Sometimes when I catch Sean being good, I reward him by letting him pick out something at the grocery store.  The only limitation I put on him is that it must be something that can fit in the palm of his hand.  And it is for this reason that I haven’t told him where Wal-Mart keeps the iPods.

And so it was one day early in the summer.  When we got to the store, we headed straight back to the toy department in search of a reward. We went up the aisles and down the aisles and down the aisles and up the aisles trying to make a decision, trying to choose the exact right perfect reward that would fit in the palm of his grubby little hand.

Finally he stopped dead in his tracks in front of a display of little boy heaven.  He pulled from the shelf a box that was about the size of a small television.  Wearing a hopeful expression, he held out his hands to show me.  Behind the cellophane window on the front of the box was a lightning blue remote control speedboat. The sticker on the front of the box read $25.

“Sean,” I asked, “Does this fit in the palm of your hand?”

“No. But I really want it.”

“Well I can see why.  It is very cool.  But this is a big thing.  This is more the kind of thing you would get for a birthday present.”

“Oh. I thought that was what you’d say,” he said with dramatic dejection.  Dramatic flair does not work on me.  I’ve had my little-boy-manipulation shot. I am immune.

He hung his head, heaved an exaggerated sigh, and as though wearing lead boots, he walked the box back to its place on the shelf.  He patted it and then stood there looking longingly at it.  If I were a member of the Academy, I would have given him an Oscar right there in Wal-Mart.

As we continued on, I took a second look at the boat and made a mental note in case of the unlikely event that it was something that he still wanted when he had a birthday later this fall.

About a week later we went to a birthday party.

And sure enough the birthday boy got the lightning blue remote control speed boat.

I watched Sean watching the boy open the box, watching the boy’s face light up.

I watched him try to pretend to be happy for the birthday boy as he has been instructed to do.  I noticed his bottom lip start to tremble.

He popped his head above the crowd of kids sitting criss-cross-applesauce in front of the birthday boy.  He searched for my face.  He gestured towards the boat with open palms.  He shrugged his shoulders in a statement of disbelief.  I noticed that his ears were red.

He got up, stepped over a few kids and schlumped over to me with the lead boots, head hung low, both arms swinging from side to side like an ape.

He put his head in my lap and whispered through tears, “That was the very thing I wanted and HE got it.”

Part of me wanted to give him a stern lecture about how silly he looked, about how grateful he should be for all that he has, about how he should focus outward and not on himself, about how it wasn’t about him today, about how he will have his own birthday this fall, about how he was embarrassing me, about a million other things.

Yet, my heart broke for him because it was exactly how I felt for years at baby showers.  I would pretend to be delighted for the mother-to-be when really I wanted to lay my head in my mother’s lap and cry bitter tears about the unfairness that some other gal was getting the very thing I wanted.

In that moment, I didn’t really know what to do. I wanted to comfort and scold him all at the same time.  And no course of action seemed right.

So I told him it’s not his party and he can’t cry if he wants to — and I sent him back to the party.  We would have to talk about it later but in the mean time the civilized thing to do was to play the part of a good party guest.

The birthday party might have provided a wonderful life lesson about waiting and wanting and not getting everything you want.  But shortly after the birthday party, Sean came home from Memaw’s with a lightning blue remote control speed boat.

Memaw had three little boys of her own at one time but apparently she needs a little-boy-manipulation booster shot.

My mother and father-in-law have owned a cosmetics studio and clothing boutique in downtown Tuna for the past 30 years.  In addition to selling makeup and outfitting the local church ladies, they have provided a number of other services to the locals.

Up until a few years ago, an older lady named Leona would come in every other week or so with her checkbook and hand it over to George.  Leona couldn’t read or write a lick so she brought her checkbook in and George would balance her statement and tell her how much money she had and write out whatever checks needed to be written.

Another lady came in to the store three times a week for seven years. She never bought anything, but she needed some place to be for the three hours her husband took dialysis.  She drove in from some outlying area and after she dropped her husband off at the hospital,  she would stop in at the store and hang out.  George and Cleo offered her a comfortable chair, a place to put her feet up, something to drink, some fudge if George had made some that week, but mostly they offered her some place to be.

Occasionally you’d get a crazy older lady who would come out of the dressing room asking for a bigger size wearing nothing but her bra and a pair of stretch pants.  George would duck quietly out the front door because he is a gentleman.

I’ve been thinking about Memaw’s store a lot lately and the cast of characters that have come in and out of there over the years.  Memaw is in her mid-80s and still works that store most days.  I’ve been after her to retire.  Although I don’t know what could possibly fill the void that she would leave behind on Main Street.

