In some families, the magic number is 3.  You know, "I'm going to count to three!!!!  One----- two---- two and a half--- two and ... THREE"  That would never work in our house.  In our house it would have been more like.  "Do it.   Negative one.. BUSTED!" 

However, we had a "Magic Number" too, or rather, mom did.  Sometime around the age of twelve or so onward, mom did it the first time.  I have no idea what prompted it.  Maybe I spilled something on an day that was already a "Jonah Day".  Maybe I was skirting the line of being out of line.  Maybe mom had PMS or maybe I did.  Whatever it was, I didn't do anything wrong per se, but mom wanted to point out that she was annoyed.  Now later, it wasn't always me.  It could be the loud music next door, the car acting up, or a cold.  Therefore, it is always possible that the first time wasn't my fault either.  I like to cling to that.

Regardless of the reason, something happened, and I heard the boom lowered for the first time.  "You're grounded until you're thirty-seven."  Okkkkaaayyy.  I know I looked at her weird.  I bet her eyes twinkled.  Just saying it put her in a better mood.  Mom has marvelous twinkly eyes when tickled. 

After that, it happened semi-regularly.  I forgot to get a homework slip signed, needed a ride to something at church, or asked for sourdough toast after dinner.  Didn't matter what it was, mom's eyes would twinkle- or if in a rare bad mood, snap- and she'd say, "You are grounded until you're thirty-seven."  If I was Gracie Allen I would have filled it in for her after the second or third time  "...till you're thirty-seven, yeah."  I wasn't Gracie Allen and knew I'd be in for real trouble if I dared to do such a thing.

It became a tradition.  The last time I remember her saying it was when I was in labor.   As Polly helped me into the car, mom leaned in and said with that trademarked glint in her eye, "If you have that baby before you get to the hospital I'll ground you 'till you're thirty-seven."

I turned thirty-seven this year.  I feel free!  I'm finally an adult.  I know the law said I was at eighteen.  Logic says I was when I got married or had a child or two, or four, or eight, or nine.... but how can you truly be an adult if you're still on restriction?  I say you can't. 

Mom... guess what?  I'm not grounded anymore.  Do you regret not grounding me until I was thirty-eight?

Mom gave me a wide variety of books to read.  From the first Little Golden Books to the little green Beatrix Potter books in the Fillmore Library, to Nancy Drew, Meg, and later Atlas Shrugged and Flowers in the Attic.  I read 'em all and everything in between.  When I look back, I wonder how I missed all the "stuff" that was in those books.  I think mom knew I'd either not "get it" or knew I'd just skip over the more "racy" sections of things like Alas Shrugged.  All I know is, I was surprised at what was in some of those books when I reread them older.

One of my favorites was, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn.  It is considered a children's book but I honestly believe most children don't fully appreciate what a masterpiece it is.  I know I didn't.  To me, it was just a great story of kids in turn-of-the-twentieth-century Brooklyn.  It was about kids who had fun in spite of their poverty, how they grew and matured, and life in the tenaments of Brooklyn's marvelous melting-pot. 

I understood Francie.  Maybe Mom realized that when she gave it to me.  It wouldn't surprise me.  I understood her desire for things to be cleaned up and perfected.  I understood the turmoil between fierce pride in her family and frustration when things didn't go how she thought they should.  I understood. 

And yet I didn't.  I'd never had to wonder where my parents would find the money for food.  As a student in private schools, most of my classmates were much wealthier than we were.  We were just average Joe (literally... that's what Dad's family calls him, Joe) blue-collar workers.  Yes, dad's uniforms were almost always light blue shirts and dark blue pants.  I had an allowance that kept me in books and fabric and junk food.  Francie and Neely scrounged rubbish heaps for anything to recycle so they could buy penny candy and a pickle.

She and I shared a love for our father's music and our parents were surprisingly similar in many ways.  My Dad, however, was as fiercely anti-union as Francie's was pro.  Her father died  but thankfully, I was not so unfortunate.  She and I both loved school and worked hard for good grades.  We loved beauty and were very innocent of the realities of life around us even though by the standards of some I went to church or school with, my life was just as difficult and sordid as they would have pronounced Francie's.  How very pathetic.  I wouldn't change my life for anything.

