PRONOUNS

Mom doesn’t use names. She speaks in pronouns.

MOM: “Did you hear? SHE couldn’t find her shoe and then she fell down the stairs, and HE didn’t even care! And THEY were standing there the whole time and didn’t help!”

So, after a ten-minute story, you need to guess who the story’s about.

ME: “Are you talking about your cousin Paula?”

MOM: “I’m talking about the neighbor’s cleaning lady – Becky!”

ME: “And who is THEY, her family?”

MOM: “THEY is the Harlem Boys’ Choir!”

It always turns out to be someone she’s met only once. Someone you’ve never heard of.

DRUGS – Part 1

One day in my high school parking lot, I noticed my mother emerge from my school. She’d been crying.

“Here we go,” I mumbled. I didn’t approach her. She drove away.

Later at home, I began probing. What she was doing, walking around my school in tears? I feared the worst.

There were two possibilities. She’d either been trying to convince school staff that “My son is a bad person who yells at me and calls me names like Douchebag,” or she panicked, and decided to spread rumors that “My son masturbates.”

I was hoping for the name-calling rumor, not the masturbation publicity. I probably got both. In fact, I was afraid to ask what Mom had done.

Did I mention that all this occurred during junior year, the time when students pad their resumes to get into the best possible college? Some parents were helping their kids write college essays. My parent was walking around school, spreading sensational masturbation claims to anyone who would give her attention.

I pretended I never saw Mom crying. Until the next day. When the school psychologist called me into her office.

And began asking questions about drugs.

You see, the only explanation my mother could find for my rude and stubborn reactions, was that I must be on drugs.

There’s no way a person of sound mind would react negatively to her round-the-clock campaign of accusations and harassment. Normal people enjoy getting falsely accused of fantastic crimes, and savor the thrill of round-the-clock gibberish spouted by someone they can’t get rid of.

So the school psychologist kept asking about drugs. Later that day when I got home, I asked “Mom, did you tell my school I’m on drugs?”

“Nooooooo! I would NEVER tell your school you’re on drugs.”

“Because mom, the school psychologist called me into her office and started asking about drugs.”

“Son, I would never tell anyone at your school that you’re on drugs. I would NEVER say you’re on drugs.”

“Mom, they told me you came to school yesterday – and said I’m on drugs.”

“I didn’t tell them you were on drugs!!! How many times do I have to repeat myself?!?”

Deeply offended, she fell silent. A long, somber pause. Then she corrected me:

“I asked if THEY thought you were on drugs.”

DRUGS – Part 2

So I was still trying to get into colleges.

But instead of padding my college applications with “glee club” and stuff I didn’t care about, I was sabotaged by my mother.

Now, my teachers didn’t want me in charge of anything. A peer group adviser – a senior position helping freshmen? Not THIS senior – he was ON DRUGS according to his mother. I got nixed from that.

College admissions people take activities seriously. It really helps you. But not me. Not with the mother I have.

No, you see, I’m a bad person. If strangers see goodness in me, they’re just confused. My mother will set them right. She sees the evil in me, and she’s here to warn my school, and others, about me.

Except Mom forgot one thing – as she often did.

I’m smarter than she is.

So when Mom wasn’t home, I went to the kitchen and got a large Ziploc bag.

I packed the big Ziploc bag with white flour from my mother’s cooking supplies.

The bag looked like $100,000 worth of cocaine. Like a kilo. Like an old Miami Vice episode.

I hid this huge bag of “coke” in the back of my dresser drawer. And I covered it up with all the stuff in my drawer so it looked concealed. Like “Here’s a large shipment of pixie dust, let’s put it right here in our top drawer and hide it under an issue of Car & Driver.”

A week later, I checked. The huge bag of coke was missing.

DRUGS – Part 3

So the bag of “coke” was missing from my drawer.

I fantasized about my mother arriving at the police station with a hundred grand worth of cocaine in a Ziploc bag.

Her theory finally proven – her son is on drugs! Better yet – her son is DEALING drugs. Jackpot!

The cops might throw away a gram of coke, but they’re NOT throwing away a kilo. They must test it – and figure out how this teenage suburban kid is sitting on that much yay.

So they test it. Probably while my mother waits. They test it with their little blue chemical test kit that I saw on TV. But it doesn’t turn blue.

And they say hmm, and they taste it, and it tastes like the rim of a poorly baked cake. Like when their daughter screwed up and made cruddy tasteless cookies in her Easy Bake oven.

And the cops return to my mother’s waiting room and share the news – it’s not cocaine. It’s cooking flour. It’s not worth $100,000. It’s worth less than a dollar. Does she want it back? Because it’s probably hers. And oh, we’re not going to prosecute your son, because having flour is permitted.

No punishment. No rehab. He’s not a drug dealer.

Now here’s the question. At that moment….

Is my mother happy?

Or sad.

Oh, I forgot one thing. When I hid the bag of flour in my dresser, I attached a post-it note that said “cocaine.”

OSAMA BIN LEGO

When Mom gets really annoying, I call my terrorist friend.

His name is Osama Bin Lego.

Yesterday, after Mom yelled at me for an hour, she grabbed a spoon, sat down with a heaping bowl of ice cream…..

Then noticed Osama Bin Lego was standing in it.

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TRUST

Mom doubts everything I tell her.

But she believes everything on TV.

If I tell her to drink more water, she decides water kills you early.

But if a TV character gets a sex change, Mom considers becoming a man.

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PETS

My entire childhood, I wanted a dog. Or a cat. Something with fur.

But Mom was allergic.

Until I found out she isn’t.

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