Rough Draft

I’m an Aries. Well, technically a Gemini. But actually a Sagittarius. You know what? Forget horoscopes. I was born...once...when the sun was shining. But it was also snowing. Which is a paradox, yes, but stranger things happen, right? 20 or 40 years ago...ok, ok, a solid 31 years ago, classic rock blared from the boom box that my mom had insisted upon lugging into the hospital delivery room. And perhaps in premonition of the chaotic energy I would inflict on the world,  just as AC/DC’s first thunder struck, I came screaming into my father’s arms. Well, I say that, but there wasn’t really a father. I mean, of course there was a father...somewhere several states away enjoying the payout from a certain sperm bank in Elgin, Illinois. But I came screaming into the nurse’s arms. Because while my mom (or Momma as we all referred to her...except for when Mommy Dearest more suitably gratified her sense of self-sacrificial childbirth) belabored with Lamaze breathing technique, my other mom (more simply always Mom and never Jane, which was her name) was preoccupied juggling cassette tapes and marking the exact moment she would then, and forever more, take the credit for coaxing me into the oxygen-breathing earth via a shared love of rock-and-roll guitar.  

But while Momma and I would allow Mom the credit, the love of cranky strings wasn’t actually mutual at all. Sure, my small fingers couldn’t be restrained from absently sliding across the rough strings of her singularly treasured electric guitar. Or should I say multitudinally treasured? I don’t know...but she had several—a whole collection actually—and I liked the rough scratch of the metal strands on my fingertips. But the second Mom plugged one into her amp and turned the volume dial as loud as it went (as she so often did), Momma and I ran screaming with our hands over our ears. 

It wasn’t that Mom was a bad musician. Ok, fine, that’s exactly what it was. She was a horrendous musician, but she never looked more alive than when she cradled a shrieking guitar at her waist. We love what we love, I guess. Mom loved guitar, Momma loved Mom, and I loved—like what I really, really loved was... 

Was... 

- 

“Ellie! Dinner’s here!” 

Ellie started from her trance and rubbed at her eyes, gone dry for lack of blinking at her laptop screen.  

“Ell!” called her husband from the base of the stairwell, “Take a break. You need to eat.” 

“Coming!” she yelled back before collapsing into her shoulders and shuffling down the steps. 

“There’s the zombie.” he greeted her. 

She stretched out her arms and waddled toward him with a vacant expression and a warbled groan.  

“Must eat flesh.” she droned just before giving his shoulder a playful bite.  

“Ayah! I need that!” he yelped, “Would pizza be an adequate substitute?”  

Her eyes went wide and she rushed to the box, hunching over and biting into the largest slice without ceremony.  

“How’s the writing?” he asked. 

“Stuck.” she ground out through a stuffed mouth. 

“Still?” 

She grunted with a colossal sigh.  

“Do you think they would give you an extension?”  

She swallowed and studied the floor, “I’m afraid to ask for one.”  

“You’ll figure it out.” he announced as if it were as simple as telling time, “You always do.”  

The kitchen fell silent except for the soft sounds of gushy chewing.  

“What did you love about your childhood?” Ellie interjected abruptly.  

“Hmm,” he paused to simultaneously finish his bite and his thought, “I had this big history kick for a while. I quit because so much of it was over my head at the time, but I holed myself up for a good two years reading everything I could comprehend. Dad was afraid I was becoming antisocial. Mom started calling me a walking encyclopedia.” he chuckled softly, “Good times.” 

Ellie nodded slowly, lost in abstract thought as she stared intently at nothing in particular. 

He lifted his index finger, “Did you know that Hitler was actually an aficionado of the arts? He was a painter himself and he also commissioned his troops to deliver famous artworks from raided territories to add to his personal collection. Odd side hustle for a world domineer, don’t you think?”  

Ellie dropped her pizza and frantically dusted off her hands as she bolted for the stairs. 

“Woah!” her husband exclaimed after her, “Ok, ok, I’ll stop talking about Hitler. You don’t have to run away!”  

“Sorry!” she shot back over her shoulder, “I think I’ve got it! Thanks for dinner.” 

- 

And now we’re back. As I was saying:  

Mom loved guitar, Momma loved Mom, and I loved history. I devoured history books like they were the Reader’s Digest. The more niche the better. I was enraptured by all the things about life that people had forgotten. I used to fantasize about alternate realities where what was remembered and what was forgotten were reversed. How different the world would be, for example, if Hitler was remembered as a great (if morally dubious) collector of art rather than a power-hungry dictator. How different modern art museums would look if we all studied the modernism of Xu Beihong instead of Pablo Picaso. How much of the United States would bear a different name if we credited explorative discoveries to the true leader of Corps of Discovery: a slave woman with the multitasking, intermediary, navigational, and influential prowess to rival even the most legendary CEOs and politicians known to man. 