The following post was published in November of 2006

* * * * *

Therapy With A Side Of Cold Cream

My mother-in-law, Cleo, has owned a cosmetics and clothing business on Main Street in downtown Tuna for more than 25 years. She has enjoyed a fair measure of success for a variety of reasons.

One, she can flat out sell. That woman could sell the devil a Bible and then he would order a few more for gifts. Two, Papa George stands squarely behind her, encouraging her and supporting her every step of the way. Three, she understands that she is not selling clothes and cosmetics, but hope and dreams. And four, the good people of Tuna need some place where they can get therapy and a makeover at the same time.

A bell tied to the front door, clinkles and clankles, announcing the arrival of each customer. She greets them by name. “Helloooow there! Come in!” she calls from behind the counter looking over the top of her rhinestone bifocals. She asks about their children, their grandchildren. She knows them.

Usually the first customer of the day is some old farmer wearing bib overalls. That might seem odd if you were at the mall, but no one in downtown Tuna blinks an eye to see a farmer in a boutique. His wife has sent him in with an empty powder compact that he pulls out of the pocket on the front of his overalls. Cleo knows exactly what to replace it with without even looking at it. His wife has bought the same product in the same shade for the last 25 years.

He pulls up a stool at the makeover counter to rest and chat. He leans on his cane and Cleo leans on the counter to hear the latest. His wife has cancer, but she is hanging in there he says. Cleo listens and offers him a piece of homemade fudge. There’s nothing that George’s fudge won’t make better. Cleo rings up the makeup and walks him to the door. “You hang in there now. We’re a’prayin’ for you,” she says as he makes his way out the door.

Ever so often, some young gal will come in with her head hanging low. She’ll pull up a stool at the cosmetics counter and pour out her woes all over the eye shadow counter. Like a good bartender, Cleo listens. Her husband has left her. He took the dog. Cleo gives her a piece of homemade fudge and pats her arm.

Fifteen minutes later, her woes have been replaced with a new face and a new blouse. When you’re living your life out in a country and western song, a bag of cosmetics and a new blouse will fix most all that ails you. She hugs Cleo as she leaves the store. “Keep your chin up gal!” Cleo calls to her. She has made a customer and she has made a friend.

You just can’t get that at the mall.

* * * *

The entire Tuna series can be found at the Best of Antique Mommy

I sat at my mother-in-law’s dining room table and looked through a box of her old photographs.

Each picture, a tiny serving of frozen time.  Smiling faces peer out of a black and white world,  telling stories of the past and explaining something of the present.

At the bottom of the box I find a large brown envelope. Inside is a photograph of my mother-in-law. She is young, tall and thin, pretty. She is standing on a stage with her husband and two other official looking people in some sort of ceremony. In a manner slightly exaggerated for the camera, she is reaching for a set of keys.  Everyone is smiling and looking into the camera.

It is the late 60s in southern California.  She is a housewife in her mid-30s.  Her children are in middle school, high school and off to college.  When her husband encouraged her to sell Tupperware to make a little mad money, she discovered that she liked it.  And she was good at it — so good that she won a car and quickly rose through the ranks to become a sales director.

It wasn’t long after the picture was taken that her husband was thrown from a horse and suffered a serious head injury. He lingered between life and death for two days before he died.  And then the world that she knew spun completely off  its axis and crashed into a million pieces.

When all was said and done, she packed up the Tupperware car with two of her boys and what was left of her life and drove back home to Texas to find healing among her family and to try to figure out how to be a single mom.

It wasn’t easy, but she carried on.  She supported herself and her three boys selling Tupperware.

I’ve always admired that about her.

One afternoon last week, my mother-in-law Cleo was at work in her cosmetic studio/clothing boutique in downtown Tuna, just as she has been six out of the seven days of a week for the past 25 or more years. Memaw is 81-year-old and puts in six days a week.

Two gals game in together and looked around. Cleo had not seen them before and welcomed them into the store and showed them around. One of the gals requested a makeover and Cleo gladly obliged. She sat her down at the makeover counter and began showing her all the latest colors, lotions and potions while her friend waited for her in the “husband’s chair” near the fitting rooms.

Cleo said the gal at the makeover counter seemed a bit distracted and kept turning the mirror in an odd direction, complaining about the light, but Cleo didn’t think too much of it because in fact, the lighting in the store leaves something to be desired. Then suddenly and without warning, the gal and her friend decided they had to go. And they took off.

Oh well, Cleo thought, no sale, but that’s how it goes.

About an hour later the credit card company called Cleo saying there was suspicious activity on her credit card and they wondered if maybe it had been stolen. She said, no, her purse was right here under her desk in the store and she went to get it. And it was there but her wallet was gone.

In less than an hour, the two gals had gone shopping at Wal-Mart to the tune of several thousand dollars.

