Travels with Penny: True Tales of a Gay Guy and His Mother Read Online Free Page B

pity and condemnation for something you may (or may not) have done.
    I could feel her eyes boring into my skull. Because I was raised with one of the Master Lookers, I knew Mom was expecting some kind of response from me about her wedding ring comment. Not a total soul-baring tell-all tale worthy of the National Enquirer, but a response of some sort was expected.
    “We split,” I said simply.
    She nodded and continued giving me The Look.
    “He didn’t want to leave Seattle,” I said. This was the truth. My five-year relationship was coming to a close over the simple fact I wanted to continue my education into graduate school and he didn’t want to move away from his comfort zone of friends and family. I could understand it if he was a multi-millionaire business tycoon with a staff depending upon his involvement, but he was unemployed. His most pressing commitment was to Days of Our Lives .
    “I wanted more and he didn’t, I guess,” I said.
    “Really?” She knew there was more to the story.
    “I asked him to come with me. He said no. I had to make a choice: continue school or not. I didn’t want to make the ‘not’ choice.” She nodded in understanding.
    I continued, although I don’t know why I felt the need. “It pisses me off. Why do people say ‘I love you,’ when what they mean is, ‘I love you under these circumstances?’ Why don’t they just say that right off the bat and get it over with?”
    She pointed to the theatre entrance. “Are they letting us in now?”
    “I’m baring my soul and you’re wondering about grabbing your seat in the theatre?”
    “I don’t want to miss the curtain. Your self-loathing will still be here after it’s over.”
    She was right, of course. The patrons were already flowing into the lobby. That’s one thing about my mom—her powers of multi-tasking are off the charts. I wonder if it’s an X-chromosome thing or if it’s training from the days of laundromats, stick-shift cars and children on your hips.
    As I man, I guess I’ll never know.
    * * *
    The theatre’s design made every seat a good seat. Mom, Gary, Troy and I sat a few rows back, center of the house. A tidy, humorous piece, When Pigs Fly was more of a musical review than a play. A thin storyline barely wide enough to hold the series of comedic songs and vignettes was just enough to keep the story flowing. Mom thoroughly enjoyed it.
    I, on the other hand, laughed through clenched fists. Primarily playing to a gay audience, the entire show was filled with innuendoes and tongue-in-cheek jokes that I found hysterical but left Mom asking questions I would prefer not to answer.
    “Cruising … like up and down Main Street in a 1950s Chevy?” she whispered.
    “Cruising … as in looking for a brief sexual encounter.” I whispered back.
    “Lube … Jiffy Lube?”
    “Lube … Vaseline, K.Y. Jelly, sexual lubrication.”
    “Oh! Like the sex shop!” She sounded excited as she put the pieces of the puzzle together. Me—not so excited. K-Y Jelly and Mom were three words and a hyphen I’d never wanted to put together.
    Mom was quite capable of dealing with bawdy humor, but I am incapable of explaining bawdy humor to my mom. Especially when history has already shown that every bawdy reference in her ear comes out of her mouth to my father, who instantly hunts me down like a rabid dog and accuses me of turning my mom into a pervert.
    In the second act, however, when the Cupid character pondered to himself whether to aim high for the “top” or low for the “bottom,” I ignored her when she leaned over and whispered, “What’s that mean?”
    Some roads I don’t want to travel.
    I thought I had succeeded with my plan to keep her isolated from sexual innuendos and content until later that night in the rented apartment when she called from the other room, “David!” Then, as I stood on the threshold, she held the phone to me and said, “Your father wants to talk to you.”
    * * *
    “Where are we