Mama's Lesson

I uncovered the box, and the drive to declutter my parent’s basement evaporated. Tucked under the stairs of my parent’s home, the box’s white surface bore my name in English.

HANAE

Mama’s beautiful handwriting had changed very little since she had made this mark. Pulling it open, I was transported to another place and time, when my hands had lifted this lid and beheld the same treasures they did now. I marveled at the faded green sweater sitting at the top of the clothes inside, the first that Mama had ever made for me.

We lived tucked away in the attic of Papa’s two-bedroom childhood home. After Papa brought us across the ocean to live in America, Mama stopped using as much English with me. All of our things sat in boxes that were never completely unpacked into the living space of the house. We’re just staying with Grandma for a little while. In the quiet hours of the day, with nothing else to do and no one to do it with, I journeyed into that labyrinth of my parent’s memories, dust well-settled on their lids. Inside I found Mama’s things from home; trinkets, pens, plastic folders full of papers, and clothes. These things would come out to be used from time to time, but always went back to their box. Year after year, they looked the same. Sometimes, there would be a new box, and our room grew a little smaller.

I went to bed beside Mama each night, on a floral pink pillowcase she sewed for me. I liked to press my back against it, and walk my little feet up the slanted attic ceiling as far as I could. From beside me, Mama would look up from a novel and scold me not to, because the oil on my feet would make the ancient white paint dirty.

“Nobody comes in this room anyway, so it doesn’t matter!”

“We have to take great care of all things. Even if no one sees.”

In the morning, she would make toast for me, never with as much butter as I wanted. She stood with me and held the honey jar, so I could stir the wooden wand around in the little amber pool. We both would watch as the bulb of golden sweetness stretched down and mixed with butter on my waiting toast. If I asked for more butter, Mama said if I ever wanted to cook well, I needed to learn what tasted ‘just right.’ One day a black carpenter ant crawled across the white kitchen floor. I gave this ant a drop of honey from the jar, so she would stay a while and eat. Her legs got stuck in the droplet for a while, and she moved the way I did when I trudged in the mud of a low tide. Alarmed, I scooped her out and wiped the drop from the floor. Ants won’t invade a kitchen that’s clean.

Some afternoons, Mama would buckle me in my car seat, and drive us into town to do the shopping. I was to be a quiet helper while she picked groceries, home goods, or clothes for us. I liked when mom shopped at the store in the mall that had a T.V. I wasn’t allowed to watch any screens except for weekends, so it always felt like a special treat. It made me grateful we always took a little longer at the registers. Mama would count and calculate and sometimes prioritize. Every trip was a lesson in arithmetic, but I never mastered her art of head-math. Calculations simply seemed to make room to suit her, while I had to fight every number and decimal. Never was she more focused than at the grocery store. Not just for price, but for the dates on each package. The weight of each apple and cabbage. Length of every sausage and zucchini. In our cart went organic produce, meat, and bread. Rarely did she buy colorful treats like juice, cookies, or candy. If I asked for them, Mama said sugar helps colds get stronger. Isn’t it nice not getting sick? Remember how it hurts when your stomach doesn’t want to keep food? Candy was for the Saturdays Papa took me to the Marina. Where Mama said no, I could often get Papa’s yes. I felt so clever.

Every evening at five o’clock, Mama and I had dinner ready on the table. Papa woke up before the birds each day to go to work, so by the time he came home he was already fighting sleep. Papa came home as fast as he could to taste whatever magic Mama conjured up in the kitchen. There are few in the world with her sense of taste and resourcefulness. At her table I learned the taste of food prepared well. Papa needed plenty of rest, but he never shied away from fixing the things she couldn’t. The things she could fix, though, she fixed. Worn clothes were carefully patched and mended by her dexterous fingers. When we couldn’t buy something new, she learned to make it. She drove into town to the yarn shop to learn from the employees, and then came home to knit and knit. She carried her work everywhere, and in the Fall of my second year of school, she pulled a green sweater over my head; her first creation. She warned me not to get it dirty or tear it, and I didn’t. One day it was gone from my dresser, and eventually my memory. Until today.

I never felt much want in the dawn of my life. I wanted for things, but never that which made my stomach growl, my fever break, or my shoulders dry and warm. I felt aware of the strength in my body from the food she chose, and the power of my mind from the math we did. The kindness of heart I curated in the shadow of her care. I knew how to care for things, and make them last. I tucked the sweater back into the box bearing my name. It was my responsibility to make sure that the next child who wore it would learn to do the same.