My First Purse

I had just finished a chapter when Hani walked in the room. Hani was my favorite LPN. She always greeted us with a smile, seemed happy to chat with me, and she had a lyrical south African accent that I loved.

“How are you doing today?” Hani boomed at Mom. One of my many annoyances was that every person who worked here raised their voice with every interaction, even though there was nothing wrong with Mom’s hearing. Occupational habit, I imagine. Mom gazed at her and smiled, but didn’t answer. She rarely talked anymore. 

“Hani, how was your time off last week?” I asked.

I worked hard to get to know the staff. Mom had been at the nursing home for ten years already. I think part of me hoped that if they thought of me as a nice person - maybe even a friend - they might be extra kind to her. 

I had been reading aloud to Mom a few afternoons a week for a while now, even though she slept through most of it these days. The idea came to me when someone mentioned The Little House on the Prairie books and I remembered Mom reading them to me when I was little, mother and daughter, snuggled up on my bed.

“Oh fine,” Hani answered. “We didn’t go anywhere, but my mom came to spend time with the kids. We hung out at the pool a lot.” 

“Oh, that sounds nice. It’s been so hot.” I said.

Hani bustled with her medical cart, unwrapped a new test strip, and pricked Mom’s finger. She deftly inserted the strip into the meter and guided Mom’s hands to hold the piece of gauze in place.

My memories of childhood are already so fuzzy. I had completely forgotten about the Little House books and it was such a joy to reread them all with her. Last month, an aunt surprised me with a box of old toys - things that my family had passed on to hers so her own kids could enjoy them. Among the dolls and the Weebles House was a plastic pink zippered pencil case. It had Donald Duck on it, with a little pocket for lunch money. I remember calling it my purse, and secreting away my favorite markers and a necklace from my godmother. I jealously guarded it against prying eyes. 

I brought the box to the nursing home to show Mom. I was always looking for different conversation topics. It was difficult to visit when only one person talked, and watching TV the whole time felt lazy and indifferent. Mom smiled at each toy and sometimes she nodded when I asked, “Do you remember this?” But when I showed her the pencil case, she squeaked out in a voice rusty from disuse, “Your first purse.” Success. It’s the last sentence I’ve heard her say. I hung the pencil case on the wall in my home office.

“What are you reading her now?” Hani asked. I raised the book so she could see the cover.

“The latest in that mystery series I was telling you about. I think this is the fourth one.” 

Back when I read the Little House series to Mom, she would sometimes read ahead when I wasn’t there because she couldn’t wait. I was thrilled at this development. Reading was always a favorite pastime for her and one of the first things she stopped doing when she got sick. There were many times over the years when I thought I saw signs of improvement. I cheered each time, and tried to coax as much out of those moments as I could. They never lasted long.

Mom had always loved romance novels, and even though it was low on my list of favorites, I gave them a try after we finished Little House. Not knowing much about the genre, I picked one that had some downright steamy scenes. That I read aloud. To my mother. Even today, the memory of it makes me blush, but it was also the last boisterous joke we shared together. “Oh my god, Mom, can I just skip the rest of this paragraph?” I pleaded, my cheeks burning hot, both of us laughing until our eyes were damp.

Sometimes we spent our visits just going through pictures on my phone. My daughter Jennifer, her grandchild, was in college several states away. While we enjoyed looking at new pictures, I also reminisced often to Mom about Jen’s childhood, reminding her of the times we had shared together. 

One of Mom’s favorite stories about Jen is what we now call The Water Incident. When Jen was in her teens, she was often dramatic and unreasonable, as teens are. I was standing in the kitchen, drinking a glass of water. We had just discovered a vape pen in Jen’s purse and I was livid, but trying to to stay calm and reasonably talk through a consequence. It was not going well. Jen was yelling and crying about my utter unfairness and the invasion of her privacy. I knew everything Jen kept in her purse. Her phone, lipgloss, wallet, tissues, aspirin, a tampon, a compact. And, of course, her lucky piece of jade for volleyball games. Sometimes movie or concert ticket stubs. I firmly believed that when you are responsible for a small human, it’s your job to know. Read a diary or a private letter? Never. Open a drawer or a purse? Fair game. 

As Jen’s tantrum escalated, I lost my patience and I threw the water in her face. All of it. 

We both gasped and stared at each other for a few seconds, the water dripping down Jen’s soaked face and hair and onto the floor. 

“What are you doing!” she yelled, but even as she stomped over to the drawer for a towel, I could see her trying not to laugh. I even heard an involuntary giggle as she gave me an exasperated “God Mom!” 

I apologized, we talked things through, and we went on to fight another day. 

Mom loved this story and told all her friends about it. She often said that she wished she had thought of it for me because “there was more than one occasion when you deserved it”.

“I’ve been meaning to clean this out,” I said, as I opened a short cupboard that doubled as a nightstand and a storage unit for random medical supplies. I started pulling everything out and separating things into piles on the floor. Mom was lucky enough to have a single room and I would periodically clean and organize drawers and closets and shelves. She always liked a neat house.

“Hani, is your husband out of the doghouse yet?” I asked. Hani has regaled Mom and me with tales of her husband’s misdeeds the entire time we’ve known her. They are always small and relatively harmless offenses, the mostly-innocent tales of living with another human for many years. This time, Hani’s husband had inadvertently driven off with the diaper bag on the roof of the car - with Hani’s purse in it. Despite a couple of hours of searching, he had been unable to find it.

“He has been forgiven,” she said, “for now. I picked out a new diaper bag and a new purse and both are nicer than the ones he lost.”  

Hani's story brought back that time in my life when Jen was little and I carried an ugly quilted diaper bag everywhere. Fashion was so far off my radar back then. My own needs were barely on my radar back then. I’ve noticed, with no small bit of envy, that young parents today have much cuter choices than I did. I’m sure they are just as tired. I can still remember exactly where I kept everything. Diapers and wipes in the left compartment, change of clothes in the right compartment, pacifiers, always two, in the outer pockets. And of course, my wallet in the center, since I never could be bothered to carry a separate purse in those days.

“My new purse looks a little like yours!” Hani said, pointing to my purse stashed in the corner. Now that I was an empty-nester, I was really focusing on my career. My purse priorities now were based on two criterion: is it fashionable enough to not be old-womanish and does it fit my laptop. Even now, I knew that it held more thumb drives than lipsticks. More charging cords than pens.  

Hani administered the insulin to Mom’s bruised stomach and we said our goodbyes, Mom smiling in her usual semi-vacant way. I finished organizing my piles, threw out unneeded mail and expired care products, and put everything back into the cupboard neatly. Left on the floor was Mom’s old navy blue purse.

She hadn’t needed it for years, but I realized I had left it here all this time. I had even moved it a couple of times when she switched rooms over the years. On purpose. Just in case she might need it. Of course, we were warned when moving in not to keep valuables in the room, so I didn’t think I would find much inside. Mom had drifted off and was snoring softly as I opened it and took out each item. Some old insurance cards, a deteriorated lipstick and a lip balm, bobby pins, a pen. Nothing meaningful, really. I put everything back in it and picked it up, along with my own. 

“Your last purse,” I said softly. I kissed Mom on the forehead, told her I loved her, and set off for home.