you’re a young person reading this, there probably exists a better-than-average chance that you are, in fact, a bit of a pain to your mom. But there is an even better chance that she doesn’t think of you as one – and never will.
If you’re a not-so-young person reading this, and your children want to do something for you: Let them, and enjoy it. The older we get, the more we know for sure that you deserve it.