Big Day

I wrote my first blog for Huffington Post.

I loved the responses. A lesbian Erma Bombeck? I believe I wrote at length earlier in the blog about how much I loved Erma’s style. I read her columns as a kid and wanted to be a writer like her some day. She was so funny and in 700 words or less could cut right to the core.

My favorite response so far has been the one informing me that I am responsible for the entire state going to hell and burning forever. The whole state. All the government officials who voted for gay marriage- everyone was going to hell just so I could get married. If I have so much power, why can’t I get my kids to make their beds in the morning? I pretty much have hellfire coming out my ears when I find the beds, yet again, left in piles of blankets, stuffed animals and pillows after each boy has raced out the door saying, yeah yeah yeah, I’m pretty sure I did...

Pretty sure is never really sure and ranks right up there with the innocent look insisting they brushed their teeth, too.

The writer then admonished me for being so selfish.

I smiled because I felt my mother walk in the room and sit down.

Well, you are, she would have said. But not for that reason. That’s crazy.

I can almost hear her deep laugh.

My mother never accepted Christ as her savior- in fact, when asked by the hospice nurse if she wanted a priest or minister, my mother shouted NO with at least two days worth of life energy to get the point across.

My sister wrote me and told me my mother would have been proud of me today.

I laughed. All I could think of was the reality of my relationship with my mom- the push and pull, back and forth. She would have been furious for months about what I was writing. Furious. How dare I tell the family secrets. And she would have been so proud of my accomplishment. It was how we were with each other. A lot of love, a lot of anger, all stirred into a single glass.

A highball glass.


She would admonish me for putting my kids in what she would have perceived as harms way.

To hell with you, she would snort, but you have to take care of the babies.

They were always her ‘babies.’

I’m not afraid, I would counter. Someone has to stand up. Others have.

Six to eight months later? She would have written a note- in that impossible scribble of hers- and told me how proud she was of me.

It was a big day for the blog today. I find myself sitting with my mother, our full glass.

Laughing about damnation, unmade beds, with an undercurrent of fury pulling us close, and tearing us apart.