Regarding Nora Henderson

It was a quarter after three o’clock in the afternoon and Luke would be arriving from school shortly.  Luke, was Nora’s grandchild, the youngest son of her eldest daughter Elizabeth.  The boy attended a nearby elementary school and, although at thirteen he was old enough to be left home alone while he awaited his parents’ return from work, had been ordered to report to Nora’s house after school everyday due to an incident some months earlier.  A precocious teen, endowed with a great deal of mathematical and scientific intellect, Luke had witnessed a pyrotechnic experiment on youtube and attempted to practice it in the family backyard to near disastrous results.  It was the quick intervention of the next door neighbor that prevented the family home from becoming a pile of burning hot black ashes.  Luke was never to be home alone again. 

Nora Henderson was the stout, talkative, very inquisitive (read: nosey), recently widowed matriarch of a clan of 8 children, 13 grandchildren and some well placed sons and daughters in-law.  On this Friday, she packed a weekend bag and planned yet another surprise visit to her youngest daughter Patricia’s home, or as Elizabeth and the other siblings called it, her babysitting gig.  For the past few months, whenever Nora attempted to reach Patricia on a Friday, Saturday or Sunday, she was out and about in Manhattan.   Her maternal instinct (read: nosiness) told her that Patricia was in a relationship, which gave her wild excitement.  Knowing daughter was in a relationship was in and of itself not good enough.  She was hungry for more details and wanted to know who the gentleman in question was.  Given the frequent trips to New York, Nora strongly hoped Patricia had reunited with Jacob, one her very own favorites from the past.   So she plotted and made every attempt to catch Patricia as she departed to be with the current interest. 

The first attempt was on a Saturday.  Nora arrived in the afternoon and followed Patricia as she bounced from one errand to the next.  As day turned to night, Patricia settled in with a bowl of popcorn and a Blockbuster rental.  Nora’s look of disappointment formed a question.  “Aren’t you going out tonight?”  “No” responded Patricia.   “I went out last night and am a bit tired.”  Patricia knew the motive of the question and conveniently omitted the fact that her current flame was away at a conference.  The following Friday evening, Nora departed her retirement village along with Luke and Elizabeth en route to Patricia’s house.  Weekend bag in hand she knocked on Patricia’s door only to find her hostess with a face of clay mask and rollers in her hair.  “You don’t have any plans tonight?” asked Nora.  “If you thought I might have plans, why would you come now?”  Nora could not conjure a response sharp enough so she just brushed passed Patricia and entered.   Again, Patricia, knowing her mother’s motives omitted her outings over the previous evenings and  plans for the following night.  Mrs. Henderson’s departing remark as she left Patricia’s place, “I’ll see you next week.” 

As Patricia entered her mid-thirties unmarried as ever, Nora had become more and more apprehensive about her daughter’s marital status.  Each and every date or interaction Patricia had with a man, increased Nora’s hope for gaining another son-in-law.  For her, it seemed as if Patricia would never marry.  After all, by the time Nora had left her native South Carolina for New Jersey, at the age of 21, she had been married and for a few years. 

It was not that Patricia could not get a man to marry her.  That was quite easy.  Being attractive, intelligent and fun loving, she got her fair share of male attention.  The issue was far greater than that.  Owing to Reaganomics, the scourge of poverty, family disintegration, crack cocaine and HIV/AIDS in America’s urban communities for the last three decades, her hometown had morphed into a gigantic landfill of unmarriageable men who were grossly unemployed and overly eager to enter the nation’s penal system.  The latter was such a reality that the word jail was no longer a noun but also a verb as per a recent conversation her younger brother Eugene had with a career criminal.  Eugene spoke of how a neighborhood ex-con stood on a local corner explaining how, during his most recent incarceration, he took younger first time inmates under his wing.  His constant refrain during the conversation was “yeah these young bloods came in the pen and I taught ‘em how to jail, like that (rapidly snapping his middle finger and thumb)!”  Thus it was clear to see that marriage was not a true option for a woman surrounded by men who could  fondly recall stories of how they extolled the virtues of proper imprisonment to recently incarcerated young men rather than evoke memories of  teaching their own sons how to ride a bike.

There was another more peculiar reason for Patricia’s social status, which was abundantly clear to her if no one else.  She was no longer a cultural fit in her old hometown, and in truth, she was sure she had never been.  As she entered puberty, she saw the clear difference between her classmates and herself.  While her peers longed for the trappings of the ubiquitous hip hop culture of the era--fat gold chains, Kangol hats and Shell-toed Adidas topped with fat city laces--she was fascinated by a Jackie O. strand of pearls,  cardigans and Clarks, although her parents could afford none of it.  While everyone else knew the latest lyrics to JJ Fad’s chart topper, she focused on another JJ—James Joyce.  The divide grew to an irreparable gulf as she progressed through high school and on to college as far too many of her peers remained began their trajectory into adulthood as single parents, petty criminals and the overworked underpaid working poor.  Even as an adult, her conversations about her limited travel to Europe made some of her childhood friends gawk as if she spoke of landing on the moon. 

Patricia was indeed in a relationship.  For some time now, she had been keeping company with a professor of literature at one the finest universities in the country.  Mauricio was politically astute and an ultra-liberal; the late Paul Wellstone looked like a moderate next to him.  Every Sunday morning in his upper Manhattan apartment, he would go immediately to the best sellers’ lists of the New York Times book review and say “Look at this Patricia, (almost no one called her that but with his heavy northern Italian accent it came out more like Patrizia and thus did not bother her as much) the conservatives are organizing. Do you see the small daggers?” He continued, on the verge of mild anger pointing at the annotations next to book titles on the list authored by the likes of Ann Coulter and Glenn Beck. “That means these books are bulk orders.  The conservatives are organizing.  That is very scary.” Often, he mocked his native land’s prime minister, calling him ‘Burlesque’sconi  (because apparently his administration was more of a comical parody than anything else).

The wise pair got along well and enjoyed many of the same activities and pleasures in life; museums, public radio (Carl Kasell was their favorite voice by far), Lincoln Center films, music in Soho and quality dining.  On the subjects of Italian cinema and fiction/literature, their passionate debates drew them closer together than ever. Whereas she was fond of the more popular crossover films such as La Dolce Vita and Cinema Paradiso, he, being a true Italian, was more aligned with less well known Italian films and directors such as The Open City and Bitter Rice.  They fiercely debated Sofia Loren’s on-screen abilities.  While Patricia saw Loren’s Oscar win for Two Women as absolute proof of her talent,  Mauricio often retorted “but Vittorio DeSica was the director and he could make a piece of paper act.”  Patricia drew emotional and sexual parallels between Alice Walker’s Celie in The Color Purple and E. Annie Proulx’s Ennis Del Mar from the short story turned film, Brokeback Mountain.  Patricia contended that neither was actually gay or bisexual, but rather, due to a history of limited emotional attachment, developed a romantic relationship with the first person who understood and connected with them, regardless of gender.  Mauricio thought it was far less complex than that for each character.  They were gay, plain and simple.  Yes, her days with Mauricio were indeed pleasurable. 

By the time, Nora was aware there was a relationship, Patricia and Mauricio were on their way to ending their brief affair.  The Ferrari was quite beautiful,  great to look at and gave the illusion of a wonderful ride but the engine never got hot enough for Patricia.  That Nora did not just ask out right about the new love, for everyone else in the family knew about him, was a clear indicator to everyone except her the nature of the mother daughter relationship was severely warped.