I loved talking over this and other books with mom.  I think I'll finally read The Chosen by Chaim Potok or something like that.  I started it, got sidetracked, and then never got back to it again.  If mom recommended it, it has to be good.  However, since I don't have that book in hand, I think I'll go reread A Tree Grows in Brooklyn.  They really should make a good movie out of it.

It's all Nancy Drew's fault.  I read the books.  I liked them.  The mysteries were fun to decipher and the adventures she had kept the books intriguing.  However, my real delight was the drawings of Nancy, Bess, and occasionally George.  I loved their clothing.  The full skirted dresses with little jackets and hats.  I loved it all.  I wanted them myself but you couldn't exactly buy those kinds of things in  1982.  People were wearing knickers, preppy double breasted shirts, and stirrup pants and baggy shirts were just around the corner. 

I saved my money.  I didn't spend my vacation money.  I hoarded and denied myself lemonade Bubblicious bubble gum and Hickory Farm's pickles.  I was determined and by the time I came back from two weeks vacation, I was ready.  I took my normal walk up Harbor Blvd, right on Seaward, and up to Thompson.  However, this time I didn't turn right on the first street past the shopping center with Newberry's and go to see John and Gloria. I didn't even get to that street.  Instead, I turned immediately into Fabrictown U.S.A.  I'd considered a walk to Beverly's down on Main Street but it was farther away and I was determined to start immediately.  I wandered around the store looking for fabrics that I liked.  I was drawn to the Gunne Sax look.  The patterns, however, were very expensive.  After much searching I found a Butterick See & Sew pattern that would do just fine.  I have no idea what prompted me to do it. 

The dress was designed with a deep scooped yoke for a "Bodice".  This yoke buttoned to a high neck with a ruffle  The sleeves also buttoned at the wrist with a ruffle. The rest of the dress hung from this yoke like a maternity dress but it wasn't intended as a maternity dress.  There was a ruffle around this yoke and around the hem. 

I chose my fabrics carefully.  A small calico print scattered across the tan background of the main fabric and I chose a coordinating floral stripe for all ruffles and the neckband.  Considering that I had almost no sewing experience whatsoever, I decided on the new and exciting product, VELCRO, as my fastener.  I bought exactly how much fabric it told me to, my pattern, pins, thread, and the VELCRO.

At home, I cut out all pattern pieces and laid out my main fabric.  I didn't bother with their silly schematic for laying out the pattern pieces.  I remembered how derisively Grandma Avants had spoken of their layouts.  It was her personal opinion (which I now share to a huge degree sometimes) that those layouts were designed to ensure maximum fabric purchase rather than minimum fabric use.  So, with happy abandon I cut all of thte calico pieces and laid them aside.  I was particularly pleased that unlike Lucy Ricardo, I did not cut the carpeting.

I laid out my striped pieces, astounded at the huge piece of fabric left over.  There had been quite a bit of the calico but nothing like this!  However, I smirked to myself that I'd bested those wasteful companies and picked up my scissors.  Providence has away of saving us from ourselves while humbling us at the same time.  This was one of those occasions.  Just as I went to make my first cut, Mom popped in the room to see how I was doing.  I could tell that my choice of dress wasn't impressive to her.  She was right, of course, but I didn't get it at the time.  It was very "Gunne Sax-ish" and that's what I wanted.  I showed her my cut pieces, my leftover fabric, and my next piece to cut and moved to make that cut once more but mom's voice cut the air first.

"Um, I don't pretend to know anything about sewing but I think those arrows and lines are there for a reason."

That's all she said.  She left the room and let me make my own decision on what to do.  I looked at the pattern pieces trying to figure out what she meant.  I looked at them on the fabric.  I looked at the layout.  I saw it.  My striped ruffles were goign sideways, diagnonally, and some just slightly off kilter.  Had I cut it out, I'd have had a mess on my hands.  Saved by my mom's timely entrance, I cut the silly thing out, this time making only minor adjustments to the pattern recommended layout.

