Picture this...my mother, in the bathroom, standing in her slip with a curling iron in her hair. "I'm more ready than you think." If I've heard this line once, I've heard it a million times. Not even kidding a little.
My mother is famously late. Never been on time to anything in her life. I told her my wedding was at 4:00, not 4:30, so she'd be on time. At 4:15 she's still at home, with our guestbook in hand. I have no idea how many people were at our wedding.
I've heard her say that line so many times I've threatened to have it engraved on her tombstone...
...But NEVER a Dollar Short
Being the good Norwegian that she is, my mom is a saver. Nothing goes to waste. I cannot remember a time when there weren't margarine (not butter) wrappers in her fridge to grease the cake pan, folded up aluminum foil in the drawer and a little container of used twisty things (but no more than six, because she read an article on organization/decluttering that told her that six was the ideal number).
Lately, she's taken to having an empty cereal bag up against the back splash as her "scraps" receptacle.
The kids have learned - the hard way - to carefully check expiration dates on anything they consume from the refrigerator. Kinda scary, kinda funny.
Now, I know most of this comes from growing up during the Great Depression, and I greatly admire her ability to stretch a dollar.
But...there was a year in high school when all I wanted for Christmas was a make-up mirror. You know, the kind with all the lights around it. Mom gave me one she found at a hospital bazaar for a quarter and three of the bulbs were burned out.
Cursing
For years, my mom, also a good Christian woman, would only - occasionally - swear. But she'd spell it...d-a-m-n. That was about as bad as it got. Then, one year, Ron and I brought a video recorder to their house and I was filming her. She asked me if it was audibly recording what she was saying. I said, yes, it was. There was a fairly long pause as she stared blankly into the lens. "Well, I'll be damned." Makes me laugh even today.
Technology
Hates it with a passion. Has never used an ATM, has pumped gas maybe once or twice in her life and, until very recently, asked every store clerk she encountered if they accepted debit cards. I finally told her, "Mom, EVERYONE accepts debit cards."
My dad used to have a computer and if was going to be out of town she'd make him turn it off. Because it made a weird noise.
When I told her I could Google her name and stuff would come up, she was appalled. She'd be even more appalled if I told her among the things that come up were financial contributions, her address and phone number and an obituary of someone with her name (now that I find odd...her name's not that common).
As much as she deplores the Internet, she is completely fascinated by Face Book and frequently asks me to find people, which I'm happy to do. I love being able to show her pictures of friends from long ago (or their children). She gets the most incredulous looks on her face...priceless.
I love my mom to pieces. She has more wisdom than most people, a fabulous sense of humor and the patience of a saint.
And she still has the power to make me laugh so hard I need to borrow her Depends. Well, not exactly borrow.
Next time...an adults only conversation about S-E-X (if I have the guts to do it)
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