Love's labor lost on Mom

By LANE DeGREGORY

© St. Petersburg Times, published May 13, 2001

Usually, I buy her a plant. She loves bromeliads and orchids and staghorn ferns. Her patio and porch sprout all forms of foliage.

This year, I wanted to do something different. Something special. Something I hadn't done in more than 10 years.

I wanted to spend an evening alone with my mom.

"Got any plans for Wednesday night?" I asked her. There was a pause. I knew why: She had put down the cordless so she could go get her purse, check her pocket calendar. Now that she's retired, she seems to be busier than ever. Finally, she came back: "No. Nothing going on. Why?"

"I got us two tickets to Shakespeare in the Park," I said. "They're doing Love's Labour's Lost down by The Pier. I'll pack us a picnic, buy a good bottle of merlot. We can hang out. Just us."

There was a longer pause. This one I didn't understand.

I had it all planned: We could meet at 6 and I'd show her my office. Then we could walk to the show. My husband would watch our two boys at home.

"It'll be great!" I said.

Still, the pause.

It had seemed like the perfect present. When I was in seventh grade, my teacher started reading Romeo and Juliet to our class. I knew I'd heard it before. The rhythm was so familiar, I told Mom that day after school. "That's because I used to read it to you," she said. Mom was in graduate school in Gainesville, studying English lit, when I was born. She'd sit in this orange rocking chair, nursing me and reading Shakespeare's tragedies aloud. "Must've sunk in somehow," she said. So there we were, 12 years later, sharing Shakespeare.

The fighting started soon after.

I guess most daughters hate their moms around adolescence. We had a particularly stormy relationship. As I grew older and more independent, Mom had a hard time letting the reins loose. The battles got worse as I grew.

By high school, I was running away a lot. I didn't like Mom always questioning me, doubting me, telling me what to do. I was an A and B student, in the band and on the school newspaper staff, a good girl overall. But Mom didn't like my friends, didn't trust me, wouldn't let me car date or push my curfew until midnight. So we fought, and she grounded me a lot, and I would run to my friend Kristy's house and stay there until her mom called my mom.

Then, in the week or so after, Mom would always find a Shakespeare play for us to go see. Those were the only outings I enjoyed with her for a long, long time.

Things got better in college. She couldn't control me from another state. So we wrote letters and talked on the phone and she visited a couple of times each semester.

Seven years later, after I had moved to North Carolina and landed my first good job and married Dan, Mom retired from teaching. She and my dad moved from Maryland to my town. I had a baby.

And Mom and I went at each other again.

I came home from the hospital to a typed list of "PARENTING TIPS" Mom had come up with, framed and displayed on my dresser. Before I could even sit down, she grabbed her first grandson and started showing me how to diaper, feed, bathe, burp and soothe him. For weeks, she wouldn't stop. She was the mom. She knew. What could I possibly know about motherhood?

Within six months, we weren't speaking. I didn't see her again until Ryland's first birthday party. Then we patched things up, I had another baby, and my little family moved to Virginia. Having at least one state line between us always seemed to help.

Last October I told Mom I was moving to Florida. There was no pause. "Your father and I will too," she said instantly. "We can't stand being away from those grandkids."

In the last six months, our relationship has improved. Mom lives an hour away, in Venice. She and Dad drive up once a week to pick up my boys and do a grandparents' day while I'm at work. They take Ry, who's now 4, and Tucker, 3, to the aquarium, to the children's museum, on pirate cruises.

My parents go home when I get home, so I seldom get to talk to them, ask about their lives or tell them about mine. When we are together, the kids are always with us, dragging Grammommy off to show her their paintings or pinecones or the grasshopper they caught in the garden.

I realized the other day that I haven't spent an evening alone with Mom since I learned to drive -- since I could get away on my own. That's more than half my life. That's sort of sad.

That's why I wanted to see Shakespeare in the Park with just her. I thought we could have some girl talk. Be moms together.

So why was she still silent, there on the other end of the line?

"I'll see you Wednesday at 6 then?" I asked hopefully.

The silence was starting to sting.

"Well," Mom said slowly. "I'd actually rather do something with Ry and Tuck. They're so sweet, so wonderful, so much fun. I miss them already."

"But Mom, you had them all day yesterday."

"I know. I just want to be with them. How 'bout I drive up on Sunday and get them?"

This time, the pause was on my end. She didn't want to be with me at all. She wanted only my boys.

"Of course," she finally offered, "you can come too."

Gee, thanks, Mom. I can come too. On Mother's Day. With my kids. The old anger started sizzling.

Then it turned sour. It melted and got cold. It morphed into sadness.

Mom had taught me how to bake corn muffins and make hospital corners and balance a checkbook. She set limits and helped me set goals. She raised me to be independent, self-sufficient, to have a job I love and to love my family even more.

But I don't need her anymore, and I guess she knows that now. Maybe that's why she gravitates to the grandkids. She's as great to them as she was to me when I was little, and they love that. She loves that. And I love that too.

But for the first time in 20 years, I wanted to be with Mom.

She didn't want me back.

"I'll make us all dinner," she was saying. "Fried chicken or spaghetti or something the boys will like. I can't wait to see them. . . . See you Sunday."

I tore up the tickets. I dried my tears.

Next time, I'll be more direct. Tell Mom what I'm really after. Make her listen and understand.

I'll sit her down and say, "Mom, my gift to you this Mother's Day is my friendship. I hope you like it."

Maybe I should pick up a plant, just in case.

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