Saturday Morning Conversation

"Amy!" Mom calls, the instant my sneakered toe crosses the threshold. I am crimson-faced and sweaty from an hour at the gym, worrying about a small terrier that yipped at me from a car in the parking lot.


"Yes!"


"I can't get Lynn! When I dialed the phone, a man came on and told me the line was no longer allegated. It made me think an alligator had eaten the phone or something!"


"I think you mean allocated," I giggle. "I'll dial it for you."


"I did dial it!"


"Well, maybe you just missed a number or something."


When Lynn, my mother's invaluable administrative assistant/driver/"4th daughter" answers, Mom and I are laughing and Lynn begins to laugh too.


"I can't wait to hear this one," she says.


"Allegated," my mother repeats, as I leave the room. "Made me think an alligator..."


"Amy!" she yells a minute or two later. "Do we have time to have lunch with Barbara Longfellow before The Music Man?"


"No!" I yell from my room. Even though I have already seen The Music Man just last week, I'm taking Mom to a matinee. I'm looking forward to it. I know all the words to all the songs. Mom took me to Broadway to see Robert Preston in the starring role when I was a child, and even though I dropped my toy derringer pistol with a clatter during Gary, Indiana, I still tremble and thrill when the curtain goes up.


"Who is coming for dinner tonight?" she asks, appearing at my door.


"Lulie," I remind her. "Your niece."


"Oh yes, of course. Did I ask Rosie?"


"I don't know."


"Oh! I asked the McIlwaine's, but, they think they have a previous engagement. The couple may be sick or something, so they may be able to come after all. I guess I should wait to hear from them first before I ask Rosie. Although, if they can't come and I haven't asked Rosie, it would just be you and me and..."


"Lulie."


"Yes, Lulie."


"We could just wait awhile and see what the McIlwaine's say, and we're having lunch with Rosie tomorrow anyway," I sigh. I'm knackered and not just from my workout.


"Rosie and Roz," Mom says.


"Right."


Mom marches inch by inch back to her room and when I peek in, she's wriggling into her black flowered bathing suit.


"I'm going to sit in the sun for an hour," she tells me. She reaches for some Aquafor cream and swipes some across the fronts of her thighs and her shoulders.


"That's grease, Mom," I say.


"So?"


"So, you don't want to burn."


"Why not? I want a tan."


I bring some sunblock from my room and gently rub the white cream into her shoulders. She wrenches away.


"It's just some sunblock," I tell her. "Look," I say brandishing a freckled arm. "I have a tan, and I've been using this."


She takes a washcloth and wipes away the sunblock on her forehead.


"You used to do this to us," I tell her. "And we hated it too."


"I did?"


"Yes."


"Dick called me," she says. Dick is 96 or 97 and lives in New Jersey. He is a retired newspaper magnate, and Mom turned down his marriage proposal roughly 65 years ago to marry Dad. ("I had 7 notches on my hairbrush," she told me, beaming. 7 proposals.) They became re-aquainted a few years back, but during a visit to her in Florida, poor Dick had to call his doctor and replenish his supply of Valium. She rather tortured him on several other occasions, because she didn't want him to think she was after him for his money.


"And?" I smile.


"Poor thing, I really think he's losing it. He wants me to come over for a visit."


"Did you tell him you were in Florida?"


"Yes. I told him I'd try to go when I get back."


Mom inches toward the sliding glass doors and the sun.


"Your hair might get drippy," I tease.


"So what," she retorts. "Laurel?" she addresses her nurse, "Where's my hat?"