It’s
easier to get a turtle out of its shell than a husband out of the
bathroom. I’ve found pounding on the door while hollering
“Isn’t your ass cold?” is not an effective
strategy. Sliding notes under the bathroom door also yields poor
results:
“Hello!
I’m the trash. Please take me out!” “Hello!
I’m your dog. Please take me out!” “Hello!
I’m your wife. Please take me out!”
What
irked me the most is I knew exactly what Nick was doing in there. He
was RELAXING, God dammit it. Worse yet, he was RELAXING between the
witching hours of 5:00pm-7:00pm, when the head of every child between
ages of 4-6 begins to spin around like self induced exorcism.
I
believe any parent who engages in such self-centered, egocentric
behavior should lose their phone privileges and be sent to bed
without any supper.
Short
of striking a match to the door, dinner was the only event that
inspired Nick to emerge from the bathroom. Nick loves food. I
mean he LOVES food and talks about it like a teenage girl processing
her first breakup: incessantly and lacking any linguistic structure.
The presentation, flavor, texture, aroma, presentation, and
post-coital meal bliss all get tossed into Nick’s culinary
monologue, which usually falls on unappreciative ears.
“How
did you prepare this?” Nick asked, chomping into the leg of
Rotisserie Chicken fresh off the Meals-To-Go tanning bed of the deli
department.
“After
whacking it over the head with my butter churn, I plucked and basted
it in a rich buttery sauce. ” I replied.
Nick
is a natural in the kitchen. He opens the refrigerator door and just
sees a recipe waving to him from the confines of the
compartmentalized drawers. Measuring cups and spoons are not required
tools for Nick as can intuitively “see” how much salt to
add or “smell” when the bacon is about to transition from
crispy to burnt.
Cooking
is not intuitive for me. A recipe must include explicit directions;
preferably a video. If domain specific vocabulary terms such
as
blanch or puree are in the instructions, I do not make it. I
also do not poach things, albeit an egg or an elephant. How or why I
became in charge of our family dinners is beyond me. But I do enjoy a
generous glass of wine or three while cooking. Here’s
what I think happened:
One
day, in the Garden of Eden, Adam was hangry. Having grown
tired
of his incessant complaining, Eve plucked an apple from a branch to
shut him up. Hell, I bet she would have preferred to pick a Bud Light
so he’d really be happy, but her resources were limited.
Throw in the fact that women are biologically engineered to feed
humans and SHAZAM!! Women evolved into walking Wholefoods
Markets.
Flash
forward a gazillion years later…
I’m
submerged in the couch, Day 2 post Chemo. My treatment plan is in
full swing and I woke up that morning without eyelashes. Once again,
my self-image takes a blow as I mourn the loss of another alluring
feature of my femininity and I wonder if I’ll ever feel pretty
again. TV women who want to lose weight and I hate
them.
Nick
strolls into the living room and asks, “What is for dinner?”
His words trigger a savage instinct in me: I decide that I must kill
him.
I
leap from the couch, 121 pounds of flying Adriamycin, and strangle my
hands around his neck. If Paclitaxel
and Docetaxel hadn’t destroyed my fingernails, maybe I would've
gotten the job done.
Nick
swats me away with the ease of a fly and I splat on the kitchen
floor. The tile feels cool against my flush cheek until I notice a
film of dirt on top of the grout and realize I’ve just
discovered something else that needs to be cleaned. Nick
steps
over my body, mumbling something about cancer taking my sanity, and
opens the refrigerator door, oblivious to the opera rumbling inside
of me.
It
takes all my strength to summon up enough energy to sit up and lean
against the kitchen cabinets, grateful for their stability. Nick’s
back is facing me while most of his body has been engulfed by the
refrigerator. He’s opening and sniffing containers of food with
the intensity of a K9 canine making its way through airport
security.
I’m
piqued by a question that’s been looping around in my head for
weeks, one that my mind will not shut up about. Usually, I can summon
enough restraint to brush it aside or swallow it whole but not today.
I take aim at the back of Nick’s head and let it rip.
“Why
don’t you ever go to chemo with me?”
“Because
your sisters do that.” He takes a swing of orange juice
from the container knowing it drives me crazy. I bite my tongue.
“I
think it would be nice if you’d go,” I say.
“Fine,”
He says, wiping his lips with a sleeve. “I’ll go, if you
can just ask the Meal Train people to send something other than
chicken. I’m about to grow feathers.”
I
shrug my shoulders. “It’s what the girls like.”
“Why
is it always about girls?” he growled. “Or your fuckin
cancer. I’m so sick of it.”
He’s
talking to the refrigerator with his mouth full, spooning in heaps of
fettuccine alfredo from the casserole dish.
“I’m
sorry if my cancer has inconvenienced you,” I grit through my
teeth.
He
slaps the lid back on the container then pulls a drumstick from a
bowl of fried chicken.
“You
have to admit your cancer has turned our whole fuckin lives upside
down.” He waves the drumstick at my face as if he’s
conducting an orchestra before ripping a bite of the leg. “What
are you, a Nedrathol?” I cringe at his shameless lack of
manners, which he applauds with a grin.
“Believe
it or not, I didn’t not sign up for cancer. Having my breasts
removed, losing my hair, most of my sanity and being drained of every
ounce of energy has not been fun.”