Oh boy.  Then came the fun. Hours of hemming ruffles.  Hours of gathering ruffles.  Hours of trying to make the dress hang right.  Hours of trying to make my VELCRO encrusted yoke NOT stick out like a sore thumb.  You see, not only did I use something unique like VELCRO to fasten cuffs and yokes, but I used STRIPS of it instead of pieces.  So the yoke was one 12" strip of stiff stick-togethered-ness stuff that I sewed on the yoke BEFORE adding the skirt.  Yeah.  Brilliant.  So I had to trim and fight and trim and fight so that it din't try to stick out like a cancerous growth in a very inopportune place.  It also itched terribly.

Then I had to sew on buttons like I had actually done the button holes.  All that expanse of fabric needed somethign to break it up.  I did small pearl buttons which actually looked pretty cute.  Then I got dressed in my new dress and raced downstairs to show my parents.  They admired my work, my ingenuity on the button situation and studiously avoided commenting on the actual dress.  As I tripped back upstairs I could see their looks at each other.  Now I realize their silent communication wasn't, "Isn't she amazing" but rather, "She looks pregnant!"  Maybe it was God warning them as to the future? 

Anyway, I went upstairs and preened in front of my huge dresser mirror  I was so excited.  I'd wear it to church the next day and woudn't  Mrs. Santos be proud!  Ahem.  I preened less eagerly.  I stood still.  I gave it a critical eye.  It looked an awfully lot like one of Mrs. Elder's maternity dresses.  Curiously, I stuffed a pillow under my dress and gasped.  It looked HORRIBLE.  Whatever would I do?

Well, for one thing I would not wear that dress with a pillow under it no matter how much I wanted to rest wherever I was going.  It looked too... maternal!  I didn't have any tan belts- Wait!  My gray suit had a nice burgundy belt tha would match perfectly!  I grabbed it and slipped it around my waist and cinched it within an inch of its life.  I always liked things really tight at my waist.  I wonder why that was?  It took a few adjustments at the waist before I got everything laying just right.  The dress was perfect!  How exciting!

I have a picture of it around here somewhere.  I'll have to dig it out.  You'd think that with all of my blunders and wasted money and the final product less that originally hoped for, that I would have learned my lesson and taken up basket weaving or rock cleaning but no, I had the bug.  I still have the bug.  And I honestly believe that if mom had "taken over" and "fixed my blunders" that morning rather than simply saying, "I think those arrows and lines are there for a reason," I would have given up on the idea of sewing for some time.

I'm still working on that perfect Nancy Drew dress.  All my attempts were cute but not quite right.  Some day...

I've heard this story so many times I feel like I was there.

Sometime in 1969 before June, Dad took mom to Arizona to meet his kids.  I don't know if this happened when mom arrived or sometime over the next day or two but at some point or another, mom went out to watch the kids shooting.  They'd stuck a match in an old weathered fence post top and were trying to shoot the match with a 22 rifle. 

After a while, mom asked if she could try.  She let the boys show her how to hold the gun and aim.  Grandpa Avants watched the scene with an amused eye.  That "California city girl" was sure to provide interesting entertainment.  I bet he wished he could talk mom into using dad's 45 pistol.  hee hee

Mom, on the other hand, adjusted her sights and fired the gun.  Now the boys swear that she not only hit the match but she LIT the match.  Mom says she merely hit it.  First shot out of the gun.  Grandpa Avants said something like, "Dad GUM!" and mom, without skipping a beat said, "Well, I was the Women's Champion Skeet Shooter of Southern California."

It took her from Ray Arizona to somewhere in California before she was able to convince dad that she' never held a gun before much less shot one!

A piece of advice.  Mockery is a boomerang.  If you allow yourself to throw it, even in jest, it will always come back and hit you in the head.  Jesting or not, this hurts.

