Motherhood, The Second OldestProfession (8 page)

What kind of a mother would...

have her maternity clothes bronzed?

Cora

Cora is an important character in this book. Mostly because adults do a lot of kidding about children.

Complaining is a mother's escape hatch. That's why you hear a lot of, “Go out and play in the traffic” or “Marrying your father was my first mistake. You were my second.” And on a bad day, “If God had meant for me to take you to church, I Ie would have put restrooms at the end of each pew.”

It's important that you meet Cora in the examination room at her gynecologist's. There's always something intimidating about the place.

Maybe it's because you're sitting in a chilled room in a paper dress (you've set drinks on a bigger piece of paper) waiting to discuss intimate things with a man who is two years younger than your cookie sheet.

On this day Cora cleared her throat and wished her feet looked better. The heels were cracked and her toenails needed cutting. She wished her whole body looked better. Since she stopped smoking six months ago, her body looked like an avocado. Even when she sucked in her stomach, nothing moved. Maybe he could give her a diet.

She reasoned she was stupid to come. There probably was nothing wrong with her. She was just tired. And probably ready for the estrogen connection.

The examination lasted less than three minutes and after a couple of questions and a few notations, the doctor smiled and said, “Congratulations: you're going to become a mother.”

Cora looked him in the eye for the first time since he came into the room. “I'm going to become a what?”

“Mother,” he said. “As in Teresa, McCree, and Nature.”

She threw her arms around his neck and for a reason that made no sense to either of them, said, “Thank you!”

Cora couldn't believe it. For years she and Warren had tried everything. They had kept charts, burned candles, sought adoption, and even gone into debt (which everyone said was a sure-fire way to get pregnant). Nothing. Motherhood eluded her.

“You know I'm thirty-eight,” said Cora, anxiously.

The doctor was without expression. “If you'd waited another year, the birth could have been covered by Medicare, not to mention The New York Times. Your uterus is tilted, so we're going to take some precautions.”

Eleven weeks into her pregnancy, Cora climbed into bed and remained there until the birth of the baby six months later.

She ate her meals from a tray that Warren prepared every morning, watched soaps and game shows, read, and entertained the parade of soothsayers who wanted to relieve her of her happiness.

Her mother said, “Tell me again. What happened?”

Her sister-in-law said, “Are you aware the kid will take your social security card for Show and Tell?”

Her husband offered to lace her bran with Valium.

Her neighbor warned she'd feel different when the kid sat around connecting liver spots on Mommy's arms.

Her paper boy said, “I thought you were the oldest mother in North America, but I looked it up in the Guinness Book of World Records and there was a woman who gave birth when she was 57 years and 129 days.”

Her former boss told her that the expression, “Children keep you young,” was first said by a nineteen-year-old mother in Milwaukee who denied saying it when she turned twenty-two.

Somewhere in this chapter it should be said that most children are wanted. For every child abandoned in a bus station, there's a list of adoptive parents who have waited and prayed for years to hold a baby.

For every woman who has an abortion there are women who are fighting for both of their lives against stiff odds.

For every mother who complains how much a child costs, how much trouble they are, and how much different their lives would have been without them, there are thousands of women who would not have been whole without them.

In May, Cora delivered a healthy six-pound, five-ounce son. She had never known before, nor would ever know again, such a feeling of exhilaration.

There is a lot of Cora in most of us. More than we like to admit. At whatever age, we are awed by the miracle that stirs inside us. We are filled with joy and wonder by the process that gives us our immortality. Why are we so reluctant to admit it?

Stepmothers with Bad P. R.

SNOW WHITE'S STEPMOTHER

It was Queenie White's first marriage.

At thirty-seven, it was something she thought would never happen. Sometimes she had to pinch herself to make-sure it wasn't a dream. She was married to a successful king, with a castle in the suburbs and a small beautiful child who looked like something out of a Pampers ad.

It should have been idyllic, but it wasn't. Snow resented her for marrying her father. Why couldn't it have been just the two of them? They were happy before she came along. At the wedding Snow had informed her new stepmother that she was wearing something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue. The symbolism was all wrapped up in one garment—a pair of raggy, (ailed jeans.

Queenie knew Snow was spoiled, but she was resigned to patience and never burdened her husband with the problem.

