The Dinner Party

The Dinner Party

Edy Stoughton

I can’t explain to you how I got to the strange place I am getting ready to tell you about and it doesn’t really matter.  Trying to explain would only confuse you and make me sound crazy.  So my story begins with my arrival.  It felt like it was twilight and a damp fog borne on a chilly breeze swirled around my face.  As my eyes adjusted to the dim light I saw I was not alone.  Peering through the mist I made out a large, ornately carved oval table with several women seated around it.  The scene was sepia-toned like an old photograph.  The only distinct figure was a young woman with a mass of curly dark hair who appeared more contemporary than the others.  She beckoned me with abrupt waves to join them at an empty seat next to her.  There were three women in addition to her and each seemed to be wrapped in an aura of solitude and separation although there appeared to be some sort of connection between the women with the dark hair who seemed to be a hostess or observer. The shock was that those women were my grandmother, my mother, and my aunt.  Three women who bore the same genes but had little else in common. 

An older woman with an unhealthy pallor whose dull reddish hair streaked with gray was in a tight bun was speaking in a soft voice when I sat down. I never had known my grandmother, but I recognized her from old faded studio daguerreotypes stuck in boxes in the attic where he inevitably was standing behind the children and the seated men wearing an apron and a shy look.   “We all knew how desperate you were to leave the farm.  You made your feelings clear. You always wanted something better. I admit it was our fault.  You were always so smart and we didn’t want to hold you back.  We did our best to give you chances, but you were never happy.”

“I had to get away from that farm.  All the work, the struggling, the doing without.  It was suffocating me.  You know that. You’re right, I did make my feelings clear. I had seen enough of you putting yourself down and serving everyone but yourself to last a lifetime,” My mother, whose set features and chestnut hair permed into set curls had a sullen look replied in a low, angry tone.   

“So you gladly took the sacrifices Mom and Dad were willing to make” my pretty blond aunt broke in. “Let’s not forget that they leased the farm and moved with you to college to take care of you because even though you were the “smartest student ever to graduate from that one-room country school”  (which I undoubtedly heard enough times since I was the “dumb little sister”) you didn’t have the sense to make it on your own at that young age.  Do you think Mom loved working herself practically to death cooking in that tea room so you could graduate?” Her sister tried to break in but she continued speaking over her in angry tones, “And what did all that sacrifice amount to?  Did you ever do anything with your amazing college degree? No. Nothing. You ended up marrying the world’s biggest ass and put up with the way he treated you so you could have the prestige of being the wife of a college professor.  Seems that no matter how much education you had, it all still boiled down to depending on a man...and a pretty sorry one at that.”

The frail older woman stared dejectedly at her plate.  She was obviously not well but she was neatly, if plainly, dressed in a simple cotton house dress and she gave the impression that her tight control of her emotions was a lifelong habit.  She struggled to catch her breath, “I’m just sorry your life didn’t turn out.  I’m sad for your bitterness.  I remember staying up late when you girls were little sewing your dresses so you would look pretty even though we didn’t have money.  I was proud that you were the best dressed little girls in the township.  I feel bad because it’s partly my fault that we were so poor.  When word got out about my lung condition the rumor started that I had tuberculosis and no one would buy milk from our cows figuring it was tainted.  No matter how hard I prayed, things just kept sliding farther downhill and all those hopes and dreams I had for you two to live better than I had turned to dust.”  She sighed wearily.

“And as Mom got sicker and more run down you couldn’t even bother to visit her or help out,” The blond muttered glaring at her older sister who burst out in anger, “Do you think it was easy for me?  You never had any ambition. Nothing ever weighed on you. You were happy to graduate from secretarial school and marry a man who loved you and pampered you.  What did I have?  A husband who never missed an opportunity to belittle me and make me feel inferior as you never hesitated to gloat about.  What would you suggest I should have done with my college degree?  It was too embarrassing for a man in his position to have a wife who actually held a job. I was too busy being the dutiful wife to his massive ego to spend time with Mom even though I knew she was dying.  Don’t you think I have regrets?”

“Maybe.  But he wasn’t exactly holding a gun to your head.  He didn’t care enough about you to mind much what you did if you’d spoken up for yourself.”

“Well, that’s not the way I perceived it.  You know I didn’t have the strength to fight him and at least I was comfortable financially so I didn’t have to end up like Mom dying of an infection that could have been prevented.  A bad trade off?  It depends on the way you look at it little sister.  Was I happy? No.  Was I comfortable and taken care of? Sure. Not such a bad bargain for a girl from a hardscrabble farm.”

The older woman pleaded in a wheezing voice, “Can’t we at least try to understand each other?  Please?  Maybe a little empathy? We can all be bitter, but what good does that do? We made our beds and we had to lie in them.  That’s life.”

Silence followed her words. Everyone seemed to have run out of anything to say. The fog increased until the three women began to fade back into the shadows of the swirling mists of time.  I hated to see them go. I had so many questions.  I felt irrevocably sad. Bitterness, rejection, lost opportunities, blame.  What a sad stew of regrets.  Mothers and daughters intimately related and yet strangers.

The young woman shook her unruly dark hair over her shoulders and stared at her lavender-painted nails.  “This polish is supposed to be chip-free.  They lied.”  Then she shrugged and turned her piercing eyes on me.  “So that’s your heritage, huh?  Lucky you.  Talk about your unfulfilled, bitter women.  Thank God they’re your problem, not mine.  No need to look at me like that.  They are your problem you know, I know they’re gone and you think the past is the past, but they never stop being your problem.  Every woman is destined to live out her mother’s unfulfilled dreams.  Don’t you know that?  You can’t help it, it’s in the DNA.  You may not like it, but you’re stuck with it.  You don’t want to pass all that angst onto your own daughter do you?”

If I could believe her, it would answer a lot of questions.  Did my intense fear of being ordinary, my desire to do something special, to make a difference...to matter have a long history?  My ambition, my drive, my restlessness, were those all motivated by what I saw of my mother’s broken dreams and unhappy life?  I clearly remember as a little girl saying I would never become her.  Ws it possible that I was doomed to be her surrogate?

Her voice broke into my thoughts, “Are you tired of the old ‘I’m hopeless,’ ‘I’m helpless,’ ‘I’m worthless’ and ‘It’s not my fault’ routine?  Then break it.  Buck up, buttercup and get busy.  When you can be reconciled with your life and live your dreams you’re helping those sad souls that brought you into this world too. Well, I have a chipped nail to fix and you have work to do.”  

Then she was gone and I had a life to live.