James Taylor: Greatest Hits
The day after her surgery I was in the hospital visiting my mother. She looked great. She had good color . She was animate. She looked…healthy.
“Hey there!” She greeted me with a smile, actually setting aside her work as I came to stand at the foot of her bed.
“Hi. You look fantastic!”
She faltered for a second, probably torn between wanting the compliment and wanting to be the dying damsel and recognizing she couldn’t have it both ways.
“I feel good. But… I’ve lots of questions for the doctor. I think he’s out in the hall, can you get him for me?” She started to reach for her ever present notepad and appointment book. I glanced at the door, not sure what to do.
“I… There are a ton of people out in the hall…” I took a tentative step toward the door.
“What are you waiting for? He could leave. Go get my doctor I want to speak to him.” Her tone was sharp. Ever since I was an adolescent, it triggered the stubborn response in me.
“I don’t know your doctor.” I tried to explain. “I don’t even know his name. What am I supposed to do? Go ask every guy out in the hall, ‘Are you my mother’s doctor?’” I laughed trying to ebb the growing tension. “Maybe you could call the nurse? Or tell me what he looks like? A name, maybe?”
“Oh forget it.” She snapped, the appointment book now open. I was dismissed. Conversation ended.
To her credit, when she got home the first thing that changed was she quit smoking. It surely wasn’t easy. She had smoked since she was eighteen. Immediately too, her diet shifted. This also was not an easy change, but one far more anticipated.
It was with this change that I realized my mother’s connection to diet could be called a relationship. Growing up we’d gone through several phases, most of them horrible. She’d never been a particularly great cook, though she was passable… when she cooked.
After her heart surgery, she decided that heart disease could not only be controlled by diet but reversed. This began a long series of vegetarian dieting with intricate complex rules. The all raw diet, shifted into the root vegetables only diet. Then came only vegetables boiled, baked or steamed, never raw. Finally, she decided that the secret, she was sure, was macrobiotics. She threw herself into this as if her life depended on it, and she probably believed it did. For years after this she took classes, bought expensive equipment and ate lots of seaweed.
The real problem, however was that she worked excessively. In turn, when she did have time off, it was spent in a state of mental and physical collapse. The by product of this was a house that was a disaster area in every sense. The amount of prep work involved in a macrobiotic diet is excessive. Living in rural America did not allow for access to ingredients, never mind restaurants and buying in bulk, an element often necessary to acquire ingredients caused infestations of undesirable guests.
Years later diet became one of the myriad sources of argument. An on going pattern that always played out similarly.
“God, I’m so hungry.” She’d complain. "My stomach's killing me."
“Eat something. Eat real food.”
“I had some lettuce.”
“Ma, you weigh less than 100 pounds, that can’t be healthy. And if your stomach hurts, it's probably telling you you're hungry.”
“You should really loose weight, you know…”
Eating with her became a source of dread and stress. At her insistence we’d meet in the middle of our two locations. We were back living in the same state by then. She’d insist I pick a restaurant, announcing she could eat something anywhere. When we’d arrive, she wrinkle her nose a the menu and ask for something like a salad, with nothing but lettuce. Then leave the lettuce because it was the wrong kind.
Eventually we found one Chinese place that served edemame and tofu that with special instructions about preparation she accepted. But she claimed never to understand why I was disturbed when she’d order hot water and produce her own tea bag. I always left a very, very big tip.
Over this time period as her diet changed, she also became more “health conscious.” There was no life style change, of course, but she did investigate a lot. She had a lot of help tips, most of which she didn’t herself do. It was this time that J. fell out of favor.
As the MD in the family, she had called him immediately. She had called him before she had called me, of course. I presume he told her something she didn’t want to hear. For after her heart surgery there was little mention of J. and suddenly, I was the executer of the estate again. I was never asked and I never raised it. In truth, I always believed that it would change again before the day ever arrived.
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