Age-Old Resentment

Gloria Buchanan slammed on the brakes at the four-way as a car just about T-boned her Chevy Cavalier, cursing under her breath.

“Gloria, watch your language,” her sharp-tongued mother snapped. “I may be too old to drive myself home, but don’t think for even a minute that I’m too old to turn you over my knee and give you a few good swats.”

Gloria ignored her. Elizabeth Buchanan had always been an old spinster, ever since her husband had died when Gloria was twelve. The youngest of ten brothers and sisters, the task of taking care of her had fallen on Gloria.

Maybe it was unfair to call her 90 year-old mother a spinster. It wasn’t really Elizabeth’s fault that she was that way. The Great Depression, the death of her husband and oldest sun, and World War II had branded her an uncaring and mean heartbroken woman. After the death of her husband, Glenn, and her favorite oldest son, Matthew, Elizabeth had given up on her family. Gloria’s older siblings, then in their teens and twenties, ran wild and rampage through the city, doing as they pleased.

Gloria, however, was as faithful as one could be. She stuck by her mother’s side, cleaning the house when her family messed it up, convincing the landlord to give them just one more week when there was no money, and going to church daily, as her mother had once done. She hoped that by doing this, though being the youngest, she would be setting an example for her older siblings.

It didn’t work. Her brothers and sisters took the wrong turn in life, and got lost in the land of the Forsaken. Gloria began looking out for number one –possibly the first time in her life she had done so. As soon as she could, she went off to college, got a nursing degree, married and moved far away from Glendale. She arranged for her mother to be put in a nursing home. She didn’t completely lose touch with her family, though. Occasionally, she called her oldest sister Candice to check up on her, and she mailed her mother a small amount every month to help with the nursing home bill.

Then her husband Rob died in a car accident, leaving her childless and deprived of family. She packed up her things, quit her job, and moved back to Glendale. She re-rented the old tenant building she had once lived with her family. She fixed it up rather nicely, and paid visits to her mother almost every day at the Glendale Nursery.

Gloria had no doubt that even in her eighties, her mother would be doing well physically. But she had no idea how well. Elizabeth had the stamina of a 20 year-old. Emotionally and mentally, she was centuries old. She still had a memory sharp as a tack, but she complained of her old age consistently. Gloria grew tired of hearing how old her mother was.

As Gloria was jobless, a woman she became friends with at the nursing home recommended Gloria to a hospital for a nursing job. Gloria went to the interview and learned three months later that she had the job. She worked in the oncology ward three days a week and on weekends. The oncology ward was a sad place to work, but Gloria was tougher than her mother. It wasn’t a regular oncology ward. It specialized in orphans with incurable or life-threatening diseases. Most of the kids in there weren’t a day over 10. When she wasn’t there, she spent her days at the nursing home.

Today was Elizabeth’s 90th birthday, and Gloria had surprised her mother by checking her out of the nursing home and taking her to dinner. Of course, though Gloria had good intentions, her mother had to be ungrateful.

“Just imagine when people see a 90 year-old woman in Fudpuckers!” Elizabeth exclaimed. “Why did you have to pick that teen joint?”

Gloria rolled her eyes. “Mother,” she replied as calmly as she could. “For the last time, it is not a teen joint. It is a family restaurant, suited for children and the aging.”

“Pfft!” was Elizabeth’s reply. “Everyone will stare at me. I have wrinkles!”

“You won’t be stared at any more than the teens with purple hair,” Gloria said sarcastically, her patience falling short of its breaking point.

“Which reminds me, I didn’t even wash or comb my hair. I wish you wouldn’t have done this, Gloria,” her mother complained. “I’m so old, I shouldn’t even be in the public eye.”

Gloria reached under her seat while trying to stay on the road and pulled out her purse. Glancing down for a moment, one hand on the wheel, she reached into her purse and pulled out a comb.

“Gloria!” Elizabeth screeched as the car swerved accidentally. “If you don’t stop driving like a maniac, you’ll get your license revoked!”

Gloria sighed. Maybe this hadn’t been a good idea. As much as she loved her mother, she was a pain in the you-know-what. “Here’s the comb,” she said unenthusiastically, handing it to Elizabeth. She made sure for the rest of the drive that she stayed below forty. Heaven forbid she get her license revoked. At the rate Elizabeth was telling her how to drive, she’d get a ticket for holding up traffic.

Apparently it had been a long time since Elizabeth had driven –or been driven. Each time Gloria tried to pass a car, her mother would screech and grab her daughter’s arm, squeezing with all her life. “Oh, watch out!” She’d exclaimed when someone tried to pass them. “We’re going to crash!” Gloria would roll her eyes and sigh.

As she began to pull into the Fudpuckers’ parking lot, Elizabeth decided to put her foot down. “We need to eat somewhere else,” she stated. “I say we go to Fran & Marilyn’s.”

“Mother, that’s a mom and pop restaurant,” Gloria objected, and not just because Fran & Marilyn’s was fifty miles and a long lecture in the opposite direction. Her mother needed a little livening. All the years she’d spent living in the nursing home had practically ruined her. Gloria told her so.

“I think not! With the way kids act these days, one step in that building and I’d be laughed at. It’s happened before, you know. ‘Oh, did she get lost?’ or ‘Are you looking for the Alzheimer’s research center?’” Elizabeth ranted. “No sirree. Kids are so full of disrespect. Now Fran & Marilyn’s is the place for old-timers like me.”

Gloria was fuming. She hated when her mother ranted. There was no end.