The stories without fanfare captured my imagination because I couldn’t help but see myself in them. These were the real people of the past—not the ones blown out of proportion by tomes of ambiguously biased history. Each of them had so much to say about humanity. Each of them proved that forgotten didn’t equate insignificant.  

Which... 

For the love of God! Ok, forget everything I just said. You know, I maybe had a highly fleeting love affair with niche history (as I did with many things), but to sit here and attempt to convincingly sell you this academically transcendent whiz kid persona is clearly futile. Just let me rewind, and I solemnly swear to give it to you straight. 

So...Mom loved guitar, Momma loved Mom, and I loved...ok, fine, I loved nothing. Believe me, it wasn’t for lack of trying. I attempted to fall madly in love with anything and everything. Mom’s contributions to the cause were music lessons of nearly every instrument known to man (I’ll just throw didgeridoo out there and let you imagine the rest), theater, karate, and, oddly enough, chess club. Momma’s initiatives included various dance forms, debate team, and textile artisanship of all kinds. And God bless them, they both willingly—no, quite enthusiastically—sat on sidelines of countless sports fields. And courts. Yes, arenas too. Might as well call out the pools and rinks while I’m at it. But without fail, and regardless of the seating apparatus, they were more often on their feet, cheering at the top of their lungs while I nearly singlehandedly lost every competition.  

My failure was, in fact, so comical and so inevitable, that at some point around middle school—and by middle school, I really mean around third grade—Mom started upping the ante by imagining these wild scenarios in which I could lose with optimal entertainment value. I, of course, understood them to be a dare. Momma was highly opposed. 

“You’re discouraging her from honest effort!” she’d complain.  

“Mommy Dearest,” Mom would reply, taking Momma’s hand consolingly, “Trying to fail is still trying.”  

Once, in my skateboarding era...well, let’s not go there.  

Once, in my artist era—one might more accurately call it an artistic moment—Mom found out about my modernist painting assignment. 

“It’s modern art!” she declared triumphantly, “There’s no way you can fail modern art, kiddo.” 

Naturally, I understood the challenge at hand. My art teacher observed in stunned awe as I labored over a cubist masterpiece for weeks. And when I say masterpiece, I mean rubbish. But cubism is the style of a great many of the greatest failures, so I suppose I underestimated the task. I was officially out of options on the last day of studio—had even overheard my teacher claiming credit for unveiling the well-hidden talent of my high school’s most enigmatic student.  

I always say that the true art of the entire project was the particular shade of fuchsia pink which my teacher’s face took on when she stepped up to my showcase to find a crisp white canvas, still wet with the four layers of thick gesso which aptly concealed every tint and brushstroke of my presumed artistic genius.  

Momma was livid. No, Momma was mortified. Well, most likely she was both as she stormed out of the teacher conference. But Mom? She waltzed out of the classroom, my painting in hand, face beaming with pride.  

“Genius!” she kissed my temple roughly before Momma yanked us both toward the car.  

The silence in that car was so thick that I remember being too afraid to even fidget. But not Mom. She was entirely unbothered as she checked her makeup in the visor mirror. 

“Did you know,” she started as if nothing were amiss, “Pablo Picaso was formally educated in classical painting from early childhood? He studied under some of the best artists of his day (including his own father).” 

“That’s nice.” cut Momma tritely. 

Mom trailblazed on, “When he painted his first modernist pieces, medical professionals saw them and declared them to be the product of—and I quote—‘diseased nerves’. If I recall, some actually cited his work as evidence of impending apocalypse: the art that would end society as they knew it.” she nudged Momma’s elbow, “What was it that teacher said in there?” 

“Take your pick.” Momma shot back, “Egregious apathy? Or flagrant disrespect?” 

Mom glanced back to me with rejuvenated mirth, “I’d say that’s the most successful failure you’ve ever had.” 

I bit down on my proud smile until Momma snorted, suddenly unable to muffle her amusement. And then the whole car erupted in raucous laughter.  

There. Ok, so that’s when I got into history. First Picasso, then Sacagawea, then a failing grade on the standardized test. Then it was onward to the next prospective passion: architecture. Or was it coding? Ah, no, it was definitely botany. 

