Last week was the first Saturday in June and we had an impromptu party. It started as a cookout with our immediate neighbors, but as this day got closer, it grew to 30 people in all. Sitting at a table, all prim and proper, is a young woman named Sandra, who moved in with us last December. She is sipping her pretentious wine out of proper long stem glass as she quaintly chats with two best friends from high school. Gucci sandals with a designer skirt and blouse adorn her under a cooling wide brimmed hat. She hides her true emotions behind expertly worn makeup and Maui Jim’s sunglasses.
She was married for a little more than 10 years to a man who had airs of his own. She came to our house with two small boys, our grandchildren. Jim, the eldest, is 10 and rambunctious. His younger brother Charles, age eight, he is more of momma’s boy. She expects them to behave as she does. Charles is apathetic to this idea whereas Jim contests it at every action.
I saw Jim coming from the pond with a handful of mud dripping through his fingers. He smeared it on his mother’s face. She flared up immediately but she did not yell at him. She coldly walked to the house turning her back on him. I waved him over to me as I cleaned the grill for the evening’s dinner.
“You ought not to have done that.”
“I know,” he mumbles with a depressed expression.
“Why you would do that?”
“As me and grandma walked around the pond this morning she told me how mom used to play in the muddy bottom of the pond. She would wear it on her face to make her skin softer. Grandma would hose her off before coming into the house for the night. She sounded lot funner then.”
I just winced with acknowledgement of his statement and sent him on his way.
It was 10 minutes later when Sandra came out of the house wearing a pink tank top and cut-off blue jeans shorts. She went to the shed and grabbed the metal pail. She took the pail to the far end of the pond where the silt mud is the soupiest. She loaded the pail with several handfuls of the most viscous muck she could dig up and stealthily approached the ten year old. There was a layer of mud ankle high on her bare feet.
The boy who had been playing for 15 minutes elsewhere was oblivious to her actions. 15 minutes to 10-year-old, is like two years for adults and he had forgotten what just happened. She took this mud and poured it over his head. Jim jumped up not knowing to laugh or cry. I hollered out, “you started it” and he began to laugh.
He grabbed some mud off his head and started chasing his mother. Sandra dove into the pond avoiding the flight of a mud ball. Jim followed her in the pond without question. Charles stood by unsure what was happening. After some encouragement from Grandma, Charles got into the mud fight with his brother and mother. In short order, Sandra’s friends and their children joined in the fun and the pond was full of laughter once more.
It was little more than an hour later when I rang the triangular dinner bell. Everyone came running for my burgers and dogs. Sandra followed her two boys. Mud soaked water replaced her impregnable makeup hiding her face. Instead of a trifling forced smile, she was wearing a glorious smile that filled her eyes and made them sparkle. As she came through the line for her burger, I said, “Welcome home Sandy.”
After dinner, the children returned to the pond. I got the hose ready for when they finished. It was eight o’clock when Sandy chased everyone out of the pond and hosed them off. It took a good hour to dry before climbing into cars or going into the house. The party broke up around 9:30 when Grandma took her boys in the house for bed. This left just Sandy and I sitting by the dying fire.
There was only a moment of quietness when Sandy asked me why I welcomed her home.
“My daughter was Sandy while growing up. She liked horseback riding, hikes in the woods, but mostly playing in that muddy pond. The last summer before college, I remember Sandy and her two BFFs vowing always come back to this pond for laughs and hilarity. Sandy went to college and every Christmas and summer she came to visit. Upon each visit, I could see the transformation from Sandy to Sandra. The makeup got heavier, the clothes became fancier and the smile slowly waned into a mild turning of the lips. It was if a good hearty smile would crack the veneer spackled to your face. Then one day you announced Sandra (sŏn’ dra’) was your name and did not wish to be called Sandy again.
Sandy loved life; Sandra loves clothes and possessions. Sandy was giving; Sandra is ostentatious. Tonight with the mud on your face, hair and clothes your smile radiated your inner love, I saw Sandy for the first time in many years. There was no makeup masking your feelings or for you to hide behind. You really remind me of when you were 14, including wearing a shirt that required a bra under it when wet.”
“I am not ruining a good bra in the nasty pond water,” she stated with an uncompromising face.
“That is the problem. You are more concerned with your possession than you are the people around you. I remember when you were 14 and I had your mother take you to get sports bras to wear. I was not happy you wore the bra as a halter-top, but your mother told me to compromise and I did. By the way, your mother kept those bras in case you would need them again.” We spent the next couple of hours talking about the differences Sandy and Sandra.
By the end of the evening she admitted, “There is more joy in Sandy than there is in Sandra. Although, Sondra makes more money than Sandy can.”
The next morning as we leaving for Church, I could not help but to notice Sandy was still with us. She had her hair in a ponytail, wearing jeans and a shirt, and just a little mascara around the eyes highlighting the brightness coming from them. Jim apparently noticed the difference in mom because he was doing what she asked instead of fighting her. This past week Sandy really worked hard to break the façade of Sandra.
There has been a pleasant transition since last weekend. I am not sure if she noticed but her wine consumption dropped significantly over this past week and her involvement with her two boys increased proportionally. People at work started opening up more to Sandy than they did with Sondra.
It is good to have my Sandy back, but I also know with her leading with the beautiful smile I will soon lose her to another man.
As parents grow older, so have their children. Kids don't stay being kids no matter how we longed for them to stay the same. We MUST allow our kids to grow into their own identities. The identities that form who they are and NOT who we want them to be.
I think some tenses need to be fixed up with this story. Other than that I would suggest just allow Sandra to be Sandra.
I have always been called Sandie, my mom and my dad called me Sandie, and I have NOT occupied the name Sandra, and I am fine with my name. I am comfortable with myself.
It's almost Christmas. Lynn Basil is writing her last book about a secret entrance into the magical doll land of Sha Bebe that she loves so much. Bagannos have taken over the world! Lynn finally meets her dolls in real life. Can she write in a Secret
Let this coming of age story of a boy named Bean take you back to a simple time. Set in a small southern town in the 1960's, encircled by a river and gleaming white cotton fields.
