12. No more tears

How grief reshapes life...

Welcome to the 13th installment of Misfortune Cookie. A memoir that wants to breathe and live, even as I feel content to let it rest. But then you encourage me to keep going, and I realize that’s something I can’t ignore. Thank you. 🎧

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Grief is a fight you can’t win, so Mom moved in another direction. I used to watch her dress up for the evening. Fuchsia was her favorite non-black color. She liked to paint her nails that dark pink and add a similar swipe of lipstick, too. And since this was the ‘80s, there were plenty of chunky earrings, horizontal stripes, big hair, and general glossiness.

I counted ten candles…Birthday cakes were good because we went to the best bakery in Pearlridge.

When she wasn’t around, I loved going through her closet and trying on her clothes, and as I got older, I borrowed items that I never saw her wear like Hawaiian muumus. The only dress I’ve ever seen her wear is a traditional Thai wrap skirt that magically appeared on her after she had arrived at a Buddhist party or celebration.

Mom, then, was whisked away to a kitchen where her well-known cooking skills could be put to use. Larry and I tried to stick with her, but she’d shoo-ed us away, usually tempting us with a task of finding an auntie or food. It usually worked.

Aunt Kay was Mom’s going-out girlfriend during those early years after Dad’s passing. She was gregarious, pretty, and nice. Her English was better than Mom’s, so I’d sometimes communicate through her. But together, I fear they were a trouble-making Thai team at nightclubs and bars, looking for young GI’s or other fish to hook.

When Mom came home with a mark on the corner of her mouth, she didn’t know how to convey to me that she had burnt her lip smoking a joint. Instead she said, pakalolo, which is Hawaiian for marijuana and pantomimed the gesture. I put one and two together.

Because like all good children who grew up in Hawaii, we’re familiar with the word, the smell, and the plant. I remember my friend excitedly telling me to follow her, which I did, while constantly asking, “What? What? What is it?” until we were in her front yard. She parted a couple of plants like a curtain to reveal the pot her parents were growing.

Another time, Mom told me a story about how they let the air out of someone’s tires. I think she did it, and there might have been a knife. I don’t remember exactly. I just know that while they were at the club some chick pissed Mom and her friends off, so there were drunken shenanigans and repercussions.

She dated again. The first was a needy Navy man. He wanted my mom’s attention and called too much. One day he came around the house looking for her, but she wasn’t around, so he decided to make a show of hanging himself in the detached garage. Her scream brought our neighbor over, the one who banged on the wall when I played piano. He helped Mom handle the situation, and the Navy man was taken away by the cops, who then took him to the hospital.

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There was another time when she told us to get in the car, but instead of going somewhere, she just drove up and around the next street over. We were young, but old enough to know that something was wrong.

“Where are you going, Mommy?”

“I don’t know.”

She drove very slowly as if looking for something. Then she finally pulled over. We sat in silence.

“What are you doing?”

“I don’t know.”

I looked at the nice houses, their trimmed lawns, and appreciated the calmness of this street.

“What do you want to do?” I asked.

“I want to call the police.”

“We can go home, and call the police.”

“We can’t go home.”

I thought about it for a minute. “Why don’t you ask someone if you can use their phone?”

She let the idea in, and I could feel her thinking about it.

“Just knock on their door. They will help you, Mommy.”

“Stay here.” She said and got out of the car. She went to a house out of eyesight, but when she returned she said they let her use the phone and drove back home.

The cops showed up to escort Mom’s boyfriend out of the house.

Her next one was a great guy. He was a fireman and stuck around long enough to end up in photo albums. But when he was transferred to Alaska, Mom opted to stay behind. I wondered what our lives would have been like had she stayed with a normal man, but like Nora in The Midnight Library maybe the choices we think will be better are busy with unknown consequences.

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There was never the sense that Mom was trying to replace Dad. I don’t remember feeling offended or that she was actively trying to forget him like in films and TV shows when the kid gets jealous or throws a fit because someone new shows up to date one of the parents.

Although, I didn’t like it when I walked downstairs one morning to discover that a naked man was in Mom’s bed and strangers were passed out in the living room.

Mom was in the kitchen.

“Who are these people?”

“Friends.” She was in a cheerful mood.

“Are you hungry? Do you want me to make breakfast?”

For once, I did not.

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