Yo' Momma

Your mother is so poor…

that during a six month period when you and your sister were in middle school and your father had lost his job at the Pepsi bottling plant she would eat a modest lunch alone at the Sizzler. She wore a long coat with many large pockets, and in each pocket she kept a one quart Ziploc bag that she surreptitiously filled with each pass of the buffet line and later served to you at home. She did this three times each week, thinking that this was all she could reasonably expect to get away with without being discovered by the Sizzler’s manager, who was by all accounts a total hard ass. After she ate, your mother would return home and plate the food she’d secreted and serve it, never revealing how she’d come by it. Your father didn’t know about her trips to the buffet, and thought only that your mother was very adept at stretching his paltry unemployment checks. One night while the four of you ate dinner, your sister absently complained about having to eat macaroni & cheese and Texas toast for dinner twice in a single week, and this set your mother off. Living under the strain not only of raising the two of you but also having an unemployed husband and working a job herself (two days a week at the office of the registrar at the state university), she finally broke down. In a momentary display of fury under the cheap yellow light of the single 60 watt bulb hanging above the table, she upended her dinner plate, sending it to the floor with a wet thud. She regained her composure and walked quickly out of the room, followed by your father’s ignorant rebuke of, “Dammit, Sheila!” It was easy to see how much this upset your sister, and she instantly regretted her complaint, but you were compelled to be indignant and point out her misstep. Later that night you accosted her in the den, saying, “Look what you did, retard.” At that, feeling her guilt acutely, your sister burst into tears and ran out of the room and through the swinging door into the kitchen. You watched her leave, and as the door swung back outwards you caught a glimpse of your mother, who’d been sitting by herself in the room. The look on her face told you in an instant that she’d overheard your casual display of cruelty. She’d already put the episode behind her and was figuring out how best to console your sister, but now she simply sat there and wondered at the pettiness of your actions.

She didn’t speak to you at all for the remainder of the night, but the next day, as though to make up for the whole episode, she returned from the Sizzler with two pocketfuls of prime rib, which she then served on her finest china, complete with sprigs of parsley. Although your parents and sister talked animatedly while they ate, you cleaned your plate in silence, wondering how best to make amends. You were wondering still when your mother brought out three bowls of melted soft-serve ice cream, rainbow sprinkles floating in the liquid like the remnants of breakfast cereal.