When Snow gave a slumber party at the castle for the jousting team, she covered for her. She took the blame for the dent in the King's carriage. She kept silent when she saw Snow and some friends smoking the croquet lawn.

One day she looked at her image in the mirror and said aloud, “Mirror, mirror on the wall, who's the stupidest of them all?” Before the mirror opened its mouth, she knew the answer.

Things couldn't continue. She dropped by Snow's room.

“Snow,” she said softly, “we're not close and I don't know why."

“Because you're heartless and cruel,” said Snow. “And you wish I'd split because I'm a constant reminder of how beautiful my mother was.”

“I'd like for us to get along because we both love the same man and he deserves better,” said Queenie.

“Stick it in your mirror,” said Snow. “You think I haven't caught you carrying on a conversation with it? You're weird!”

“Do you have any idea what love really is? It's caring enough to tell you the truth even at the risk of losing your love. Why don't you get your act together? Stop dressing like trick or treat. Get some order to your life. Enroll at junior college. Volunteer. Or I'll tell your father what you've been up to.”

That night, fearful that Queenie would make good her threat, Snow headed for the forest outside of San F'rancisco. She spotted a small cabin in the clearing, occupied by a commune. It was the first time she had ever checked in anywhere without a reservation. For the next three years, Snow played the guitar, grew her own vegetables, and made owl macrame planters for a local florist.

There is probably no guilt in this world to compare with that of a stepmother who has driven a child away from the family hearth. Queenie tried daily to find her.

Then one day a courier brought word from Snow.

Queenie duly reported it to her husband.

“We've found Snow.”

“That's wonderful,” said the King.

“Not so wonderful,” said Queenie. “She's living in the forest in a commune.”

“So, it could be worse. She could be living with a man.”

“She's living with seven of them. All dwarfs.”

“I want her home,” said the King.

Snow returned with a husband, a baby, and asked to be reinstated in the family.

The couple and their child slept on mattresses surrounded by candles in sand, drank goat's milk, and ate sunflower seeds. They meditated and chanted all day long.

Queenie stood in front of the mirror one day and said, “Mirror, mirror on the wall, what must I do to survive it all?”

And the mirror answered, “Drink!”

CINDERELLA'S STEPMOTHER

Her name was Buffy Holtzinger.

But to the world of fairy tales, she was identified only as “Cinderella's mean, evil, ugly stepmother.”

Buffy attracted losers like a white dress attracts spots. First there was Ray, who left her high and dry with one small daughter and another on the way. And then there was Eugene, who brought his daughter, Cinderella, to (lie marriage, then split to get in touch with his feelings.

Buffy was one of the first working mothers in her neighborhood. She held no illusions that she was a “real” mother (a fact which Cinderella reminded her of at least fifteen times a day). She worked. She came home. She shouted until she had varicose veins of the neck. She fell into bed. There was no doubt in her mind that if she continued raising three teenaged girls by herself she'd end up like Rapunzel sitting in a tower braiding her hair. She had to get them married off if she were to survive.

Her two natural daughters were bad enough. They were surly. They lounged around the house all day reading the Palace Enquirer (a gossip rag) and waiting for someone to spoon-feed them.

Goofing off Buffy could handle. But it was Cinderella's active imagination that drove her up the wall. From the beginning, Cinderella played with the truth like most kids play with their gum—stretching it, rearranging it, hiding it, and disguising it. She told her teacher in the third grade that her “stepmother” made her play outside naked in the snow. She told them her stepsisters got silk dresses for Christmas and she got a certificate to be “bled.” She told everyone her stepmother hated her because she was pretty and made her wax the driveway.

One night, when Buffy was needlepointing a sampler that said, “you have to kiss a lot of toads before you find your prince,” she summoned Cinderella to talk.

“Cinderella, why do you say things that aren't true?”

“I don't,” said Cinderella defensively. “I do everything around here. I'm nothing but a slave. You like your kids better than you like me. Daddy and I were happy before you came along. If he were here, things would be different.”

“All of us have chores,” said Buffy tiredly. “And if all of you get them done you can go to the ball next Friday night. How would you like that?”

“Who are we kidding here?” snapped Cinderella, as she headed for the door. “You'll think of something to chicken out. The pots won't be sparkling enough or the floor won't shine enough. I hate you and I hate your stupid warts!”