“I want to be young again. I hate these wrinkles, and I hardly have any hair left to dye! I can’t even go for a run anymore! I can hardly get out of my bed in morning. Just wait until you get old, Gloria. You’ll hate it. It’s terrible.

“And those smart-alecky teens, they act like they know more because they can drive their cars and blare their music and do gymnastics and pass PE with flying colors. Well, none of them know more than I do. None of them have worked fifteen years in a shoe factory! None of them have lost a husband and son! None of them have served in World War I, have they? I’m ninety years old, for Pete’s sake! My time to go will be comin’ soon enough. I don’t need to put up with them on one of my last days on this Earth!”

“Mom, calm down,’ Gloria snapped. “You’re over-reacting.” Then Gloria knew where they needed to go. She pulled out of the Fudpuckers’ parking lot much faster than she had pulled in. She turned left and headed toward Glendale Christian Hospital.

“I have back pains, my hip goes out, I have bleeding gums, there’s arthritis and . . . hey, this isn’t the way to Fran & Marilyn’s,” Elizabeth said, interrupting her own speech.

“I’m fully aware of that,” Gloria said through gritted teeth. “I’m glad your age hasn’t affected your observance rate.”

“Where are we going?” Elizabeth asked, sitting up straight in her seat.

Gloria was so thankful her mother had stopped complaining that she didn’t reply; she just enjoyed the silent atmosphere, which she knew would be broken in a matter of seconds.

“Well, I’m waiting. Answer me, young lady!” Elizabeth ordered, making Gloria’s prediction true.

“You’ll see when we get there,” Gloria replied mysteriously, knowing it would drive her mother up a wall.

And it did. But Gloria tuned her out, whistling and humming, until she pulled into the parking lot at the hospital for the oncology employees. She climbed out of the car and went over to help her mother do the same.

“This isn’t a restaurant, it’s a hospital! I don’t need a check-up! I just had one back at the home! What are you doing? Gloria Grace, stop it!” Elizabeth cried, struggling as Gloria jerked her out of the car.

Gloria half-dragged, half-carried her mother to the fifth floor of the hospital. There, Elizabeth stopped moving as she saw all the little kids, some playing in the Kid’s Creative Corner, others hooked up to IVs in wheelchairs. For once, ninety year-old Elizabeth Buchanan was speechless. “Why . . . Glory . . . what . . .”

“Well, Mother,” Gloria began. “This is where I work.”

“I knew that,” Elizabeth said slowly. “Why are we here?”

Gloria went on ignoring her mother. “This is the orphan oncology ward. Most of these kids have no families, and came from an orphanage that could no longer take care of them. Every kid here is inflicted with some illness, terminal or life-threatening. Some never leave, and some do, on the wings of God. Most of these kids will not live to see twenty, let alone ninety. They don’t have back pains or arthritis, but they do get shots every day and have incisions and surgeries and tubes put down their throats. These are the smart-alecky kids you are always ranting about. Do you not see how lucky you are? Do not resent growing old. Many are denied the privilege.”

Elizabeth shook her head sadly, and she moved away from her daughter. For her 90 years, she was nimble, and she squatted down next to a little boy who was playing in a little sandbox. Artificial sand, of course. His name was Brian. What Elizabeth could not see that Gloria knew, however, was that he had a brain tumor. Invisible on the outside, but the most visible on the inside. Tomorrow is the big day of his operation. He would go into the operating room, asleep, and probably never wake up again.

Gloria just stood and watched her mother talk to Brian, question him about how he was feeling, and help him make a sand castle.

“How old are you?” Brian asked her, his curious blue eyes flicking back and forth, as searching for the answer in Gloria’s wrinkles.

“Well, I’m ninety today. How old are you?” Elizabeth said kindly, rocking back and forth on her heels.
“Wow! Ninety? You’re ancient! Mommy says I’ll never get that old.” Elizabeth stopped rocking as more kids gathered around. She stood up.

A thoughtful look crossed her face, and something changed. Gloria didn’t know what it was, so she studied her mother’s face, hoping it would reveal itself to her and reappear. It didn’t. It wasn’t the wrinkles; the crows’ feet hadn’t left. She was still wearing make-up, her hair was still brownish-gray, and her eyes were still green. Then what was it? She had on the same hoop earrings that she had been wearing that morning when Gloria picked her up. And then Gloria figured it out. The real Elizabeth Buchanan was back. Her kindness, her loving nature, had returned. Her face glowed and shined like it hadn’t since Gloria was a kid.

“Thank you, Gloria,” Elizabeth said softly, turning to where Gloria was standing.

“I thought this would turn you around,” Gloria replied, nodding her head. “You’re welcome.”

“No,” her mother said. “I mean thank you for everything. For taking care of me, your family, our house, thank you for all of it. Thank you for trying to see that your siblings were led in the right direction, even if in the end they weren’t. Thank you for coming back and visiting me, thank you for sending money, and thank you for bringing me here.”

Gloria was shocked. Her mother had been talking for about five minutes, which was longer than she had ever spoken without ranting. And it was a gracious five minutes. Another shocker. Gloria felt a tear slip out of the corner of her eye. “You’re welcome,” she whispered, and dabbed at her eye. The kids were watching, and what kind of nurse would she be if she cried in front of her patients?

Then the sentimental moment was over. It would never return, and never be replaced, as long as her mother lived.

“Eh, Glory, what do you say we take Brian to Fudpuckers?” Elizabeth asked, her eyes twinkling.

Gloria’s mouth made an O, and then she closed it. “Sure, Mom, that’d be great.” They turned and headed to the receptionist desk. Their arms linked to reform the unbreakable bond between mother and daughter that had once been broken