Sons & Lovers

[mallorys_camera]

So the Cannery Row street fair was a bust. We made money, some money – maybe marginally more than a regular, no frills Sunday – but was it worth it? All that planning, all that hauling, all that wear and tear on my nerves. For days beforehand, I was La Bitch On Wheels.

True, Milo the dog – frustrated because his post-operative spay instructions include the provisio no off-leash exercise for two weeks – went on a rampage, tore the stuffing out of each and every sofa cushion. Then he started on the throw pillows.

True, Max screwed up his SAT II and Physics subject. He couldn’t be bothered to prepare for them, you see. The girlfriend was over the night before, they holed up in the Max-o-torium behind closed doors with the lights off. At nine o’clock I made Ben knock on the door, tell Max it was time to take Maya home.

The next morning I said to Max, "I have to talk to you about something that’s potentially embarrassing for both of us."

"Go for it," said Max.

"It’s none of my business whether you and Maya have a sexual relationship. And I’m not going to ask. However, if you are having a sexual relationship, I need to emphasize the importance of using protection."

"I’ve got it covered, Mom," said Max.

No pun intended, I’m sure.

Well, of course, they have a sexual relationship. Why wouldn’t they? She’s gorgeous, he’s gorgeous, they’re pumping out hormones faster than the entire research and development department of Levitra Incorporated. And I’m not going to be a hypocrite about it.

However when Max called me at the store a couple of hours later to tell me (A) he was sure he’d fucked up the Physics and (B) that I had forgotten to sign him up for the math, I completely lost it. "You never told me to sign you up for math," I screamed. "What am I – a mind reader? I signed you up for what you told me to sign you up for –"

"Well, you’re supposed to know – "

Bam! I hung up on him.

You cannot have it both ways, I fumed at the dial tone. Either you’re an adult capable of assuming adult responsibilities and that means imparting essential information along the necessary channels or you’re a kid who shouldn’t be boinking his girlfriend in my house without giving me the option of selling the video to Pay-Per-View.

I didn’t talk to him for two days. During this time I talked plenty to Ben about jocks and how much I hated them, arrogant fucking monsters, and wasn’t it ironic that I had given birth to one –

"That’s sad," said Ben, "and I feel for you, I really do, but right now we need to figure out how we’re going to track the sales we make from the street fair booth –"

We made up at the street fair. Max manned the store, Ben and I alternated gopher duties with delivering the hot sauce rap to streetside strangers. I felt like one of those Amsterdam hookers in their glass booths – say Sailor, can I interest you in The Ring of Fire? My jaw muscles ached at the end of the day from smiling so hard.

Max won Ghiradelli’s ice cream eating contest. The prize? A ten pound piece of chocolate. "So, Mom, bet you’re not so mad at me now, now that I’ve won this," he grinned.

"I’m prouder of you over this accomplishment than I am over anything else in your life," I said. "And that includes maintaining a 4.1 grade point average and learning to pee standing up. I think we can both agree that I’ve acted as your agent here and so 15% of that belongs to me –"

"You know what’s weird? This thing is 12.5% of Maya’s entire weight –"

"So, Max, does a life in retail appeal to you? You know son, some day all this will be yours –"

"Mom, it sucks. I’m gonna go to law school."

"That’s my boy," I said. "We better sign you up to take that test over again. And this time you damn well better prepare for it."

Comments

[thewindrose.livejournal.com]

You sound like a great mom! I admire your consistency and your fairness.

[hipstertrash.livejournal.com]

I worry about Max sometimes. In saying that, I realize that a good 90% of it is pretty much internal, my own conflicts bubbling up in response to your portrayals of him.

I've lived through that world. I didn't have a 4.1, and I wasn't on the basketball team ... Max strikes me as the kind of guy who I would have been on good terms with from a distance. Mutual respect.

I'm not sure that I can name one guy from my 50-odd graduating class who didn't either A) give up on the teams and the GPA and the SAT business long before junior/senior year, deciding in the midst of 'greatness' to become ... whatever they became, 'normal' people, I guess; B) blew a fuse somewhere along the way; or C) maybe had stirrings of discontent, that there was something else out there, but resigned themselves to the lives they chose before they knew what the choices were.

I'm not entirely sure where I'm going with this ... if he wasn't quite so smart, quite so achieved, not to mention aware, it wouldn't be this disquieting. Do you ever think that the whens/ifs might become an issue? That one day he'll get fed up with being the golden boy and watch the ground beneath his feet fall away?

[mallorys-camera.livejournal.com]

It's my other kid who's gonna blow a fuse, actually -- the preternaurally beautiful Robin. (I say this knowing that when mothers make predictions like this, it's tantamount to an evil fairy's curse. But there's a part of me that's always an observer and I see what I see.) The thing about Max is that he's remarkably grounded. Plus he has a step-brother (his father's side) who's been through rehab three times now. I don't actually care where he goes to college or even if he goes right away. But I want all the options to be open to him.

SAT

[(Anonymous)]

At least in my day, you could ask the testing service to not count your SAT scores within 3 days of the test.
Ken L.