The Color of an M&M

It’s funny, the things you remember. I’m pulled back to that day where I was sitting against a fence of the entrance of an old football stadium, my mom walking toward me from the concession stand with a bag of M&M’s. The long curls of her hair were half in an updo to keep it from brushing her face with the fresh winds that flew through on a Friday night in October. She had those high waisted, super washed out denim jeans with a button up sleeveless shirt tucked in, her usual wear for this kind of night. My surroundings blurred, it’s almost as if my mind and body have drifted into this memory.

During football season, my parents would work at the ticket booth of my aunt’s stadium for extra cash to get me and my two older brothers all the things we wanted from Santa Claus for Christmas. My oldest brother (who was 9) and my other brother (who was 7) were at home with my grandma and cousins that night. “Don’t talk to strangers,” as we’re often told when we are children, is something my mom always had to emphasize to her social butterfly of a daughter. This night was different. Being that I was a child, I couldn’t have been any older than three, I didn’t understand what was so different, but I felt that it was. As children grow older, we start to understand and comprehend things from when we were younger. I now understand the stress of finances was beginning to become difficult for them.

              This night, the winds were a little stronger and thunder whispered not too far from us. My mom sat next to me as my dad continued to rip tickets as the steady current of fans arrived to watch Friday night football. She held the bag of M&M’s up to her face, her smile coming out from behind the bag of candy, “Want to play a game with me?” she asked.

              “What kind of game, Momma?” I asked intrigued with the bag of candy. We never really had sweets or sodas growing up. My mom has always been the type who is super concerned with health, including the types of food you feed children. When we went to movies, we were allowed one candy and one soda. When we went out to restaurants, she would always give the look of disapproval with some Spanish words under her breath when we ordered anything that was not water. My dad, he was a total sucker for the cute puppy eyes (and he still is with my nieces and nephews). Not my mom, and especially not with me.

              I understand, now that this child has grown older, why my mom did and said all of those things. My mom worked so hard to break free from what society thought women should be at the time. In her childhood in the late 60’s and early 70’s, having such a strict father, she was raised to believe that a man would one day provide for her. But my mom, being who she is, could not sit back and rely on a man to simply provide for her. She wanted her own purpose in life.

Shortly after this night, I was enrolled in a headstart program with my school district and my mother went to a vocational college to get some sort of degree. My dad, being the man that he is, did not want her to stress over anything which meant he did not want her to go back to school. Eventually, when we were all old enough to be in school, my mom went from being a housewife to a student pursuing a dream she let go of when she became pregnant with my oldest brother. My dad came to understand the drive my mom had, and how it could help all of us as family, so he gave in and supported her.

              “I am going to pick an M&M, and you have to tell me the color-,” she said.

              I remember laughing, “That’s easy momma!”

              “You didn’t let me finish!” She put the bag of M&M’s behind her back so I can have her full attention. Nothing’s changed. Even at 30, if you want my full attention, wave some candy in my face. “You also have to spell it for me.”

              My mom was a full-time mother to me and my brothers. She could not bare the pain of any of us crying over some nanny or babysitter. She always thought that if her children were to cry, it would be because they wanted to be with their own mother. She left her dream of working in the medical field to be with us and to give us a childhood filled with memories of family, not with memories of some stranger who may or may not be taking care of us.

              “Ok, momma! Pick the easy ones first!” Mind you, I was 3, maybe 4? My mom had taught us the alphabet and was even teaching me to read and write.

“It doesn’t work that way!” I remember her laughing at me when I said that. “You can’t pick the easiest one or the hard one. You have to take whichever one comes first.” She brought the bag of M&M’s from behind her back and tore the top corner off. “Are you ready?” she asked me.

              I really wanted that candy, as we often didn’t get treats like this. I nodded in sheer excitement as most kids do with chocolate. She tilted the bag and I saw the first color that came out. It was the one that didn’t have a color like the other ones. “Brown,” I told her.

              “Good! Now how do you spell it” she asked me.

              This was definitely a hard one for me. I remember trying really hard to get it right, but I didn’t. So, my mom ate the M&M. “Hey!” I protested, angry that my mom ate an M&M and I didn’t. “That was for me!” She laughed, for some reason my mom and grandma would laugh when I would get mad. Maybe it was my expressions, or the fact that this tiny human was standing up for herself, fearlessly. My grandma would always pick on me to get me mad and I always remember her bursting out in laughter. She still, to this day, tells me the things I would say when I was mad. I was such a clever child.

              “But you didn’t spell it right,” she reminded me. “If you want the candy, you have to get it right.”

              “Fine,” I muttered. “I’ll try again,” I told her with my arms crossed and knitting my brows.

