soda when peals of girlish laughter drifted across the grass to me.
Looking up, I saw my mother and Aunt Mae, collapsed against each other and pointing at me with great delight. I could cheerfully have strangled them both, but I managed to shake my head and to mouth the words, “I don’t know you.” They looked confused, but at least stopped their sophomoric act, as I walked over to them. I loudly gave them directions on how to get to a restaurant near the Wharf Rat, along with many gestures, and then muttered, “Go to the Rat. I’ll meet you shortly.” Chastened, they hurried away, and I sauntered to my car.
There, I wiggled out of my failed costume, tossing it and my cap and glasses into the backseat and revealing the jeans and shirt I had fortunately worn underneath. I may have looked a little sweaty and disheveled, but at least I was me again—if indeed I had ever been anyone else.
As I approached their table at the Rat, both women looked quite relieved to see me in something like normal garb and began simultaneously to babble apologies for blowing my cover. I had no choice, of course, but to tell them what was going on and why. Over my beer and their white wine and salads, we sorted it all out, apologies were accepted and we all returned to something like normal.
Both women were naturally concerned for Cindy and outraged at whoever was causing her, and peripherally me, such distress. Both my mother and my aunt had been widowed young, but under very different circumstances. Aunt Mae’s husband had died in his late forties of a sudden cerebral hemorrhage. Aunt Mae had never remarried, being unable to find a man she considered even half as wonderful as Uncle Frank had been. She began raising herbs to fill some of the painfully empty time, and became so good at it, she now had a large herb garden and had converted her garage into a small but well-known shop where she sold both dried and potted herbs in season. She had even published two little books on the subject, and actually sold a fair number of them.
Mom’s widowhood came along much more dramatically. My father died when I was twelve and Sonny fourteen, which would have put Mom at about thirty-seven or -eight. As I remember him, my father was a heavy drinker and not a merry one. Although he never abused any of us physically, he was sarcastic, critical and withdrawn. He hated his job. Although he was good at it, he always left the impression that he was much too intelligent to be manager of the local supermarket and that somehow Mom, Sonny and I had entrapped him there.
The summer that changed our lives for the worse and then for the better, had Provincetown sideswiped by a powerful hurricane. Dad had closed the market early, seen to it that the large glass windows were covered with plywood, that the generator was set up to kick in if—when—the power failed, etc. He then visited his favorite bar and fortified himself and finally came home, angry at the many inconveniences he had suffered already that day.
By then Mom had pulled her car into the garage, and the three of us had dragged the outdoor furniture into the basement and closed any windows, doors and attic vents we could find. We had just gathered all the candles in the house when Dad drove into the yard, obviously and vocally pissed that he had to get out and re-open the garage door in the pouring rain.
The night was a horror. Dad blew a gasket when he found that dinner consisted of do-it-yourself cold sandwiches. Mom was worn out from helping move all the furniture, and making the house as secure as possible; hot food was out of the picture anyway, as the power had long since failed. Dad retired to the den and sat in front of a black TV screen with his scotch.
Mom, Sonny and I sat in the kitchen, listening to sounds we did not realize the house could make and survive. The building that was always so cozy in winter now presented us with chill drafts it had never before allowed to
Looking up, I saw my mother and Aunt Mae, collapsed against each other and pointing at me with great delight. I could cheerfully have strangled them both, but I managed to shake my head and to mouth the words, “I don’t know you.” They looked confused, but at least stopped their sophomoric act, as I walked over to them. I loudly gave them directions on how to get to a restaurant near the Wharf Rat, along with many gestures, and then muttered, “Go to the Rat. I’ll meet you shortly.” Chastened, they hurried away, and I sauntered to my car.
There, I wiggled out of my failed costume, tossing it and my cap and glasses into the backseat and revealing the jeans and shirt I had fortunately worn underneath. I may have looked a little sweaty and disheveled, but at least I was me again—if indeed I had ever been anyone else.
As I approached their table at the Rat, both women looked quite relieved to see me in something like normal garb and began simultaneously to babble apologies for blowing my cover. I had no choice, of course, but to tell them what was going on and why. Over my beer and their white wine and salads, we sorted it all out, apologies were accepted and we all returned to something like normal.
Both women were naturally concerned for Cindy and outraged at whoever was causing her, and peripherally me, such distress. Both my mother and my aunt had been widowed young, but under very different circumstances. Aunt Mae’s husband had died in his late forties of a sudden cerebral hemorrhage. Aunt Mae had never remarried, being unable to find a man she considered even half as wonderful as Uncle Frank had been. She began raising herbs to fill some of the painfully empty time, and became so good at it, she now had a large herb garden and had converted her garage into a small but well-known shop where she sold both dried and potted herbs in season. She had even published two little books on the subject, and actually sold a fair number of them.
Mom’s widowhood came along much more dramatically. My father died when I was twelve and Sonny fourteen, which would have put Mom at about thirty-seven or -eight. As I remember him, my father was a heavy drinker and not a merry one. Although he never abused any of us physically, he was sarcastic, critical and withdrawn. He hated his job. Although he was good at it, he always left the impression that he was much too intelligent to be manager of the local supermarket and that somehow Mom, Sonny and I had entrapped him there.
The summer that changed our lives for the worse and then for the better, had Provincetown sideswiped by a powerful hurricane. Dad had closed the market early, seen to it that the large glass windows were covered with plywood, that the generator was set up to kick in if—when—the power failed, etc. He then visited his favorite bar and fortified himself and finally came home, angry at the many inconveniences he had suffered already that day.
By then Mom had pulled her car into the garage, and the three of us had dragged the outdoor furniture into the basement and closed any windows, doors and attic vents we could find. We had just gathered all the candles in the house when Dad drove into the yard, obviously and vocally pissed that he had to get out and re-open the garage door in the pouring rain.
The night was a horror. Dad blew a gasket when he found that dinner consisted of do-it-yourself cold sandwiches. Mom was worn out from helping move all the furniture, and making the house as secure as possible; hot food was out of the picture anyway, as the power had long since failed. Dad retired to the den and sat in front of a black TV screen with his scotch.
Mom, Sonny and I sat in the kitchen, listening to sounds we did not realize the house could make and survive. The building that was always so cozy in winter now presented us with chill drafts it had never before allowed to
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