Two years of therapy and a world in chaos is all it took for me and my sister Jen to realize that “routine” and “self-care” aren’t four-letter words. I wish I could say the same for my mother.
In three years of pre-virus stay-at-home workdays, tooth-brushing and showers were rarely present in my life. Now barely a month in quarantine, I’ve managed to carve healthy morning and evening routines into my days. Jen’s managed to carve our parents out of hers.
My sister’s a physical therapist, an essential worker, and my parents have been attending her daily Zoom workshops since quarantine began. She needs space, she tells me. And just till June, she’s told them. Then she’ll reassess.
It’s nearly time to start my nighttime routine when my mother calls to tell me she’s ordered a pillow on Amazon to help with her acid reflux. It’s set to arrive between late-April and mid-May.
Then she asks me for a favor: Will I talk to Jen? What exactly does she mean by “space”? Could I ask Jen if she and my dad can still attend the Zoom workouts? Maybe not all of them, just a few.
I tell her she should talk to Jen—I can’t be in the middle.
“It isn’t healthy for me.”
God, I’m selfish.
“I hope you understand.”
My tongue feels like it’s grown fur.
I can tell she’s upset by the catch in her voice—that, and my father’s been sending me “your mother is depressed” texts for two days.
“I’m fine … it’s fine …” Mom’s voice edges into the distance.
She wants to get off the phone.
“Mom, you can talk to me. I know you’re sad.”
I picture her setting the phone on the kitchen countertop and running.
“Mom. Do you have anything you can do instead of Jen’s Zoom meetings? Anyone you can talk to about what’s going on?”
I sent her links to therapists. To Al-Anon. What else can I do?
“I have things to do. I have the workout—”
The workout that I sent her—a link from my sister. “I don’t want to talk to them, but I don’t want them to die, either.” I told Mom it was from a friend. I didn’t—don’t—want to get involved.
“—and I have family to talk to.”
By family, she means her sisters.
In his texts, my father reminds me that my mother’s mother is dead. Four years ago today—or yesterday. Or the day before.
Either way, guilt is lathered between the letters.
Family.
Her family.
Not me.
My stomach hurts. I grip the phone and curl inward, forcing the digestive teas I bought at the store this afternoon out of my memory, along with the craving to drive to the retirement community and drop them on her doorstep with one of those huge bubblegum-colored balloons. Covid-19 be damned.
At the store my husband says it’s too early to buy a balloon—it’ll deflate before Mother’s Day.
And then there’s the virus … that deadly excuse to keep a safe distance from the two people who can (maybe) hurt me the most.
“Mom?”
“Okay, take care now. You, too. Bye-bye.”
Her prefrontal cortex is on the fritz. She’s now talking at me and for me.
I try to remember if “take care” was ever not part of her three-tiered Midwestern goodbye, if I always thought the phrase was the cold shoulder of farewells. Kind of like—
“Mom … you know I love you … ?”
“Okay. Yep. Bye-bye.”
That was 5 hours ago. And I still haven’t brushed my teeth.