“They're not warts! They're moles!” shouted Buffy after her.

The next Friday was predictable. Buffy's two older daughters made a stab at finishing their chores, but Cinderella was doing her Butterfly McQueen number. She flicked a speck of dust off with her finger, blew on it, and went on to the next brick.

Buffy called her bluff. “That's it! I made a rule and I'm going to hold you to it. You're grounded.”

Several hours later no one was more shocked to see Cinderella at the ball than Buffy. She grabbed one of her daughters and said, “How did she get here?”

She popped another cheese puff into her fat cheeks. “She's telling everyone a fairy godmother made a coach out of a pumpkin, a coachman out of a white rat, footmen out of lizards, and horses out of frightened mice.”

“Oh God,” moaned Buffy. “Tell me she didn't say that to the reporter from the Palace Enquirer. They're going to put her away in a ha ha house. You tell her to get herself home or she won't be able to sit down for a week.”

Cinderella met a shoe salesman that night at the ball and married him several months later. Happiness continued to elude Buffy when Cinderella submitted a manuscript to a publisher called Stepmommie Dearest. The title was changed to Cinderella and the book became an instant best seller.

It is credited with saving millions of women from a second marriage who are now living happily ever after.

HANSEL AND GRETEL'S STEPMOTHER

Wilma met Hansel and Gretel's father at a woodcutters' convention and it was magic. They liked the same music, the same food, and the same jokes. No one was surprised when, three days later, Wilma gave up her job as a secretary to marry Herb and go live with him and his two children in the forest.

From the beginning, Wilma sensed that the children resented her presence. They set the table for three. They coughed on her porridge so she couldn't eat it. And one night they put a dead wolf in her bed.

“Maybe they're getting too much sugar,” she suggested to Herb. “They seem so hyper.”

“Nonsense,” he said. “They're just active little children. Try to have a little fun with them.”

Wilma tried. She took them on picnics and they tied her to a tree. She read them little stories and they put a candle under her dress. Finally, Wilma faced the problem realistically. They were the type of children who would kill both parents and make you feel sorry for them because they were orphans.

When she told Herb that something had to be done about their behavior, he said, “So, what's your solution?”

“I think we should take them out into the forest and dump them.” Seeing the horrified look on his face, she said, “I'm only kidding, Herb. Can't you take a joke?”

But just at that moment, a plan began to form in the warped little minds of Hansel and Gretel ... a plan to get Wilma out of their lives for good. They planned an outing in the forest where they purposely got lost. When they returned, they told their father Wilma tried to ditch them. The only way they had found their way back was by dropping crumbs. “She's never liked us,” said Hansel.

“Things were wonderful before she came,” said Gretel.

The next week, they once again planned an outing with their stepmother, and this time disappeared forever, sealing Wilma's fate.

Several days after their disappearance, the little cottage was overrun with authorities taking fingerprints, looking for clues, and questioning Wilma and Herb until they were incoherent.

“There was a Rosemary's Baby quality about those two,” said Wilma. “Something I couldn't put my finger on.”

“They were just active little children,” Herb growled.

“You weren't here the day they strapped 138 pigeons to their arms and said they were going to fly to South America,” said Wilma. “I'm telling you, Herb, those kids were weird.”

“Are you saying you're glad they're gone?” asked the inspector.

“I'm saying I think they planned to run away,” said Wilma.

“Then why did we find crumbs of bread a few feet from the house? Is that the act of children who want to stay lost?”

Wilma had no answer. The case against her was too strong for her defense. She was a stepmother who had never displayed any real affection for her two charges. At one point during the trial, when someone mentioned that these two little children would never be seen again, Wilma laughed uncontrollably.

She was sentenced to life in prison for the questionable demise of two small innocent, helpless children,

Wilma was considered quite mad by those around her and incapable of communication. However, one day in the prison library, Wilma's eyes caught sight of a small story on an inside page of The New York Times. It seemed that two small children were being sought for shoving an old woman into an oven. They had conned their way into her home by telling her they had been abandoned in the forest by a wicked stepmother. After they did the old lady in, they ripped off all her treasures and escaped on the back of a white duck.

A chill went through Wilma's body. She wanted to stay where she was forever. She felt safe there.