“Oh, this will look good on you.”
“Yes, but it’s your color. You should have it.”
“No, you take it. I have a blouse almost like it.”
“Yes, but you always need another blouse for work.”
I knew my mother desperately needed clothes for work, and I knew she must feel badly because she couldn’t afford to buy me clothes. On these nights, for once, we were kind and generous toward each other.
Throughout the box, often wrapped in a scarf or doily, there would be pieces of costume jewelry or knickknacks—clearly things my aunt no longer wanted or that were possibly recycled gifts. Most of the things she sent were ugly or useless even to us, and I realized that my mother exercised great restraint by not saying anything to me about how insulted she was to receive them.
My mother had always put my aunt on a pedestal. But her habit of complaining about everyone she ever met or knew included her sister and brothers. (I say “habit” because it seemed like part of her personality to do this.) So it was a pleasant surprise that, for the most part, she tried to hide her judgments and disapproval from me regarding Aunt Natalla’s hand-me-down gifts. And because of this, I had good feelings about my aunt and put her on a pedestal myself. I thought of her as someone who was kind and loving.
So when my mother told me Aunt Natalla was coming to visit us from Missouri the summer before my junior year, I was thrilled. I was excited to meet this elusive “Fairy Godmother” for the first time in my life.
Uncle Kay, who still lived in Bakersfield but whom we saw infrequently, joined us for the occasion of my aunt’s visit and he seemed to be on his best behavior. He had lived with Aunt Natalla and her husband, Homer, for several years when he was in his early twenties but had finally been kicked out because of his drinking. On the day of Aunt Natalla’s arrival, Kay offered to pay for a taxi to pick her up at the tiny little regional airport, a few miles out of town, since neither he nor my mother had a car.
The three of us were as cramped in the backseat of the taxi as sardines in a can. It was June and, as was typical, it was already boiling hot by nine in the morning. When we got to the airport, I was full of excitement; I stood behind the chain-linked fence waiting with anticipation for my aunt to get off the small propeller-driven plane. But instead of greeting us, instead of saying hello to her beloved niece for the first time since she was a baby and giving her a big hug, she immediately started complaining.
“Oh, my God,” she said. “I’m exhausted. We had a two-hour layover in Phoenix and then the plane was delayed on top of it all. And the food was terrible. I couldn’t eat a thing. I’m starving. My God it’s hot here. It’s worse than Poplar Bluff!”
When she finally looked at me, she gave me a pathetic smile and tried to be the good aunt, but it was clear that she was uncomfortable and unhappy and didn’t have the energy or ability to get past it long enough to connect with me.
Kay sat in the front seat with the driver while my mother, my aunt, and I all squeezed into the backseat.
“I’m sorry it’s so tight in the cab,” my mother apologized. “We should have left Beverly at home. And I’m so sorry you didn’t have a good flight. I hope you’ll be cool enough in the apartment. There’s a cooler right in your bedroom.”
My mother and I had worked hard for two weeks to get our small apartment clean for my aunt. But upon our arrival home, my aunt made it abundantly clear that it was not up to her standards. As soon as she walked through the door she had only negative things to say: “My goodness, how can you live in such a tiny apartment? This rug needs a good cleaning. Don’t you have any clean towels? My goodness, these sheets need a good ironing.”
She also complained about my mother’s smoking and the yellow layer of smoke stains that lined the ceilings. My mother tried not to smoke as much in Aunt Natalla’s presence but she was hopelessly addicted to cigarettes and couldn’t help herself. My aunt spent that whole evening either standing at the front door or on the front porch, trying to get some fresh air.
When my mother cheerfully told her that dinner was ready that evening, my aunt took one look at the food she had prepared and insisted on taking us out to dinner. My uncle called another cab and we went downtown to the Chinese restaurant.
Aunt Natalla left the very next day. I assume she must have intended to stay longer but she was just too uncomfortable. She’d come all the way from Missouri to see us but she couldn’t wait to jump back on that plane to get home—home and away from her poor, country bumpkin kin.
Like my mother often acted with her own friends and neighbors, my aunt acted like she was a queen and we were the lucky “minions” who had been blessed by her presence. Only my aunt was far worse than my mother.
I felt deeply disappointed after Aunt Natalla’s visit—but I knew my disappointment couldn’t compare with my mother’s hurt feelings. She had been so excited to see her beloved sister, the sister she put on a pedestal. She hadn’t seen her in fourteen years, and it was unlikely she would be seeing her again any time soon. And she had worked hard to make Natalla feel comfortable: she’d bought new sheets for my twin bed so she
