“Having a conversation,” she says as though I've interrupted a matter of great importance. She then turns back to the bush, “You’ll have to excuse her; that must be her Father’s influence. That certainly doesn’t come from the Fetterman side of the family.”
“Just walk away,” I told myself. “Just turn around and go inside.” Wait... no, this might be good... stick around and see what she tells the bush. The latter, more mischievous voice wins and I take a seat by Shorty on the front stoop.
“Well I know she doesn’t look a thing like Mindy but I swear that’s her daughter.” Shorty then nodded in agreement as if the bush was sharing an interesting tidbit of information. She continued, “Yes, but she’ll grow into them. Of course, I've always had beautiful legs. That must be her Father also.” Well, I’m game for schizophrenic episodes but not when I’m the butt of the joke.
Back inside Mom is in the kitchen cleaning up from lunch and Aunt Phyllis is in the living room drinking her Miller Genuine Draft out of a glass... like all Fetterman women do. “You want a beer?” Phyllis says with a devilish grin.
“No she doesn’t!” Mom shouts from the kitchen.
“What what?” Shorty hobbled into the house and sat upon the gold velvet couch she purchased in 1965.
“Phyllis is trying to give Maggie a beer.,” Mom reported with a dismissing huff.
“Then give the kid a beer. What are you now 20?” I would have expected this question had I not been in town to visit for my 18th birthday. I thought she might stop calling me “kid.” Apparently old habits die hard. She took my water glass and dumped its contents onto the plant behind her. I should mention it was a fake plant. She haphazardly splashed beer from her glass into my cup and set it back down just as Mom came in from the kitchen. “You need this more than I do,” Shorty said, motioning to Mom. I laughed and sipped the beer. Score. When I was younger, the more beer Shorty drank, the older I got, and by four in the afternoon, I was smoking cigarettes and watching the stories.
“The pot roast should be done in about 3 hours, so dinner at -” But Shorty cut off Mom before she could finish.
“Wait, I’m getting a message,” she said pressing her hand to her ear and cocking her head to the side, “Dr. Barber says Mindy needs to call Willy right away.” She then placed her hands neatly on her crossed legs.
“Right, dinner will be at 6.” Mom nervously said. Willy is my grandmother’s old maid, and lifelong friend. But she hadn’t come by the house since Shorty had lost her marbles. We all made a mental note of the message and moved on. Time passed quickly with Shorty asking the same questions repeatedly. Time flies when you never change the subject. The Fetterman women were soon drunk and melee ensued. They can be quite shitty to each other sometimes, but all in good fun. Shorty makes fun of Phyllis for buying her “shit-colored towels” for Christmas one year. Mom makes fun of Shorty for throwing burnt rolls from the kitchen at the Thanksgiving guests when they chuckled at the rock hard bread.
“Ah, shit!” Mom shouts from the kitchen. In an instant, we are all in the kitchen to see what all the fuss is about. “The pot roast is burnt. Who put the oven on 450°?” Mom looked inquisitively at everyone in the room.
“Well I wouldn’t have to if you didn’t under cook your pot roast.” Shorty retorted and headed back into the living room. I wasn’t going anywhere; I was hungry and looking at burnt dinner. I poked my head around Mom’s shoulder to get a closer look at the pot roast.
“Smells good,” I said sticking my finger in for a taste.
“Ah!” Mom snapped slapping my hand away. “Three butts in a one butt kitchen! Out! Out!” She shuffled Phyllis and I back into the living room, where Shorty sat dazed, sipping her MGD. When she was young she had great legs and even now she crosses her legs to accentuate her best asset. Still got it. Mom continued her repair of the roast. “Maggie!” She called from the kitchen, “come in here and do these mashed potatoes while I fix the roast.”
“Don’t you listen to her honey you don’t have to do a thing,” Shorty assured me. I really, really love being her favorite. But I was hungry and didn’t mind taking one for the team. I enthusiastically mashed the potatoes while Mom pathetically basted the roast.
“Uh, Phyllis Lee, I mean Lady Bell, I mean Spookie, shit… Mindy! Get me a beer if you don’t mind.” Without a word I retrieved Shorty’s beer and poured being careful to tip the glass to reduce foam. “Thank you sugar,” She smiled.
“Ah ha!” Mom had a eureka experience in the kitchen. Again, there were four butts in the small galley kitchen crowded around the poor burnt roast that had become the object of our fixation. Mom cracked an MGD and dumped it over the singed roast. “Au-jus!” She declared. The beer foamed and fizzled around the burnt lump of meat.
Soon we were dining on Mom’s salvaged entrée. It wasn’t all that bad and I was happy to have the extra beer. Shorty didn’t care for it, saying, “We think it’s too dry.” I wanted to say “We who?” But again, what’s the point?
Mom asked Phyllis how her youngest daughter, Paige, was doing with her new husband and baby. “Fine, fine. Jackson said his first word the other day, ‘shit’.” We all burst into laughter; he’s one of us all right.
