In case you're wondering, my dinner turned out wonderfully too

For some reason, I decided last night that I was going to cook myself dinner. I had gotten the A_Man, A_Can, A_Plan cookbooks for Christmas, and I hadn’t tried to make anything from them yet. I looked through them last night and found the three recipes that sounded most appealing at that time. I wrote down the ingredients I’d need to buy to prepare the three meals, and I headed off to the grocery store.

I was almost finished with my list when I started having some real trouble trying to find the last few items. I looked and looked all over the same aisles multiple times, but I couldn’t find what I needed. I decided to myself that that’s why I don’t cook – it’s too hard to find all the ingredients!
My phone rang as I was hunting for pizza sauce. I pulled my phone out of my purse. No name was coming up, but I recognized the number. I had dialed it before for something, but I couldn’t place the number. I answered the phone. “Hello?”

The voice on the other end said hi. The person sounded like they knew me. I still had no idea who I was speaking to. “… Hi,” I said, to stall a bit longer. I was taking a breath to say, “I’m sorry, who is this?” When the person said hi again. And then it hit me.

I was talking to my mom. Shit! This antsy, anxious feeling came over me. “What are you doing?” she asked me.

“I’m grocery shopping.”

“Oh. Is this a bad time?”

“Yeah,” I said slowly. I told her I was having trouble finding the tortillas and pizza sauce. She started naming places I should check. I’d looked in all of them. She was suggesting a few others and telling me what to be looking for (“The pizza sauce comes in a small jar. It’s probably by …”). I started studying the aisles more closely in case I’d glanced over what I was looking for. As I continued my search, she kept giving me suggestions and descriptions to help me find the missing ingredients.

It was weird to have not talked to my mom in almost a year, only to suddenly find myself having a conversation about something as mundane as on which shelf my Wal-Mart would decide to place pizza sauce.

When I’d managed to find both the missing items and discovered I had a new quest ahead of me in tracking down minced garlic (remember, it’s all for three different recipes), I told her I would call her back once I was finished and back at home.

As soon as we hung up, I called my dad to tell him what had happened. He didn’t answer, so I immediately called ER. When I told her I’d realized the person I was talking to was my mother, ER gasped loudly. “What are you gonna do? Are you going to call her back?”

I told ER that I pretty much had to, since I’d told my mom I would. So once I got home and put my groceries away, I took Piper outside and started to prepare dinner. I knew the night was going to be a busy one for me, so I called my mom as I was cooking. She asked me where K is nowadays. I told her Iraq. She asked me if I’m still in my same job and in my same apartment. She didn’t know I had a dog. She also didn’t realize that I still talk to my stepsisters.

I told my mom that I had started a draft to answer her email, but that I’d decided not to send it because I didn’t think it was a good thing for either of us yet. I told her that the fact she’d taken off work the entire week of my wedding and had waited by the phone for me to call and invite her made me feel that way. I reminded her of the multiple emails I’d sent telling her the decision whether or not to come was hers. I reminded her of the responses she sent that gave me no indication whatsoever that she was coming to the wedding. I reminded her that she’d told me she had spent all her vacation time and money remodeling her bathroom. How was any of that supposed to make me think she wanted to come to the wedding?

I told her I needed her to accept responsibility for the fact she missed the ceremony. She accepted some of the responsibility, she said, which, frankly, for her is pretty dang good.
I told my mom that I knew she wanted to be at the wedding, but that I wasn’t sure if her not coming was done to hurt my feelings or to be stubborn (my mom used to skip my brother’s events after she had a fight with my dad, so this would be totally characteristic of her). I told her I was surprised she didn’t even call on the day of the wedding, and she said, “I figured you wouldn’t have wanted me to.” I told her, “You’re probably right, but I figured you still would have.”

We were honest with each other, and we were able to have a good, long conversation. We talked for over two hours. Before we hung up, my mom tried to leave the ball in my court by saying she hoped I’d call again soon. I told her quite frankly that I’m going to be hesitant to call at first. I can’t just jump right back into it like I hadn’t just had a conversation telling my mom I have a dog, my husband’s in Iraq (been there for five months now, thanks), and sure I’ll send you an email so you know how to spell my last name.

The good news is that the conversation went as well as possible. I’m still approaching with caution just in case, but at least things seem promising for once.