Today would have been my mother’s seventy first
birthday. My conversations with her most of the time bordered on the
incomprehensible - for both of us. I can’t remember a time when our
conversations didn’t remind me of the old Burns and Allen show.Burns
and Allen!
Burns and Allen!
Sigh.
Never mind.
One day she came in from one of her doctor appointments and told me that the
doctor had told her that she had a deviated nasal septum.
I said “Oh a Coke nose.”
She “ A coke nose? What’s that ?
I “That’s where you sniff too much coke and it eats the lining out.”
She “ But doesn’t it fizz when it goes up your nose?”
Momma and the attack of the orange bumble bees came about because I decided to spray an
infestation of bees that were boring into the rafters of a tool shed where I
worked on my projects. The shed was important because it kept me safe from
the slightly distrustful eyes of my mother, along with the cat‘s, the pet
coon‘s, the dog‘s and various neighbor's. All of whom had ample reason for
wanting to keep an eye on me. Just as an excuse to see what I was up to, the
shed held up one end of her clothes line. Or maybe it was the other way
around.
Not seeing any pesticide handy, I grabbed the only spray around, a can of
army surplus, fluorescent orange spray paint. I gave it a few shakes and
sprayed the bees that were in their burrows. Usually on the only part of
their bodies that was visible in the hole was sprayed - their butts.
I was really disappointed in the insect killing ability of the paint. The
bees were buzzing, both literally and figuratively. They were making the
same noise I heard drifting out the front door of Chad‘s Rose Room near my
grandmother's house when the bar discussion was fixing to spill out on the
street. Not that I would be around that den of iniquity, straining to see a
picture of the stripper of the week that was pastied and pasted in the
little diamond shaped window about two feet above my eye level. Not me.
Anyway, I left the shed before the bees could back out of their holes and
seek out the one who visited such an indignity on them. Or find a suitable
substitute. I wandered down the hill, not noticing my mother coming out the
basement door with a clothes basket on her hip.
The ten or so orange bees slowly backed out and drunkenly lurched through
the air, grasping desperately at anything to give them some support and make
everything quit spinning.
From my fort, I could see the yellow pedal pushers with the flowered blouse
she was wearing, leaning slightly forward while staring intently with the
clothes basket on her hip. Then she started to swat at the air around her
head with her free hand. Feet churning, hands slapping at her hair, she
dropped the wet clothes as she danced around the backyard. One wobbling bee
trying to grab hold of a wildly gyrating flower dropped inside her blouse.
The dance became a bit risqué as she treated the neighbors to some moves
worthy of the floor show at Chads before letting the screen door slam shut
behind her as she “danced“ into the house.
It was only later when I was bringing in her blouse that I had retrieved
from one of the lower limbs of the pecan tree that I realized I might have
played some small part in the attack of the orange bumble bee’s when I heard
her side of the phone conversation with the ladies on the party line ( a
primitive form of a chat room).
Ok, maybe “some small part” is rather mild.
I listened with fascination and no small degree of gathering alarm to Momma
only slightly embellishing the attack of the Orange Bumble Bees more than I
would have. It was then that I saw one of the “gathering alarms” struggling
through her hair leaving little orange foot tracks. I reached out and
flicked it off the top of her head as she was telling them “Yes orange. And
glowing too. Hundreds." It hit the wall with a satisfying splat before
dropping into a leg twitching orange ball. My mother's head snapped around
to see what I was doing. A picture of boyish innocence, I kept my hands
behind my back where she couldn’t see the paint stains and was kicking my
toe on the floor-- to send the still twitching ball in the direction of the
floor furnace while she told the ladies that she thought that the swarm of
glowing orange bees might be connected to the fallout from them testing
those atom bombs.
By the time 2 came in from work and could investigate, I had gotten rid of
most of the evidence, even brushing her hair before she took a nap to get
over a headache. If she wanted to avoid those headaches, she should have napped till I was grown.
I miss you.
posted by lighter at 9:19 AM
rimfire at idlehourwebs dot com
Sunday, October 27, 2002
© LCM3
Rimfire at Idlehourwebs dot com