“Don’t
forget you lost your job too,” Nick points out with the
drumstick.
“Oh…thanks
for the reminder,” I seeth.
“You’re
welcome,” he says with a full mouth. “And by the way we
need to refinance the house.”
“Why
do we need to refinance the house?”
“Because
you're not working.”
“Because
I have cancer.”
“The
bank does care if you have cancer.”
“Why
can’t youget
a second job? You work from 10:00-2:00 and take a two hour lunch.”
“You’ve
always resented my sales hours,” he says. Besides, who would
take care of you and the kids if I got a second job? ”
“Exactly
how are you ‘taking care of me and the kids?’”
“Hey,
I’m the one who found the cancer. If it wasn’t for me
you’d probably be dead by now.” He wiggles five fingers
in the air and points the drum stick at me with the other.
“You’re
welcome.” He slams the refrigerator door louder than
necessary and leaves. I
don’t dignify his comment with a response. Instead I retreated
to the bathroom because the shower is the best place to cry in peace.
My
stomach turns cartwheels until the water pressure drums away enough
steam for me to stand. Anger
and grief pour out of my body, spiraling down the drain into God
knows where. I only know it will show up in some other form
because that kind of energy never goes away, it just finds another
person to sink its teeth into.
The
bathroom is safe because the ceiling fan whirls at a breathtaking
velocity that would even panic a starved seagull off the
beach.
No one can hear me thinking as I unpack all the derogatory language
my husband has been using with increasing volition.
“What’s
that faggot have to be so in your face?” he said, when Gus
Kenworthy shared a victory moment with his boyfriend.
His
argument about the use of the N word, “Blacks use it amongst
each other. It’s racist if I can’t use the same word.”
The
Holocaust. “Genocides happen to every race. Why can’t the
Jews move on with their lives.”
When
I addressed his homophobic, racist or discriminatory language he’d
become more defensive. “Relax, it's only words.”
“All
acts of dehumanization start with words,” I’d tell him.
“And I don’t want those words flying around our house,
getting into the sofa, clinging to the curtains, especially in front
of the kids.” I’m particularly boiling with rage because
he’s rekindled his devotion to the Catholic Church since my
diagnosis.
“Well
it’s my house too; I can say what I want,” he’d
tell me.
“What
would Jesus say?” I’d remind him.
A
cacophony of shrieking noise shatters my emotional breakdown. Even
more concerning, the sound is growing louder and stronger with each
passing pitch, headed right towards me, the mutilated, very
naked person in the shower.
The
door flings open in a fantastic sense of urgency as my daughters
marched into the bathroom: “MMMMOM!!
WE’RE HUNGRY!!”
Damn
that Eve.
The
John is not a private place for mothers, I remind myself.
Again. Children are hard wired to hunt down caretakers and are
fundamentally opposed to knocking, unless it’s time for Trick
or Treat. One of the best things about being a working mother is the
euphoric feeling of locking the bathroom door and not having to worry
about anyone crawling under the stall.
I
peek from behind the shower curtain and notice Julia is toting a
recorder while Sienna’s arm is engulfed by a box of Cheez-Its.
“The
4th graders got recorders today,” Julia reports. “We’re
going to play them at the spring concert. I have to practice.
Every day.” She gives the recorder a little toot in the spirit
of repetition.
“Oh!
That’s exciting,” I say from behind the curtain,
contemplating what to do to preserve my modesty, though it’s
not my naked body I don’t want them to see. It’s my naked
body that looks like it went through a meat grinder. One
thing
I know is true; they have no intention of leaving the bathroom
without me.
I
shut off the shower just in time for Sienna’s daily report.
“Jimmy
Babarosa threw up in gym class,” she informs me.
“Ewww!”
Julia interrupts her practice session to contort her face in disgust.
“Sounds
like he had a rough day,” I said. Behind the curtain, I
strategized the best route to the towel rack and go for it, hoping
Jimmy Babarosa’s stomach bug is enough of a distraction for me
to grab cover.
“Did
they have to put the sand on the floor? Julia asked.
“Yeah!”
said Sienna. “His puke went everywhere. There were chunks of
food in it.”
“His
mother must pack a great sandwich,” I said.
But
I was not quick enough. They saw me; eyes big as moons, wondering
what in the universe happened to their mother’s body.
“Ouch
Mom! That looks like it hurts,” said Julia.
“It
looks worse than it feels.” I lied.
“Did
the cancer do that to you?” asked Sienna.
I
nodded my head. “It’s what I have to do to get the
cancer out of my body.”
“Are
you always going to look that way?” she asked.
“No
honey. My body will heal but it will look a little different.”
Sienna savored this idea alongside a Cheez-It.
“That’s
OK.,” said Julia.
Recorder
practice commenced again.
“Have
a Cheez-It Mom,” said Sienna. “They’re really
good.”
I
squatted down so she could pop a chip in my mouth. She
wrapped
her little arms around me and I buried my face in the softness of her
neck. They saw ME, their mother, not a cancer patient.
“Can
we have S’ghieti for dinner?” Sienna asked.
“Sure,”
I said, gobbling up their strength like Adam did that apple.
“Let’s
go make some dinner,” I said.
We
marched out of the bathroom and into the world; a harmonious
procession of unconditional love. And the band played on.
Contact
Maureen
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