My daughter didn't wait until she was a teenager to shun me. During the years she was four and five, she disowned me. She had a New Mom.
While listening to Amy Grant's new (at the time) CD, Behind the Eyes: "My New Mom loved this song. She sang it like that."
"My New Mom has the upstairs at the hotel. She lives in a hotel. It's so big, it's up to outerspace! Can you believe it?" If only this was true! To have someone else scrub my toilet and make my bed every day? Pure Bliss.
"Know what? My New Mom doesn't have bones. She's just made out of herself." There was no longer room for the bones after the cellulite moved in.
"My New Baby got my dad on fire. Yeah. He did. But my mom put water on it and put it out." I am hiding all of our matches.
"My New Mom's birthday is on Easter. Know why? Because that's when God wanted it." My birthday is actually December 22nd. Easter would be a vast improvement.
"My New Mom doesn't wake me to go to Mass." Watch me.
"My New Mom loves the Green Bay Packers. She says they're good." I don't do football — especially professional football and even if I did — the Packers???
"My New Mom has a pink house in North Carolina. She used to have a house in Palm Beach but it got ruined by the hurricane." At the time we lived (always had during her lifetime) in Jacksonville, Florida.
"My New Mom has a bathtub that reaches to the sky." Even if I had a nice, deep tub like that, I didn't have time to use it.
"My New Mom doesn't eat that sauce on her noodles. She says it's gross." Well now she's just downright lying. I'll eat any form of noodle or carbohydrate life form no matter what's on top of it.
"My New Mom eats butter and cheese on her noodles…just like me." Okay, true. But only because my picky kids wouldn't even entertain the thought of eating meat sauce, red sauce or any other of the 42 varieties I bought and wasted. So I stopped trying and simply maintained a large supply of unsalted real butter and shredded Parmesan.
While decorating a small terracotta pot with gold paint: "My New Mom painted a pot gold when she was my age. She was an artist." Yeah, back in Mr. Hysell's Art IV (or was it XIV?) class my Senior Year at Upper Arlington High School. These days, my painting is limited to covering crayon marks on the living room walls.
And when did I, the Original Mom, reappear? Upon meeting the new hostess at Pa Pa's dinner club: "Hi! My name is Melanie but my mom (pointing to me) calls me Booger and you can too!"
I miss the New Mom.
