Mother’s Day
Anna Jarvis invented Mother’s Day to honour her mother. She wanted to create a day to recognise all that courage and love. She later became disenchanted with the way businesses commercialised it. She tried to have the holiday rescinded, but instead learned that if you let a marketing wolf out of the bag you may have to watch it eat your baby lambs.
This is what I was thinking when I walked into the lounge and saw Gaz, 14, and all hair, asleep on the floor. The Boy — my boy, also 14 and made of lumps — was in bed wrapped up comfy in his doona while his friend was passed out on the dog-piss carpet with a few cushions to keep him warm.
Not missing the funk of marijuana and cheap beer that lingered in their clothes I greeted the scene, “Hi Gaz, what a lovely surprise.”
“Oh, hi,” said Gaz with the discomfort of finding himself in the wrong place at the wrong time.
“Tea?”
“No.” He checked his phone and leapt up with a shot of adrenaline. “I’m late for breakfast.”
“You need a lift?” Of course he did. It was Mother’s Day, and he was late for breakfast with his Mum.
When I returned, I woke the lunk-headed boy. “You know it’s pretty shitty making your friend sleep on the floor and not even give him a blanket.”
“I didn’t know where they were.”
“Hall cupboard. But even so — if you took the bed, he should’ve had the blanket. I mean. It’s hospitality. I’d be appalled if his mother let that happen to you.”
A scowl of shame descended on my proud boy. Proud friend. And fair enough — who likes a reprimand? I started cleaning up. He went on the computer and started killing things — sighing and harrumphing. Stewing in his own rudeness.
“So how long you gonna sulk about it for?”
“I’m not sulking.”
“Well, how long are you going to mope, then.”
“I dunno.”
“Would 5 minutes be enough? 10? 20? How about an hour?”
“20’s fine.”
“Cool.”
While cleaning the bathroom and letting the boy cool down I got to thinking about Mother’s Day. Bloody Mother’s Day. Talk about rubbing your nose in it. He’s called ‘The Boy’ because he’s not mine. I won him in a shit lottery when my sister died in a freak accident. His dad’s around — in his life and all — but he’s my boy now. I share him with my husband, who was away this weekend.
Normally, we get on well. I love him. I don’t always like his moods — but I love the whole package. The bone-headed masculinity. The creativity — especially in his excuses. His surprising use of big words. His willingness to confront demons. True — often not his own. But in the way of people made of trauma, he’s willing to allow space for it in others. His mother was like that… before the bus. A stubborn dreamer of dreams. A willing adventuress. Funny as hell and just as hot headed.
Crap.
Fifteen minutes passed and I walked back into where he was on the computer.
“And another thing-” I saw him slump… thinking he was out of trouble and now back in it. “It’s Mothers Day. Is that why you have the shits?”
“I don’t have the shits.”
“Does it bother you — Mother’s Day?”
He thought for a moment — “No.”
“It’s just- I don’t have kids. I always wanted them, then I got you — and I’ve always felt it’s something we shared. You without your Mum. Me without my kids. The disappointment. The loss of possible futures.”
He nodded — not something he felt himself, but an idea he could work with. “I hadn’t thought of it like that. Didn’t you want kids?”
“I did. They just never came. Not for lack of trying, though.”
Nothing much was going to happen now. We weren’t going to have any orange juice in bed, or scrambled eggs. As a little kid, my Mum — always broke but never short of ideas — took me to Chinatown for my birthday. Gave me $20 and told me to pretend we were in Hong Kong. I told this to the boy and we agreed we’d go to Hong Kong for the day.
We bought some t-shirts with rap stars on them. Went to YumCha. Had our fortunes told in a supermarket. Later we took some noodles to Mrs Macquarie’s Chair where we watched the winter light set over the harbour bridge. He told me some secrets. I told him some of mine. We shared the loss of love and comfort. We shared the love we have. There was the warm inner glow of humans meeting on the plain of eternity.
The boy was a weekly border at the time, but always reluctant to go back to school. “The showers are so mean,” he said. “Can I have one last bit of luxury?” Of course he could. We went home, and he ran the city dry of hot water, in the newly cleaned bathroom.
The next morning, the feeling of goodwill was still with me. I was thinking about it while I showered. Remembering how hard it was to be a teenager. How hard it was to navigate the world of friendships and cool. Of bodies. Of needing your parents but wanting to be free of them like a kid riding a tricycle.
While the steaming shower filled room filled I noticed words forming on the mirror. Emerging in large letter he’d written in soap to appear in the mist, “I love you Aunty. Happy Mothers Day.”