But honestly, I digress. There really is a point to all this. So let's just get on with it, yes? Here we go...the point: 

Precisely 11,323 days ago, I was born to a crisp earth, tucked neatly to sleep under a clean blanket of snow. It is quite precise, in fact, because the clock has just struck the exact hour of my first tears shed on earth. Which is also quite symmetrical because fresh tears wet my cheeks now as I stare out at the snowflakes dusting the world to a soundtrack of my local Rock FM radio station. Everything about this moment reminds me of Mom’s wildly expressive retellings of that happy day I entered the world. 

But this day is not happy. This is the day I walked out of my fourth job in thirty months. This is the day that reality has finally collided with me after 31 years: failure is not a viable career path. This is the day that I want to call Mom so that she can offer a good lighthearted teasing which has always cheered me up. This is the day that I can’t though, because she’s still gone. As gone as she was last year. And the year before (when Momma and I clandestinely scattered her ashes in the Amazon forest, according to her clearly articulated wishes). But somehow it doesn’t hurt any less today. 

I’ve never set out to sample careers—each one, just like each one of my childhood pursuits, I’ve wholeheartedly thrown myself into in hopes of falling madly in love. But I seem to be much more gifted at winning a losing bet than investing in a winning future.  

I pick up my phone and dial Momma. It won’t be the same. I know it won’t. But she’s all I have left. 

“Happy birthday, kiddo.” are her cheery words that greet me, and the joy in them cracks whatever thin support that had held up my composure; for how could someone in the world be so happy...because of me?  

“Oh, baby.” she coos when I begin to wail into the phone. 

“I quit my job and Thunderstruck just played on the radio and it’s snowing and I—and I—I just—” 

“I miss her too.” 

“I wish, at the very least, I could be the kind of person she’d be proud of, you know?  I’m just such a fuck up.” 

Momma pauses briefly, “You know...there was never a moment—not even a single instance in your rather impressive portfolio of athletic failures—that she was not proud of you, baby.” 

“But just look at my life, Momma. I try so hard, and I have absolutely nothing to show for it.” 

“That may be how you feel, but I see your life differently.” 

“And how exactly do you see it?” 

“I see a young woman who would prefer to risk the appearance of failure rather than charade as a master and live a lie. That’s something to be proud of. You will find your solid footing eventually.” 

“But what if I never do find it?” 

“Go look at the painting.” 

I crane my neck around the corner to see the blank canvas which Mom got professionally mounted in a gilded frame and labelled: Success. She’d gifted it to me when I moved into my first apartment, and it has hung on the wall in every one since. It’s more memory than art—a family joke that Mom had lovingly stroked each time she’d visited me. 

“I’m sick of that thing.” I pout. 

Momma hums, “I was furious with her after that meeting with your teacher. I thought she’d taken everything too far. I was afraid she was setting your expectations on failure and that you’d lose motivation to even shoot for success.” 

“Maybe you were right.” I mumble just before blowing my nose. 

“You know what she said?” Momma sighs with a sad fondness that breaks my heart, “She said that the path to happiness is paved with failure. Failure to quit when faced with overwhelming odds. Failure to buy into lies like good enough is the best there is. Failure to perform to the unrealistic expectations of everyone around us. Truly, her greatest hope for you was that you would fail every day until your world expanded into something so much richer than just passing and failing.”  

“She really said all that?” 

“I know. I thought I fell in love with a wild rock-and-roll girl.” Momma laughs, “I've never forgiven her for being the wise one of the family.” 

I laugh with her until I start to weep again. 

“Will I ever stop missing her?” I ask between sobs. 

“Probably not.” her voice cracks with the words.  

- 

“It’s late, El.” whispered Ellie’s husband from his weary perch against the doorframe, “Sleep on it. Come to bed.”  

Ellie pressed her palms firmly into her eye sockets and took a long, centering breath. She collapsed back into her chair with an exhausted, “Ok.” 

“Ok.” she whispered once more to herself as she bent back over her laptop to power down. She jolted at a much louder than necessary alert prompting her to either “Save Recent Changes” or “Close Without Saving”. And, although she’d been prompted by this message dozens of times in the past, something about this one final decision required from her after a day of nearly boundless indecisiveness left her at an impasse. The cursor hovered aimlessly over the message as she studied each letter.  

S-A-V-E 

C-L-O-S-E 

And then suddenly, she couldn’t read any of them because tears made her vision swim as doubt sunk its teeth into her thoughts. 

Not good enough. it whispered loud enough to reverberate into her very soul, Not worth it. 

She swiped at her cheeks in frustration and jammed her finger into the trackpad over: 

Close Without Saving.