Habit Read Online Free Page B
Book: Habit Read Online Free
Author: Susan Morse
hinted for years that it would be good to get her off the road. Iâd passed these observations on to Ma, along with my own opinion, and definitely didnât let her drive anyone in our family around. But I didnât feel it was my place to apply too much pressure until the carâs incarceration, when financial things were up to me. David makes a good living; heâs well thought of enough to have steady work, but like most working actors, itâs a living, not a Tom Cruise-like fortune. Plus, this was an opportunity to make the roads a little safer.
The deal I offered Ma for the impounded Camry was wily but appropriate. To her credit, Ma saw the sense in it. Operation Ma would bail the car out of jail as long as she would take a senior citizenâs driving test to see if she was safe on the road. This seemed more than fair to her, mostly because Doctor Maxwell warned me on the phone that unfortunately most of his elderly patients managed to take this test and keep their credentials even though their families were sure they would not.
As far as I was concerned, Maâs driving was no worse than it had been when I was a child. This had nothing to do with her advanced age, but I figured at least if someone else judged her to be good to go, any resulting disaster would not be on my head.
The testing man, incoherent on the phone after Maâs exam:
âI have never in my lifeâthe other cars honking, Iâm having these flashbacks, I tried to save us, but she kept calling me an ass. Donât be an ASS , she said. What is WRONG with her?? And I wanted to get my door open and JUMP for it, but she didnât STOP, she justâoh. Iâm sorry, Iâm going to tell her doctor the truth, I canât be unethical, Iâmâoh, oh, I have to hang up, Iâm not well . . .
Doctor Maxwell, later that afternoon:
âSusan Susan Susan.
âI know.
âGet rid of the car. And it might be a good idea to have your mother checked out for mental impairment.
All this was going on in between trips to the Center for Infectious Diseases to get the kidsâ typhoid vaccines and malaria pills, and tense spats with our college-bound senior, Eliza, who wouldnât even look at schools in Ohio for some reason (whatâs wrong with Ohio?), let alone anywhere in an earthquake or hurricane zone. I was close to the breaking point.
For me, Maâs car trouble was simply an illustration of values she seemed to share with all those people cheering for George W. Bush. Pre-emptive war was necessary. Taxes, bank regulations, and parking tickets were not. And as soon as they turned eighteen, Maâs grandsons would need to lay down their lives defending her right to ignore them. Or something like that. It was a last straw type of thing, and I found I just couldnât deal.
It was the eve of the midterm elections in 2006. The Republicans were out of favor with most of the country, but there was that stubborn 30 percent still hanging on, and one of them was my newly indoctrinated neocon bible-thumping mother. What happened to Ma and me was classic. We saw it all around us: Our relationship, tenuous enough already, fractured along the red state/blue state divide. I told Ma that I would figure out what to do with the battered car, pay the bills, run the errands, and keep her safe, because I may be a bit of a brat but I was a Democrat brat and thatâs what good little Democrats do.
But I couldnât sit across the dinner table from Ma and smile just yet. Birthdays and all that pseudo-harmonious chitchat and folderol were not going to be happening this year.
Ring. Ring. Doctor Maxwell.
3.
The Answer To Everything
R ING. R ING.
âHello?
âHi, Ma.
âOh, how are you?
âOkay, how are you?
âAll right. There was a fire alarm in the middle of the night.
âOh my gosh, did you have to go down the stairs?
âNo. I called them, and they said donât you worry
The deal I offered Ma for the impounded Camry was wily but appropriate. To her credit, Ma saw the sense in it. Operation Ma would bail the car out of jail as long as she would take a senior citizenâs driving test to see if she was safe on the road. This seemed more than fair to her, mostly because Doctor Maxwell warned me on the phone that unfortunately most of his elderly patients managed to take this test and keep their credentials even though their families were sure they would not.
As far as I was concerned, Maâs driving was no worse than it had been when I was a child. This had nothing to do with her advanced age, but I figured at least if someone else judged her to be good to go, any resulting disaster would not be on my head.
The testing man, incoherent on the phone after Maâs exam:
âI have never in my lifeâthe other cars honking, Iâm having these flashbacks, I tried to save us, but she kept calling me an ass. Donât be an ASS , she said. What is WRONG with her?? And I wanted to get my door open and JUMP for it, but she didnât STOP, she justâoh. Iâm sorry, Iâm going to tell her doctor the truth, I canât be unethical, Iâmâoh, oh, I have to hang up, Iâm not well . . .
Doctor Maxwell, later that afternoon:
âSusan Susan Susan.
âI know.
âGet rid of the car. And it might be a good idea to have your mother checked out for mental impairment.
All this was going on in between trips to the Center for Infectious Diseases to get the kidsâ typhoid vaccines and malaria pills, and tense spats with our college-bound senior, Eliza, who wouldnât even look at schools in Ohio for some reason (whatâs wrong with Ohio?), let alone anywhere in an earthquake or hurricane zone. I was close to the breaking point.
For me, Maâs car trouble was simply an illustration of values she seemed to share with all those people cheering for George W. Bush. Pre-emptive war was necessary. Taxes, bank regulations, and parking tickets were not. And as soon as they turned eighteen, Maâs grandsons would need to lay down their lives defending her right to ignore them. Or something like that. It was a last straw type of thing, and I found I just couldnât deal.
It was the eve of the midterm elections in 2006. The Republicans were out of favor with most of the country, but there was that stubborn 30 percent still hanging on, and one of them was my newly indoctrinated neocon bible-thumping mother. What happened to Ma and me was classic. We saw it all around us: Our relationship, tenuous enough already, fractured along the red state/blue state divide. I told Ma that I would figure out what to do with the battered car, pay the bills, run the errands, and keep her safe, because I may be a bit of a brat but I was a Democrat brat and thatâs what good little Democrats do.
But I couldnât sit across the dinner table from Ma and smile just yet. Birthdays and all that pseudo-harmonious chitchat and folderol were not going to be happening this year.
Ring. Ring. Doctor Maxwell.
3.
The Answer To Everything
R ING. R ING.
âHello?
âHi, Ma.
âOh, how are you?
âOkay, how are you?
âAll right. There was a fire alarm in the middle of the night.
âOh my gosh, did you have to go down the stairs?
âNo. I called them, and they said donât you worry
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