DRUNK ON NUTTY LOVE

Do you know any sloppy drunks?  You know, the kind that after a few cocktails get all maudlin and sad and wax philosophic about the human condition, or express their deep and abiding love for you and every other living thing with the utmost sincerity (at least in the moment), as they cling to your hand, hug you too long, or gaze blearily into your skeptical eyes?

That's me at some point over the holidays, but without the booze.  It's short-lived.  Mostly I'm not a fan of the forced intimacy and expected good cheer of Christmas, but there is generally a moment when it all comes into emotional sharp relief and I get drunk on love and gratitude.

And that moment often involves a "visitation" from my mother.  She's been dead for 9 years, but around Christmastime she decides to float on back and hang out with me.  Even as I write this the tears are falling because she is punishing me with her love again.  She is forgiving me for being judgmental, rude at times, dismissive; for taking her for granted.  She is reminding me that she loves me anyway, in that Christlike way of mothers, and that her sacrifices were made from her heart and because she had no other choice.  Love just is.

She's also sort of smug about watching my pity party of longing to sit and talk with her.  "See?  NOW you miss me!  Now you're 67 years old and your "kids" are grown and you worry about them anyway, your grandkids are precious but exhausting, your eyesight is a struggle and for some reason you can't hear your husband quite so clearly as you used to when he turns his head away and keeps talking.  You nod asleep in front of the TV at night and you wake up way too early in the morning.  You try to keep your body healthy, but you share my sugar addiction and losing weight is hard!  The world is moving so fast and sometimes it all seems confusing and overwhelming and you think war, famine, and pestilence are just around the corner, especially with a crazy Republican in the White House!  You think a lot about the past and have some new curiosity about your genealogy.  You realize you are the only one left of your original family and that particular loneliness is completely unexpected. You wish I was around to talk to about all of this.  You wish you could tell me you are sorry for being so impatient with those very same issues when I talked about them.  Well, nope!  I'm dead!"  And she smiles -- with love, wisdom, and bit of quiet self-righteousness.  (She was not an overtly vengeful person, but she could "silent treatment" you into submission.)

So, there's all that and also the memories of Christmases she created, the food, the decorations, the gifts, all the usual family Christmas stuff that she pretty much did single-handedly (see: "taking her for granted" above).   Some of that I've retained, some I've let go.  But I have a deep appreciation for her, for all of it, and I do wish I could tell her so.

The other day I remembered a tiny tradition that I'd nearly completely forgotten over the years.  Mom used to buy mixed shelled nuts.  You see them in bins in the produce section:  almonds, hazelnuts, walnuts, pecans, Brazil nuts.  She had a wooden bowl, the same bowl each time, where she'd put the nuts and the nutcracker and picks.  The bowl sat on the kitchen table and I remember my dad, more than anyone else, sitting in his place at the table, bowl before him, as he cracked and ate with delight.

I don't think my granddaughters have ever seen nuts in the shell, have ever cracked open a nut to find the meaty prize inside.  Today I got Mom's bowl down from the top shelf where it has been ignored for years, filled it with nuts I bought at the grocery store, placed cracker and picks atop the pile, and now it awaits the arrival tonight of the family for our traditional Christmas Eve buffet.

Like those nuts,  Mom and I often bumped up against our unique tough exteriors, but inside there was the reward of dense, sweet substance, different each from the other but still a delight.

If she was here, I'd cry into that bowl, drunk on love.  I guess, actually, that's exactly what I'm doing.  Her spirit is here with me, happy to see me and asking why in the world I didn't bake any Christmas cookies?!?

At least, that's the view from here...©