Blue Flowers

Placing a small headband littered with a few small blue flowers in my hair, I look at myself in the mirror and wish I had chosen a different hair style. This one makes me look too much like the one person I never want to be. I shrug to myself, knowing there is not much time now before I have to leave, so there is no fixing my hair to a different style. Hopefully, dressing myself with a smile is all I need to not be seen as her. 

Turning to the door, I make my way down to my car and drive over to my Grandma’s house. I have known her as Mawmaw my entire life, but I have to always explain to people what Mawmaw even means, so I always introduce her as Grandma at first. Now that I have everyone on the same page, let’s get back to the story I wanted to share. 

I am on her doorstep, oh I forget how I got here so quickly. I must have spaced out on that drive thinking about what I need to get done at her house. I glance at my reflection in the rear view mirror, noticing the smile does help. From the car, I hear Mawmaw’s dog yapping. She has the ugliest mini-chihuahua called Betsy. Betsy hates everyone, even Mawmaw honestly, but they are two peas in a pod. I knock slightly, causing Betsy to crank up the yipping. I stare at the fecal brown door wondering if Mawmaw is in the back of the house or basement, so I knock again. I hear some shuffling, it might be a few more moments but I know she heard me now. Betsy calms down a bit so Mawmaw must have also threatened her with her cane. I continue to stare at the door with it’s grumpy looking mat that says ,” STAY AWAY!!!”. At least it doesn’t have anything that reminds me I look like the worst human in the world. Taking my thoughts back to the door and house, I realize the whole front of this house matches Mawmaw perfectly, cantankerous and unwelcoming. 

Finally reaching the door, Mawmaw throws it open with a humph. She yells back at Betsy to shut up, though I don’t understand why since that dog never bothers to obey. Betsy has come racing, yipping to the door and Mawmaw whips her cane in the teensy terror’s way and she skids back narrowly avoiding the stick of doom. At this point, I think Betsy has seen the error of her ways and yips quietly from a distance while glaring at me with those black, buggy, alien-like eyes. I think she used to be cute, but it must have been fleeting. 

My attention going back to Mawmaw, I see the same glare. 

“Well! Are you coming in or letting my heat out!? I am missing my program cause you are here”, she says shortly, already turning back into her hallway and shuffling down to the living room. “Shut that door and lock the locks”, she calls back to me. 

Slipping off my black ankle boots, I place them in the shoe rest. Betsy eyeing me the entire time. She knows I bring her bribes. I pull some of the kibbles from my pocket and give them to her as I walk past. I follow Mawmaw to her favorite room of the house aside from the basement, where she teases she has buried the bodies of those who annoy her most. The family thinks it is a joke she tells, but I am sometimes not sure that it is a complete lie. 

She finished marching, as well as an 82 year old woman who walks with a cane can march over to her seat in the living room. I see she has gained a few dozen more magazines and newspapers. Looking at the covers I notice they are her usual fare of absurd and magical stories that aren’t usually true, but she loves them. She sits down, wiggling her rump into the perfect spot on her chair, grabs her aghan, props her cane against the armrest of the chair, and leans back with a satisfied sigh. You would think she has just finished a hard day’s work in the garden, not walked the 20 feet to and from the door. 

“Clear yourself a seat girl, and don’t you dare move Betsy’s bed”, She says to me sharply while unmuting her program. 

Standing there for a few seconds more I find a place I can clear off to sit, it is just a wooden chair off to the right of her. Before clearing myself a spot and settling in, I do what I always do when I first arrive.

“Mawmaw, do you need anything before I get comfortable? I think a cup of tea sounds delightful, what about you?” I knew this would upset her, for some reason she doesn't like me in the kitchen. 

“You stay out of my kitchen!” She snaps at me, this time looking away from her TV show to make sure I am thoroughly afraid of her. I am not.

“Don’t be sensitive Mawmaw, I was only offering a warm beverage”, I placate.

“It isn’t helpful, you go in there and put things away in all the wrong places thinking you know better and…..”

Interrupting her, “ That is because your idea of putting stuff away is to leave it all on the counter Mawmaw.”

She almost screams to me “That is so I can reach it!” 

“Ok ok, I forget you are old and short, you don’t need to get short with me about it” winking at her I hope she gets the joke. 

She is about to say something back at me in return, but lets out a few humphs and sighs instead. She mutters under her breath, shakes her head at me, then looks back to her tv program. 

