Mother's Shopping List
Paring Knife
She will lie awake imagining every possible choking hazard, and will remember my small teeth. Pink lady apples, with their crisp, thin skin, are the only fruit I will eat for the better part of my childhood, so she will strip each apple of its dangerous casing. Even when my teeth grow in strong, she’ll only give me the soft parts. She’ll eat the peel herself.
Body Wash
She will learn how to stroke damp toddler hair, how to hold my naked body in a plush pink towel, to inhale the soap smell, to press her lips into the crater of my little girl neck, to blow on the washed skin and tickle my collarbone, to hear the raspberry sound, to feel the laugh spill from my belly, and listen as it fills the whole bathroom, the whole house.
Pork Chops
When I ask if she can teach me to cook, we will make pork chops. I will dunk each slimy slab of meat into the egg wash, then the breadcrumbs, over and over. While she is chopping the vegetables she will notice egg droplets on the counter, crumbs dotting the tile, the way I let things drip and splash. Soon she will be at my side, taking the pork from my hands and wiping up the mess, telling me to wash up, to set the table, saying, it’s just easier if I do it. Really, it’s just faster that way.
Lice Removal Kit
Someday, her hands will be tangled into the roots of my hair. She will tie and comb and pinch and pull until 3 o’clock in the morning. I will lie against the hard kitchen table, bathed in bright light and unable to do anything but listen to the rustle of her fingers across my exposed head. She’ll see every inch of my scalp.
Falafel
In Epcot’s version of Morocco, my family will be standing in front of the food counter, staring at the menu. My mom will ask for a sample of the FOWL-uh-fell. We will all look at her. The what? She’ll point to the menu, confident: the FOWL-uh-fell. We will laugh and laugh as she eats her feh-LAHF-el, laughing all through Epcot, reminding her in every country that she does get some things wrong, and she will laugh with us, as if to say, I know I do. I know.
Tampons
Her voice will be muffled as it comes through the bathroom door, asking me if I need help. I won’t. I’ll emerge victorious, independent, womanly. I’ll begin to wonder what else I do not need from her.
Rearview Mirror
I’ll spend summer evenings practicing for my driving test, my nervous mom in the passenger’s seat, reminding me to check my blind spot and telling me I’m too close to the curb. I will roll my eyes. One night, when the bruised purple sky streaked with orange distracts me as I back out of a parking lot, she will be the one to see the child running behind the car. She will scream my name and we’ll slam to a stop. I’ll let her drive us home.
Pancakes
On a walk while I am home from college, I will mention depression and a school counselor. She will not know where to hold this. She will worry that she has caused it, worry that, somehow, she was the one who tangled up my mind. The next time I visit, she will gather all her courage in her chest, bring me pancakes in the morning, and ask, how is it going, with the counselor and all? I will tell her the truth, which is to say, I will tell her I do not feel like talking about it, and she will grapple with the parts of me that she can no longer wrap in her arms.
Laundry Basket
She will come into my room, often knocking, but not always. She will gather my chaos into her basket, picking up dirty socks and inside-out pants, saying nothing about the stains. Sometimes, there will be leotards that reek of my body. T-shirts marked by my clumsy eating. Bloodstained underwear. Things I’d rather keep hidden, things I could wash myself, but she will say she loves doing this for me. So I will let her.