Cleo said she just felt sick to her stomach. Everything including her social security card was in her wallet. She couldn’t even think of what to do first or whom to call, so she ran right out of the store and two doors down to the 1^st National Bank of Tuna for help.

Together, Cleo and the bank manager called all of her credit card companies and reported the cards stolen. The manager also knew to put a fraud alert on her credit record. They took care of her, they went beyond the minimum. AD called and thanked them for looking out for his mama.

The police on the other hand. Two of the bank tellers in the drive through had seen the gals drive a way in a white car with Missouri plates. The police were called with this information right away but they couldn’t check it out right now because they were in the middle of a shift change. Feel free to go back and re-read that last sentence in case you think you read it wrong. In the middle of a shift change. Apparently Barney had to pull the bullet out of his pocket and hand it over to his other brother Barney and this takes some time.

The Wal-Mart manager was even less helpful than the police. Not his problem. Did not not care. Could not be bothered. So much for pro-active loss prevention.

Cleo said that for two nights she couldn’t sleep. She felt so violated and kept replaying the events over in her mind. She kept wondering what else was in her wallet that she had forgotten about. She wondered how this could have happened. She wondered what she could have done differently. She is alternately angry and scared but mostly exhausted. She wasn’t physically hurt in any way and for that we are grateful, but mentally she is bruised and battered and that makes me spitting mad.

In the past year or so my father was assaulted and robbed at gun point, my mother had her identity stolen and now my mother-in-law was robbed in her store.

There’s got to be a special level of hell for people who violate and take advantage of old people and children.

There’s just got to be.

We were in Tuna this weekend and went to church on Sunday morning with my mother-in-law Cleo.

After services, Sean and I went outside to wait for everyone to make their way out to the car.

Sean spied a dandelion growing in the church yard and bent over to pick it.

He brought it to me and said, “Here Mom, hold out your hand.”

He very carefully laid his golden gift in the palm of my hand.

“Why thank you Sean!” I said, my heart all aglow.

“Don’t moosh it,” he called over his shoulder as he ran off, ”It’s for Memaw.”

Oh.  Okay, sure.  I knew that.

Photo Temporarily Unavailable

Beware.  The suspect shown above is armed and dangerous, using dimples and dandelions to target the elderly and unsuspecting.  Was last seen in a church parking lot running off with the heart of a woman who appeared to be of advanced maternal age.

Last week, we drove to Illinois to visit my parents and let Sean OD on popsicles and Wivian.

Knowing that in the coming week, that Wivian would be indulging Sean’s every whim and thereby be promoted to most favored grandmother status, Cleo, my mother-in-law, made a pre-emptive strike in the Grandma Wars and loaded Sean up with seven or eight presents to open along the way.

When we were about a mile away from MeMaw’s house, Sean demanded to open his first present and being the spineless jelly fish of a parent bent on instant gratification that I am, I let him.

From a beautiful gift bag laden with festive ribbon and colorful tissue paper he pulled a twenty-five cent pinwheel.

“Oh my!” he exlaimed. “I can’t believe my eyes! I’ve never seen such a thing!”

And then he spent the next 50 miles holding the pinwheel up to the air conditioning vent and cackling with joy.

If only his thrills would always be so cheap.

In our family, we celebrate Easter and our risen Lord as we do any other holy day – by racing home from church and eating entirely too much. And then complaining about how full we are as we waddle off to check out the dessert table.

And after all that eating, nothing much else can be done except to sit around the table and talk trash before going back for another piece of pie. When my mother-in-law Cleo and her siblings get together, talk inevitably turns to Millie Conway. After 70 or more years, it’s still Millie Conway. If you have ever wondered how long one can harbor sour feelings, it’s at least 70 years.

In case you are wondering, Millie Conway was a girl that Cleo and her older sisters grew up with. As legend has it, Millie had the good fortune of being an only child and consequently was afforded a few luxuries – new clothes, an occasional Coke or a bologna sandwich all to herself. In Cleo’s family there were seven children and no such luxuries. If Cleo were to have to choose a last meal, I can tell you right now it would be a sandwich of thick cut bologna with real mayo and a Coke. The contentious feelings towards Millie wasn’t borne out of the fact that she had so much and that Cleo and her sisters had so little, but that Millie was the original Nellie Oleson.

After a round table rehashing of Millie’s many acts of evil against the sisters, each one reported as though it had never been told before, one of the siblings will say of their oldest sister, “You know, Fanny always wanted to hit Millie but mama wouldn’t let her,” and then almost piously, “Mama never let us hit anybody or anything like that.”

And then someone will say, “Poor Fanny went to her grave wanting to hit Millie and never got the chance.” And then we all hang our heads in a moment of silence for Aunt Fanny and her unrequited and unopened can of whoop ass.

“Whatever happened to Millie Conway anyway?” someone asked.

