She Ain't Heavy, She's My Mother Read Online Free Page B

the wonderful world of historic feminine lingerie, could be so much more. But in the end, I unquestionably knew better than to enter my parents’ quarters and amuse myself with their personal effects without permission, so I stealthily returned it to its proper place.
    From the beginning, my parents made it clear that I could always confide in them. They were my parents and they loved me, no matter what. They were repeatedly tried and tested by both sons, and for the most part, they remained true to their promise. But in this case I remained silent. Later, when it was discovered in its proper dwelling back under my parents’ bed, no one bothered to wonder at this miracle amid the scurry and confusion.
    Like the winds of Hurricane Betsy, we were soon racingsouthward to the famed beauty salon and antique boutique called Hair-etage, owned by Mr. Philippe. While the ladies waited for their cherished appointments, they could browse and purchase old Staffordshire porcelain figurines, silver Corinthian-column candlesticks, Louis XV crystal chandeliers, or, when seated under the streamlined, state-of-the-art hair dryers, they could experience the comfort of a newly upholstered and puffed-up bergère or a Queen Anne wingbacked chair. The only drawback to this mecca of beauty and art was the presence of a precocious boy dragged by his mother to witness and partake in an afternoon of hair-washing, combing, setting, teasing, and shellacking.
    “Now, doodlebug, when we arrive, please put on your best manners and behave like a good little gentleman, sit next to me and don’t run around the salon like a wild Indian. Mr. Philippe’s store is filled to the gills with very expensive things that we don’t want to break and have to buy and make Daddy very angry, do we?”
    “I promise to be good. Can we go to the Camellia Grill on the way home?”
    “If you wait patiently while I get my hair done, and sit still while Mr. Philippe cuts and styles yours, we will go to the Grill for hamburgers and chocolate freezes.”
    She should have known that even the tempting bribe of Camellia’s was not sufficient to ensure my complete cooperation; nothing on earth could be incentive enough to constrain my bull-in-the-china-shop reputation. These were the days prior to the mass dispensing of Ritalin. I know for a fact that as an infant, tiny shots of bourbonwere mixed into my bedtime bottle, so I would not have blamed my parents if they had attempted to further medicate me. In retrospect, I was a super ball of energy, a Tasmanian devil on speed, and my boundless antics often elicited my mother’s highest curse: “Judas priest, son, can you sit still for a cotton-pickin’ minute, is that at all possible? I Sewanee, you and your brother are driving me to distraction!”
    Sometimes I thought that it might have helped release some of her mounting frustration and stress if she could just cry out the occasional
fuck, shit
, or
piss
, which I had mastered so effortlessly. Now I know that vulgar language is a nasty addiction for anyone, especially a preschooler, but I’m not completely to blame. Since my birth, I had repeatedly overheard alarmingly florid vocalization flowing from my father after his third J&B scotch on the rocks. He was a handsome, thunderous, imposing, manly man. Sentimental, he drank J&B scotch in honor of his two sons, Jay and Bryan, and by the ripe age of three, I had mastered gutter vocabulary. I didn’t understand the meaning of these words, but I fully grasped their dramatic impact on others, especially my big brother. He would frequently wrestle me beneath his husky frame and tickle me mercilessly until I’d expel a litany of expletives.
    “Shit, fuck, piss … shit, fuck, piss … damn it to hell … biiiiiitch!!!”
    When this would happen, Mother would explain that even though Daddy sometimes spoke like that, it was not proper language for a polite young boy.
    When she was a little girl, she never heard languagelike that.