I call my mom almost every weekday morning, but we generally take weekends off because we’re both very busy, important people. So her call, on Sunday, came as a surprise.
“I have something very important to tell you,” she said.
My stomach flipped. I immediately thought of my sister, filming a Steve Irwin-type adventure show in Australia, the deadliest continent on the planet.
This is it, I thought. Hailey’s been eaten by a crocodile. I knew this day would come.
“What?”
Matt, who had watched me halt mid-stride and heard the quaver in my voice, looked up from his laptop, his eyebrows a full inch higher than usual.
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| Those lovable nutjobs |
“Did you know that when your father goes to the bathroom, he counts the tiles on the walls and floors? He can tell you exactly how many tiles there are in the bathrooms of every home we’ve ever owned.”
“What?!”
I let out a long breath of air. For Matt’s benefit, I shook my head and rolled my eyes ceiling-ward. He resumed typing.
I pictured my parents sitting side-by-side at a honky-tonk Austin bar, an icy pitcher of Miller Light between them. I wondered how much of that sweet nectar remained.
“I just thought you should know since we’re related to him,” Mom continued, laughing. “Wait – you’re related to him. I’m not. So you should know.”
I repeated this news to Matt. After all, our offspring would feature genes from both nutjobs on the other end of the call.
“But does he count them all or count across and down and then multiply?” Matt asked.
I repeated the question for Mom.
“I don’t know,” she said. “Here, you ask him.”
“Your mother thinks I’m Rainman,” Dad said.
“You count tiles in the bathroom?” I asked. “Do you count them all or count across and down and then multiply?”
“Both,” he said.
“Both?! And it never occurred to you to mention any of this when I was getting tested for O.C.D. as a child?!”
He didn’t seem to hear this last question.
“You know those holes in shower drains?” Dad asked. “I count those too.”
He returned Mom’s cellphone.
“How on earth did this topic of conversation come up?” I asked.
“You know that Kendle you got me?”
Mom never can remember the name of Amazon’s eReader.
“Kindle,” I said.
“Yes, Kindle,” she said. “Well, you put a book on it about a guy--”
“'The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime,'” I said.
“Yes! And we were talking about it with the bartender and Dad said, ‘Well, you know, I count tiles in the bathroom,’” she said. “And I always thought Sheldon Cooper from ‘The Big Bang Theory’ was a little strange, but he’s not strange; his brain is messed up --like your father’s. He’s not normal. And all this time you had O.C.D.C. and Dad was the source.”
I detected a hint of triumph in her voice.
“So go write a blog about it,” she said.
So I did.
I greeted New Year’s Day 2016 with regret and a hangover, the product of too much pinot and the realization that the moments-long rest I had snuck into the last of my ever-frequenting trips to the restroom had transported me four hours into the future to 3 a.m.; my husband was climbing into bed, the kitchen had been cleared and our party guests were gone. WORST. HOSTESS. EVER.
I traded my jeans and sweater for pajamas and stumbled into the bathroom. I gobbled two Tylenol and, swallowing, studied my reflection in the mirror. God, I look old. How did we get to 2016? How is that even a real year?
I joined Matt under the covers and engaged in my typical post-drinking ritual: analyzing and reanalyzing every stupid thing Alcohol made me say and do the night before. Last night’s list included: pre-screening a friend’s friend as potential dating material for my single sister, Hailey; drunkenly humming “Imagine” and becoming irate with Brice, my annoyingly young Cranium teammate, for failing to correctly identify the “Humdinger;” eating that second bowl of chili. And I had so many questions, all of which would remain unanswered until I could quiz Matt in the morning (not the insanely early “morning” of the present but the acceptable, reasonable “morning” of hangovers – 10 or 11 a.m.) Left to captain the ship alone, did he remember to tune in to the Times Square ball drop ABC infuriatingly tape delays three hours for west coast viewers? Did our six guests drink any of the six varieties of sparkling wine I binge bought at Safeway? Did Kelsey follow-through with her vow to smooch Bonnie, our rotund feline, at midnight?
I can now sympathize with my mother; As far as I know, Mom has failed to consciously greet any New Year’s Day of the past three decades. She’s not one for champagne toasts or fireworks. On every New Year’s Eve I can recall, she’s mysteriously disappeared from the festivities by 9 p.m. By 10 p.m., we generally find her facedown in bed.
On New Year’s Eve 1999, my family, my mom’s sister’s family and my grandmother sought refuge from Y2K on a houseboat anchored in the middle of a north Georgia lake. Convinced the power grid would fail and planes would plunge from the sky, Hailey insisted our parents stockpile the boat with bottled water and toilet paper. The world could end but we’d be well-hydrated and sporting clean hinies.
That New Year’s Eve celebration occurred well before I reached the drinking age and at least a decade before I advanced to the “sleeping age” – that profoundly disappointing stage in life when too much red wine and the lure of a soft pillow can temporarily prove stronger than the party underway in the next room –- but other than the world not ending, I don’t recall all the details.
So in between chili-flavored burps and my mental recital of transgressions, I texted Mom and Hailey this morning:
Me: “What do you remember about Y2K?”
Mom: “That I went to sleep early.”
Hailey: “I remember making mom and dad stock up on gallons of water and food for the houseboat and then anchoring off on that island on the houseboat with the Storeys and watching the fireworks and me trying everything to wake Mom up but she wasn't phased. I remember talking about the Watergate scandal (random). And I remember us watching Australia to see if it was going to blow up when it hit the new year first.”
Ironically, Hailey spent this New Year’s Eve in Australia, where she’s temporarily living. And as far as I know, that country didn’t blow up. But I’ll have to check the delayed taped telecast to make sure.
