Heptadecagon

Mom moved away from her family in 1973, so the phone served as an important life line for her. I don't remember her speaking to acquaintances much, but I do remember tripping over the long, winding cord of the phone hanging between the wall and the floor as Mom spoke to her sisters. Those calls sometimes went on for ages, and I could probably have determined how long by the number of cigarettes Mom smoked during those conversations. If I could go back in time, I'd do just that, then I'd place the conversations into categories: a 1-smoke call, 2-smokes call, 3-smokes call, etc. Later on, after Gina had gone off to college, Mom spent time speaking on the phone with her, too. Trying to dispense advice about the college dorms or money or classes or boyfriends. All the subjects moms try to help their daughters with. I remember calling Mom from college as well. She knew how I was doing just by my voice. I thought she possessed a pretty unique ability until I became a mom myself...

A week or so ago, Sesame Street 's Facebook page featured a clip of a very old short. I'm including it here, in case you've never seen it. But I bet for some of you, if I said, "a loaf of bread, a container of milk..." you'd fill in the rest with "and a stick of butter." This clip is labeled Can you remember? And seeing it last week reminded me how bittersweet memories can be. That clip was a favorite of my mom's when I was little, and just the words conjured images of green shag carpeting, long, dark coffee tables, the wrought iron railing between the kitchen and the family room, and Mom's voice repeating this chant. I wonder if I said to her, "A loaf of bread, a container of milk..." if she'd be able to fill in the rest as easily as I can. My guess would be no, but since this is a memory from a number of years ago, Mom might just surprise me with a yes. I'll do my best to remember to ask her the next time I see he...

My cell phone rings when I'm at the hair salon, speaking to the stylist while Talia gets her hair cut. The readout says it's Dad calling, at 4 p.m. on a weekday. I better take the call. "Hey Dad, can I call you back?" "I bought fresh green beans at the store and I need to know how long to boil them." "Oh, well I don't boil beans, I saute them. In a bit of olive oil and garlic." My comment is met with silence and I figure that he doesn't want to saute the beans. "If you don't want to do that, though, I'll have to get back to you in a few minutes." "Okay. Would you do that?" "All right. Bye." The man has an internet connection and scads of cook books, and he calls me. Maybe he just needed to hear a friendly voice, maybe he really thought I'd know and so he'd get a quicker answer than he could find with his computer. Who knows? What I do know is that it doesn't take long to sea...

Mom used to be a reader—a voracious one. Stack upon stack of books littered our house. Even now, the family room is lined with books, many of which are from my childhood, others that have come in since I left the family home. Mom wasn't partial to one genre in particular, either, so the books that exist in the home now are as varied as they used to be. I remember looking at all the books—from encyclopedias to classic fiction to her beloved Ayn Rand and the Childcraft series. Many of those books, she'd take off the shelf and read a little piece to us. One book had the classic poem, "The Highwayman." I remember Mom reading the poem aloud, her voice long and low, her eyes bright. And after she was done, I'd take the book from her hands and stare at the pictures. I think the green cast of the woman's skin both entranced and horrified me such that I remember spending many moments with the accompanying illustrations. The entire poem is illustrated and can be f...

I have a lamp. Of course, we have several lamps. But this one, it's special, and holds a tight place in my heart. It sits now, in the basement, on top of the filing cabinet that Tim acquired from an old job. The lamp isn't plugged in. It simply rests, bulb in hand, waiting for us to turn it on, to use it once again, to see its light burn bright. This lamp used to be on often, every night in fact. Because it was the lamp that we passed on from child to child. It saw the twins when they were two days old: itty-bitty identical cherubs who barely weighed as much as a sack of flour each. It welcomed the fiery redhead and eased him through some rough patches in the wee hours of stormy nights. It said Hello , and, Aren't you a surprise? to the little princess that took up the guest room, but who, clearly, is no longer a guest (and never was). It is a lamp with Noah and his animals, in an ark, on top of a swirl of blue water. It has no place in my home now...