I relinquish my fight at this time to make her tea, and make sure she has enough groceries. She is either going along with the ruse or hasn’t picked up on my true motive of annoying her with the dishes. When I am “rummaging and ruining” her kitchen, I’m actually taking down a grocery list for her. Yes, she still goes out shopping for her groceries herself, but I began to notice she didn’t have a lot in her cupboards. Since she isn’t the tidiest of people, I have found her bank statements and noticed she doesn’t have a lot budgeted towards food. To help her, I go out and buy her the more expensive delicacies that she is unable to afford or maybe just won’t spoil herself with. Truthfully, I am not sure if she just forgets that she didn’t buy them or we have a silent agreement to not speak of it. 

Looking around the room, I realize how messy it is. She hasn’t been in the mood for cleaning it seems. I move the old magazines from the chair, placing them gently on the table that already seems to be holding more than its fair share of books and papers, and is that a banana skin? I will deal with that later. Sitting down, I look over at Mawmaw to see if she noticed me assessing my cleaning priorities, she is still staring at her program. 

Betsy now comes in, she stayed away to let me be the sole target for the scolding, and sits on her bed. Her bed are the other two cushions on the couch next to Mawmaw. The couch only has three sections and the dog takes up the majority of it. Betsy is 3 pounds. It is ridiculous that Mawmaw lets her, but that dog seems to be the only thing that keeps making Mawmaw happy, if you can call how she is happy. 

We watch some daytime television, Mawmaw makes rude comments to everyone on the show, but she seems to enjoy this daily ritual of hers. 

I do my best to come and see her two to three times a week. Most of the family hate Mawmaw because she is quite cantankerous and can come across as uncaring and ungrateful. She is rude, gruff, and can be generally unpleasant, but she hasn’t been nasty to me. Also, she has always had good reason to set healthy boundaries with some of the aforementioned family.

She has always been the one to fully support me in all my crazy ways. I don’t mind her for her ways either. She is a good soul, unlike the person I see in my reflection. I wish I looked a bit more like MawMaw did at my age, then I wouldn’t hate myself so much. She is a much better person than the son she created.

Like I have said, I’ve seen her budget. She could afford herself some better treats for her meals, but she gives most of her meager pension to orphans and charities. I was surprised to see this, but she has done a lot of research in her charities and really cared about where she was placing her money. She would rather go without her favorite meal, salmon with asparagus and rice pilaf, than not pay for a child in Africa to have a decent meal each day. That’s where I step in and make sure she has her salmon for her rice pilaf. 

I admire her, she is a strong fighter. She didn’t have to take care of me when I was a kid and my parents were nowhere to be found, but she did the right thing and made me a bedroom and got me into the right schools. She always provided my meals, a good education, and unwavering support. She was, is, and will always be rough around that edges but this is a  woman who did the best she could for me. She isn’t a nurturer, but she loved me through her actions. She also never asked me to be anything but me, not many of my friends growing up had that same freedom. 

Mawmaw is a grump and likes her space. She may appear annoyed or inconvenienced about my visits, but I know she appreciates them. It makes me happy when she tells me about the meals she found in her fridge, or the “Thank you” text I get a few days later after I cleaned some of the parts of her house. I helped her with her garden a lot last year and then the canning. That was a feat I am not looking forward to helping her with again, but it keeps her so happy and healthy that I will have to help. 

My favorite thing to do is to put her dishes in the wrong spot, just to irritate her. Please don’t tell her that though.

After watching about a half hour's worth of the daytime program where the host of the show brings on celebrities to mock them or shock them, I finally get up and start heading to the kitchen. 

“Just where do you think you are walking off to young lady?” she calls to me without peeling her eyes from the tv. 

“It is time for tea”, I quip. 

“Don’t touch those dishes” 

“I make no promises” I reply as I move her cane away from her 

“You trickster! If you even dare think of touching those dishes I will bag up all of Betsy’s poop and hide it in your car the next time you come over!” 

Already in the kitchen, I grin and examine the damage. I have to clean it, she hasn’t touched it since earlier this week. Debating my options, I go ahead and start cleaning the kitchen. Next week I will just have to deal with dog poop in the car. I know I will because this won’t be the first time she has done this. She is the person that does not make empty threats. 

Treating her well makes me feel less like the person I see most prominently in the mirror that reflects the side of me I wish I didn’t have to see. She may have created him, but he clearly didn’t see the love and care she does give. My reflection will eventually not bring me shame or sadness, but that is a story for another day.