Mom

‘Missed call, from Lila.’ ‘Voice mail received.’ These two notices are on my phone when I finally decide to pick it up. I check the voice mail first, and it’s my mom. A very terse voice, one that I have heard many times in my life, comes on, “Where are you? Why haven’t you called? It’s Friday.”
I am immediately taken back in time. I am twelve years old again, and I’ve done something wrong, again. Apparently I promised to call mom the minute Mark and I got to Chicago. I don’t remember that, but if she says it’s so, it’s so. She has called my brother, and one of my sisters, and the all points is out for me because I also have calls from them. ‘Ma called, where are you?’, my brother has emailed me.

It’s amazing how we are trained like dogs from birth to fear mom. I love my mom, but as soon as I hear her ‘angry’ voice, my blood runs cold. So it was that I went to the wedding we were both to attend on Saturday, with a bit of trepidation. Sure enough, when I came up to her, she gave me her patented icy stare. “Did my voice mail sound angry?”, she asked. Yes, yes it did, and when I told her this, her face lit up with joy. Apparently nothing satisfies a mother more, than knowing that even at the age of eighty nine, she can still rattle her sixty one year old son.