“Smartest thing that girl ever did.” I didn’t mind so much that Shorty called me kid. When she called Paige “that girl” it always sounded…well…shitty. Phyllis glared at Shorty. “Well Phyllis Lee, bless her heart she’s dumb as a post.” Whenever Shorty said “bless her heart,” you knew she was setting them up for an insult. Easiest way to be rude is too sugarcoat it a little. That was the southern belle in her. Like the leg crossing thing. I wouldn’t know, I was raised on the east coast with Mom.
We all knew that Shorty wouldn’t be able to live long in this house by herself; that sooner or later the Alzheimer’s would make living alone impossible. We were all just enjoying this time together; care free.
I spent the rest of the evening watching Mom pointlessly struggle to explain to Shorty and Phyllis where we had lived in Dallas a few years prior. “So you drive through North Carolina, down through Georgia and then over or what?” Shorty asked.
“No, no. Not down then over, over then down.” Mom became frustrated trying to explain with simple words. Naturally, she decided a visual aid would be more helpful. She picked an astray up off the coffee table, emptied it into the trashcan and slammed it against the wall. “Kentucky!” she exclaimed. She kept it in place with her elbow and extended her other hand to the coffee table to retrieve a magazine. “Texas!” She looked around the room for another prop. “Maggie, come hold Texas and Kentucky while I go get Tennessee and Oklahoma.” As I grasped the two states, Mom came from the den looking pleased. She thrust Tennessee (a coaster) and Oregon (a plate) against the wall. Phyllis had to hold Tennessee and Oregon so Mom could trace a finger path from Kentucky to Texas. This elaborate display was meant to explain the trip, but it was impossible to decipher the route as Mom had to climb across the mangled bodies of her state holders. It was a freakish game of twister... with props. We all laughed and began dropping states.
A few moments later after Shorty had forgotten, we began the process of retelling the story. This would continue for the rest of the evening.
[writer's note: This story was first committed to paper for a submission to this Literary Magazine and an assignment for a Creative Writing Class. Instructions included that we should always write while considering our purpose in the telling of the story. What did we want to get out of it? Well I suppose I have only one purpose. All Fetterman women are crazy but Shorty is the only one diagnosed as such. The only thing I want to do is tell the story so that I will always have this memory. And perhaps to spare my children from having to tell it to me over and over... and over again someday when I lose my marbles.]
EPILOGUE
I began telling this story to anyone who would listen, seemed interested or happened to bring up a topic that reminded me of it. Many of you know that this is the process that inevitably leads to a new blog posting. That is where the similarities between this story and other self-deprecating, life experience, true stories turned blog posts end.
For years now I have contemplated crafting a book of short stories a la David Sedaris featuring all of my blog posts, as well as several as-yet unpublished stories. However, I find that what draws us, as readers, to compilations of short stories is not in their individual appeal or worth; it is in the overall theme and underlying idea that unfolds through the telling of brief moments in time. Everything that I am as a writer, a person and a woman comes from the amazing women I've only briefly introduced you to today. And until today at 2 o'clock in the afternoon this story had been trapped in antiquated floppy disk hell in a junk drawer at my Mother's house. “I can't finish the novel I've been working on for 6 years,” I've always said when asked about my writing, “because I can't find this one story. The story. The story that started it all. That story is my beginning, my middle and my end.”
Over the years I've attempted to recreate it but have never been successful. My writing process is infamous to those unfortunate enough to come into contact with me on a “writing day.” I've written in excess of 20 versions of this story. Each one judged inadequate and deleted immediately upon completion. The first few years I convinced myself that my harsh self-criticism came from a feeling of insecurity based upon the overwhelmingly positive reception that the original received mixed with feelings of inadequacy at how easily the words had previously arrived into my head.
Now I realize that while that answer may have explained my dormant phase from the time this was submitted (2003) until 2007, the remaining years of inactivity on this piece have an entirely different cause. Evelyn “Shorty” Fetterman died on February 5th, 2007. While it is always difficult finding humor in death, that only contributes to what I believe to be the larger reason for my mental block (in regards to finishing the book). No story has a happy ending. While there may be a happy conclusion to the end of a story, all stories end in death. Everyone dies. It has taken me 2 years to realize that I haven't been able to recreate this story, or even get a good start on that damned book, because my intense admiration and love for Shorty rendered me unable to emotionally commit to a story conveying her as a main inspiration in my life when I still had not reconciled her death. I now know that I will never get over her death, but it has become more important that I share her charm, wisdom, humor and …. shitty one-liners with at least my friends... and at best the world.
I have chosen to submit this story nearly untouched (save a few comma removals and typos that I am shocked made it past the dreaded "Professor's red pen"). I only hope that the emotion generated upon finding it, reading it and subsequently writing this Epilogue have unlocked some hidden door inside me behind which all ability to finally embark on the telling of this full story lay hidden.[writer's note: My mother, Mindy Fetterman, wrote a piece for USA Today titled “The Burden of Caring for Elderly Parents” which was later republished on ABC News.com and several other nationwide news sources and relevant community forums. I find the most heartening line to be its final: “Evelyn Fetterman died in February at age 84. She had been living in an assisted living or a nursing home for 10 years. Her daughters are sad and tired. They miss their Mom the way she used to be. They're relieved that it's all over. And for that, they feel terrible.”]
