Dear Loyal Readers:
It’s been one of those weeks when you’re not sure where the time goes, but springing the clock forward seems to have sucked all the energy out of my solar-powered typing fingers. So I am taking a few weeks off—well, not really “off.” I have teamed up with an editor to try to turn “Rotten Romance” into a more marketable commodity, and that means I must abandon this Substack for a bit because there are only so many hours in the day.
But I will be back with more true tales of family dysfunction and marital meltdown, along with ruthlessly dyspeptic observations of contemporary life. Allow me, however, to leave you at this juncture with a couple of anecdotes about my mother that didn’t make it into previous posts.
As many of you know, my parents had a little summer place in Montauk, where they kept a “beach” car, generally some broken-down jalopy like the 1977 Ford Torino described earlier or a beat-up Honda Civic held together largely with duct tape. It was in the latter, as I recall, that my mother stopped for gas at the local Shell station. An eager and officious young grease monkey, several times referred to her has mom, finally giving her a credit card receipt with “Is there anything else I can do for you, Mom?” My mother flashed him a brilliant smile and replied, “Excuse, dear boy, but I don’t believe we’re related.”
Also in Montauk, after my father suffered a stroke and landed in the hospital, his future well-being still as yet undetermined, I took us both out to dinner at a favorite spot on Lake Montauk. We had just returned from the hospital an hour away, exhausted and shaken, and we ordered favorite drinks: a martini for her, a Manhattan for me. It seemed to me a fine time for confessions. “Tell me,” I implored her, leaning close, “because I’ve always wanted to know. Were you a virgin when you married Daddy?”
She took a cautious sip of her drink. “You know, that’s none of your damn business.”
Of course she was right. Mothers always are.
See you again soon!
Sounds like a great project! ❤️
Good luck, take the time you need and enjoy! Look forward to seeing you soon!