It was like that movie Baby’s Day Out, except with my parent. I turned my back for one second, and the little rascal got away from me.
I imagined her crawling along an I-beam at some high-rise construction site.
But she’s afraid of heights, so more likely she’d be in Times Square, telling The Naked Cowboy he isn’t dressed warmly enough.
It started with tickets to see the new Larry David play. My mom checked that she had the tickets for the third or fourth time.
“It says, ‘late arrivals will not be seated,’” she read, for my benefit. My mom is early to everything. We left with an hour to spare.
And yet, we found ourselves in a cab crawling up Sixth Avenue for a half-hour with fifteen blocks to go. I checked our route on my smartphone; the driving estimate to get to the theater was fifteen minutes, the walking was only ten.
Because I’m having a mommy-type moment that I wanted to share with you. Not only because it’s a cool thing that’s happening to me, but because it’s a little reminder that wonderful things can happen in a woman’s lifetime.
We begin way back when Daughter Francesca was born, and I quit my job as a lawyer because I really enjoyed being home with her. Lawyering didn’t work for me part time, and the months after her birth made me realize that raising her was simply the most important, and fun, thing I could do.
This all sounds great until you realize I was getting divorced and had zero money. So I decided to be a writer, and then followed five years living on credit cards while writing and getting rejected.
But meanwhile I got to stay home with Francesca, and I remember those early days so well, because the lack of money was beside the point. I was doing something I loved, being with this curly-haired, blue-eyed, baby, and watching her grow.
I remember after I’d put her down at night, she’d be in her crib, talking away.
I would stand outside her bedroom, listening, but I couldn’t make out any of the words. She was just yakking up a storm, in an extremely animated way.
This would last for hours.
So one day, when she was about four years old, I asked her, “Who are you talking to in your room at night?”
And she answered, “I’m telling myself my stories.”
Fast-forward a couple of decades later, when she actually becomes an author, and this summer, something remarkable is happening. Namely, my storyteller daughter has a novel coming out in August, entitled Full Bloom.
Plus I have a novel coming out in July, entitled The Unraveling of Julia.
This is a harmonic convergence for our tiny two-person family.
This summer, mother and daughter will be blooming and unraveling together.
You can pre-order our books now, and we’d be delighted if you would!
We’re even doing events together, and I can only imagine how proud my mother would be. She would curse with happiness, her highest form of self-expression.
For what it’s worth, I never pushed Francesca to be an author.
I pushed her to become a veterinarian.
I need a vet very badly.
Nor do I take any credit for her becoming an author, because the best storyteller in our family was Mother Mary. She could turn anything into a story, and she knew to keep it short, punchy and funny, just like her.
The day of her funeral, there was such a heavy rainstorm that my entrance hall flooded for the first and the last time ever. Francesca was sure it was a sign from her, and I agree.
Somehow, I know that my mother will show up at one of our signings this summer, heckle us, and/or do something vaguely obscene.
I can’t wait.
It reminds me of the saying that everything will be alright in the end, and if it’s not alright yet, then it’s not the end.
Well, this might be the end because everything’s alright.