“Oh she died some years back,” Cleo says.

Everyone paused to consider this.

Then Antique Daddy adds triumphantly, “Well, I bet the first thing Aunt Fanny did when she got to heaven was kick Millie Conway’s butt.”

And if there is any image that will convey the true meaning of Easter, it’s two old ladies in a throw down at the Pearly Gates.

I was sitting next to Cleo, my mother-in-law, in church on Sunday. With her head bowed, she dabbed her nose with a tissue and sniffled. I whispered to her, “Are you okay?”

“Oh, I’m just all choked up,” she said as she fanned her face with her hand.

I imagined that she was overcome with emotion to be surrounded by her family, to have her grandson sitting on her lap feeding her goldfish.

So I nodded at her and patted her arm in a knowing and loving gesture. I understood.

Then she leaned over and said, “Allergies. I’ve got a head full of snot.”

Allergies and love — apparently both come wrapped in snot.

My mother-in-law, Cleo, has owned a cosmetics and clothing business on Main Street in downtown Tuna for more than 25 years. She has enjoyed a fair measure of success for a variety of reasons.

One, she can flat out sell. That woman could sell the devil a Bible and then he would order a few more for gifts. Two, Papa George stands squarely behind her, encouraging her and supporting her every step of the way. Three, she understands that she is not selling clothes and cosmetics, but hope and dreams. And four, the good people of Tuna need some place where they can get therapy and a makeover at the same time.

A bell tied to the front door, clinkles and clankles, announcing the arrival of each customer. She greets them by name. “Helloooow there! Come in!” she calls from behind the counter looking over the top of her rhinestone bifocals. She asks about their children, their grandchildren. She knows them.

Usually the first customer of the day is some old farmer wearing bib overalls. That might seem odd if you were at the mall, but no one in downtown Tuna blinks an eye to see a farmer in a boutique. His wife has sent him in with an empty powder compact that he pulls out of the pocket on the front of his overalls. Cleo knows exactly what to replace it with without even looking at it. His wife has bought the same product in the same shade for the last 25 years.

He pulls up a stool at the makeover counter to rest and chat. He leans on his cane and Cleo leans on the counter to hear the latest. His wife has cancer, but she is hanging in there he says. Cleo listens and offers him a piece of homemade fudge. There’s nothing that George’s fudge won’t make better. Cleo rings up the makeup and walks him to the door. “You hang in there now. We’re a’prayin’ for you,” she says as he makes his way out the door.

Ever so often, some young gal will come in with her head hanging low. She’ll pull up a stool at the cosmetics counter and pour out her woes all over the eye shadow counter. Like a good bartender, Cleo listens. Her husband has left her. He took the dog. Cleo gives her a piece of homemade fudge and pats her arm.

Fifteen minutes later, her woes have been replaced with a new face and a new blouse. When you’re living your life out in a country and western song, a bag of cosmetics and a new blouse will fix most all that ails you. She hugs Cleo as she leaves the store. “Keep your chin up gal!” Cleo calls to her. She has made a customer and she has made a friend.

You can’t get that at the mall.

The entire Tuna series can be found at the Best of Antique Mommy

Discipline is the parenting issue about which I have the least confidence. Because I haven’t read every book ever printed on the topic? Because I haven’t bent the ear of every person on the planet who has a child? Because my child is an angel and does not require discipline? No. No. And Almost. Oops. Make that No, Almost and then No.

The problem isn’t even so much sorting through all the competing philosophies – Dr. T. Berry Brazelton, Dr. Phil, Dr. Karp, Dr. Spock, Dr. Seuss or even Dr. Scholls. The problem is that no matter what discipline philosophy you adopt, it doesn’t take into account the Memaw factor.

On our last visit to Memaw’s house there was a particular item in her living room that Sean could not resist. After the third and final warning not to touch it, I whisked him off to the bedroom to have a discussion and it went like this:

Scene: The interrogation room (or Memaw’s guest bedroom). The ceiling light has only one working bulb. The room is bathed in a dim ominous wash of green. The suspect is brought into the room and made to stand on the bed for interrogation. He is not offered an attorney or read his rights because, well, he has neither. His mother emerges from the shadows and stands by the bed to speak to him eyeball to eyeball:

AM: (using her most authoritative tone, which by the way, never worked on the dog either) Sean, I asked you not to touch that, didn’t I?

Sean: Yes Mommy.

AM: But you touched it anyway, didn’t you?

Sean: Yes Mommy.

AM: You have been disobedient, so now Mommy has discipline you. Do you understand what Mommy is saying?

Sean: Yes Mommy. (Pauses briefly and then calls into the living room) MEMAW! GET ME!

Stifled giggles heard from the living room room.

* * *

What now Dr. Phil??