Last Friday

Restless.  

It is my last Friday at work.  Afterwards, early, in fact, a few of us go for a beer.

Then I'm going home, wondering "what next?"  I return a few calls, one my mother asking for toilet paper.  Seems like a reasonable request.  Robyn makes me a margarita.  We sit in the sun and breeze and talk.  I want to jump out of my skin.

I drive up to Marion and buy toilet paper, floss, paste, a toothbrush.  There aren't any with small heads.  We have small mouths, my mother and I.  (Ironies never cease.)  

Does she remember that she prefers smaller brush heads?  She seems to be changing her tastes.  I remember when Mom was adventurous, liking spicy, exotic foods.  She seems to prefer old lady food these days, a little bland.

Mom is sitting in her room.  The television is off.  I tell her about my new job and she exclaims over my good fortune, new again!  We talk a little and I put her things away.  I remind her the cat box needs changing.

"You look tired," I offer.

"No," she said.  "I'm bored.  There's nothing to do here."  Mom has forgotten how to control the television.  When people come in to clean, they change the channel to Jerry Springer and then Mom can't find IPTV again.  I'm thankful they actually clean.

"Is your t.v. working?" Euphemism.  I mean "can you work the television."  "Have you had dinner?"  Mom's expression is flat.

"I've had dinner,"were you going to take me out?"  She brightens.

"Not today, this is a rescue run.  A sad lonely voice on my phone, begging for toilet paper."  

She laughs.  She always laughs at my jokes.  It's a social contract we have.  But she's dying for me to take her and I don't have the energy today.  We talk a while longer and then I say "goodbye."  On an impulse, I turn back into her room and offer to get her television to the channel she wants.

"Oh no, that's fine.  I don't want to watch t.v."  

She sits, disheveled in her chair.  She won't wear a bra and it makes her seem lumpy.  Her hair needs a wash today.  There is a resentful passivity to her.  I feel as though somehow there is something I should do, but there is nothing.

Mom, the chair, the room, full of art with it's big window and finches in the feeders.  The room is stuffy because she's often cold and doesn't know how to adjust the temperature.  Waiting for nothing.  For the next thing, whatever that is.  Resenting not knowing.

"That didn't make me feel any better," I think to myself on the way home.  

Caitlin and Nathan are hanging out when I get home and we get Nathan talking.  For a while, I get to know this boy who talks for hours on the phone with Caitlin every night.  They sit on the sofa, her legs across his lap, and sort out their busy lives: work, Boy's State, the television he spent every last of his pennies on, Caitlin's plans for the week.  They are driving, pushing, moving forward with fresh urgency.

Robyn and I move upstairs to make room for their smooching.  My parents did it for me.  It's only fair.  After a while, Nathan calls good night.  Caitlin takes Robyn's car to pick up Walker at the movies.  I feel myself settling.

Tomorrow our tasks and duties, choices and opportunities, will unfold before us.  We will forget to be thankful for what's available to us, in our hustle:

The next thing, and knowing what it is.