So my mom walked over to my house today. As usual, she was both happy and harried. It’s her resting state. “My car won’t start,” she said. “Can I borrow yours?”
“Sure,” I said.
“Grammy, you have burrs in your hair,” the Princess pointed out, removing them one by one, like a little gorilla picking fleas off an elder.
“I know,” Mom said. I think she was enjoying the social grooming.
“How did you get burrs in your hair, Mom?” I asked. I know her well enough not to ask why she hadn’t combed them out—as I said, harried and happy. She was no doubt on an urgent mission and hadn’t yet had time to address the fauna in her hair.
She gave me a tolerant look. “I was walking because my car wouldn’t start. I just told you that.”
I pictured it, her Subaru broken down somewhere, my beloved 70-something year old mom, wandering through the wilderness, lost, struggling through the snow in her bright blue coat, fending off coyotes. “Poor Mom! Where did you break down?”
“I didn’t. I just told you, the car won’t start.”
“So where is it?”
She gave me a puzzled look. “It’s in the garage, dummy.”
Her garage is attached to her house.
“I don’t understand,” I said, because I’m the logical one in this relationship. “Where did you pick up the burrs?”
“I had to go around the front of the house because I forgot to open the garage door, and there’s a bush that overhangs the walk, and it had burrs on it and I had to fight my way through it.”
“Why didn’t you walk around the bush?” I asked.
She paused. It was clear this option hadn’t occurred to her. “Are you going to blog about this?” she asked.
“Can I?”
“You never asked before.”
“I’m asking now.”
She laughed. “Sure,” she said. “Go ahead.”
Because Mom is nothing if not a good sport. Love you, Mom!
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