              “Wait, wait,” my mom put the candy in her pocket. “Don’t you want to know how to spell it?” she asked me. Here I was, upset that my mom ate the candy. “If the color comes out again and you know how to spell it, you’ll get the M&M!” 

I can hear her voice telling me this as I come back to my current reality, standing in my kitchen, 30 years old and 250 miles away from home. I realize what my mom was doing. Lessons are sometimes learned as we face problems, but to my mom if she could avoid us getting hurt in the future, she’d rather teach us at a younger age. Nothing worth wanting comes easy. Now, as I hold the yellow bag of M&M’s, it’s as if I stepped back to 1993, in that same football stadium sitting next to mom. I start to realize how grateful I am of how much older I’ve become. Then that gratitude turns dark and somber as I realize that also means my mom, too, has grown older. When I think of her or talk to her on the phone, I envision her as beautiful today as I’ve always seen her. Nearly three decades have passed in what feels like a blink of eye and I am now the age that she was that night.

I stare at the bag for a moment, hearing her voice, and I begin to notice how similar our voices are. I tear open the yellow bag on the corner and tip it over for an M&M to come out. The feeling of déjà vu creeps in to mind and suddenly my heart is overwhelmed with emotion. So many lessons both my mom and dad have taught me, but it was always different with my mom. With my dad, it was all about patience. For my mom, it was about a woman living in a man’s world and learning to thrive, not survive.

              She was always so much harder on me than my dad was. She was preparing me for all of life’s challenges, especially the challenges women face. For more than twenty years, my mom was able to get her dream of working in the medical field as a laboratory technician. Most of my memories of her are in front of a microscope, calling me over to see what blood looks like, what sickle cell anemia looks like, what white blood cells look like when they are infected with HIV/AIDS. By the time I was fourteen, I could draw blood on patients and run PSA’s on machines and even analyze cultures collected by urine. My mom gave me all the knowledge on science she wanted for herself but could not get until she was 30.

              As much as I wanted to make her proud, the medical field was not for me. No matter how hard I tried, I never felt what my mom felt every time she would talk to me about it. She found purpose in how she was able to help people, and I could always see that even at an early age. She had the reputation of being the sharpest needle amongst some of the most well-known doctors in our hometown as she never missed a vein in her professional career. She always earned perfect scores for her laboratory audits that measured cleanliness and quality assurance of the laboratory machines. She embodied every syllable of the word perfectionist, and she did so proudly.

              Now that I’m returning to school and I’m a student for the first time in a decade, this bag of M&M’s takes me back to that moment. That night where she made me work for something I wanted. As silly as an M&M may seem, to me it represents a lesson learned. My mom taught me how to spell the word “brown” that night. In her very own abstract way of teaching, she taught me many things.

              The day I gave up on school is the day I disappointed my mom for the first time in my life. The day I told her I had no interest in the medical field was an even bigger disappointment. Years went by of walking on a lost path. My mom never gave up on me. That little girl that was learning to read and write was fighting to come back to the surface, the girl that was ready to fight for something worth wanting.

I will always remember the day I called my mom and told her I was accepted in to a university. I could hear it in her voice, she was so happy for me. I could hear the tears she tried to mask. I’ve only seen my mom cry once in my life. To hear it in her voice that day was something I’ll never forget. She asked me what I wanted to study and what I wanted to do. I spent the next thirty minutes telling her all the things I would like to do and would be able to do with the degree I would now be pursuing. I felt like that little girl, fearless to take on anything.

I’ve always struggled with expressing myself to my family, especially to my mom. The daughter of a phlebotomist is wanting to pursue liberal arts. To my mom, there is only one answer and that is the right answer. One answer. One very specific and limited answer. For me, I’ve always challenged why it has to be one perspective, one right answer. I feared I would not get the acceptance from her that I wanted. That little girl spelling out the colors of the M&M’s has always wanted to make her momma proud.

              She was worried, I could tell. My mom being a worst-case scenario, half empty type of perspective wanted to give me her motherly advice. “That’s a very competitive field,” she told me. “You’re going to have to work really hard.” I admit, at first, I was taken off guard that my own mother would feel the need to tell me this. Suddenly, I realized I had not worked hard for something in a really long time. My promotions at previous employers, my accomplishments throughout the different professions I came across, they came rather easy to me in the sense that I achieved high recognition with minimal effort.

              “I know, but anything worth wanting doesn’t come easy,” I told her. At the time, I thought this wisdom was something that came from previous experiences. Now, a few months later, with this bag of M&M’s, I realize that answer came from her, only it came from her 27 years ago, to a little girl with a craving for life’s challenges. That little girl still lives within me.

              I tipped the bag of M&M’s to my hand and smiled when I saw the first color that came out.

              “That’s right,” I heard those tears behind my mom’s chuckle as if she were standing right next to me, “you’re absolutely right, baby.”