During my freshman year of high school, we lived in Noel, Misouri. Population 782... three when dad was in town.  Our house on Harmony Street had no insulation so after Christmas, Dad moved us across the bridge outside of town to a cinderblock house over by the Arthur Murray Hotel.  Lorene street. 

When we lived in Missouri, Dad worked out of Pacoima California transporting sailboats behind dual wheeled pick up trucks.  Occasionally a boat would actually be on top of the truck. He'd come through on his way to some place or back to California again.  Mom and I spent most of each week alone.  Mom knitted and crocheted, I sewed and embroidered.  We both read voraciously and loved to listen to the radio at night.  Bruce Williams (never buy a house without an attorney) and Sally Jesse Raphael  (a fun eighth grade graduation party idea is a lunch box social just in case you wanted to know.)

Sometime between February and May, we grew into a habit of teasing each other with mockery.  My parents never put up with disrespect or "cheek".  I would never get away with sassing any adult much less them.  I knew who was boss and I knew how to show respect for my elders!  However, my mom and I did tease each other.  I'm pretty sure mom started it.  I would never have had the guts to do it myself.  I probably asked "What's for dinner?"  or something innocent like that and mom must have replied in a mocking singsong echo of my query, "What's for dinner?"

However it started, this became a funny little past time for us.  She'd tell me to go put away the dishes and I'd mock it on the way to oblige.  I'd tell her we were out of shampoo and she'd repeat my information saucily.  It was fun in a quirky sort of way.  It fit our bizarre personalities and incomprehensible senses of humor.

At this time in my life, when the weather was inclement or if I happened to be running late, or just because, Mrs. Strickland and John would pick me up for church.  I loved riding in their little tan Ford Tempo and laughing with them.  Mrs. Strickland was one of my heroes. 

One Sunday, an elderly woman of our church, Mary, needed a ride so we stopped on our way and brought her to church with us.  As I stepped out of the car...

Remember how I said mockery is a boomerang?

... Mrs. Strickand said, "Will you help Mary get into the building?"

Without blinking an eye, I quipped as I reached for the car door handle, "Will you help Mary-"  The tone, remember, is mocking.  Kind of like when a girl is ticked at her sister and says "neah neah neah neah."  I wanted to drop through the floor.  Just let me runaway and hide.  I'll miss you.  Forgive me.

The look on Mrs. Strickland's face still hurts me.  She was so shocked, grieved, and dumstruck.  I helped Miss Mary into the building and fought back tears.  John seemed to understand that there was a reason I'd done it and that it wasn't meant to be ugly.  He patted my shoulder awkwardly a few times until Dickie Lett came into the classroom and started our Sunday School Lesson.

Later, I did apologize to Mrs. Strickland and tried to explain.  Somehow I think she found it all very amusing but wisely agreed with me that  I'd better quit the game with mom.  When mom heard about it, she agreed too.  However, one great thing happened from that experience- well, several actually.  I learned how to joke with my mom.  Before that time, my attempts at joking were awkward and unnatural.  I also learned that things that are innocent diversions in one situation and inappropriate in another are probably generally best avoided.  You never know when it'll cross over that line.

If you reach for the boomerang "Mockery", be sure you don't let it hit you between the eyes.

"Be sure you don't let it hit you between the eyes"

Overheard on the swings at Well's Road Baptist Church in Ventura California circa 1982.

Noemi:  "Sal, your ears are disgusting.  EEEEWWW  Look at that earwax!  EEEWWWW!"  (Important interjection.  Sal is not a girl.  Sal is short for Salvador, her younger brother who was my age.)

Chautona:  "You've been talking too much Sal."

Sal:  "What?????"

Chautona:  (With complete and utter confidence)  "The more you talk, the more earwax your body produces.  I think it must have something to do with softening the sound from the sound waves being so near the ear.  I don't know.  I just know that the more you talk the more earwax."

Noemi:  "That's crazy.  Who told you that?"

Chautona:  "My mom."

Noemi:  "I think she was pulling your leg."

I gave Noemi a look.  She should know better.  She knows my parents.

Chautona:  "MY mom?"

Silence.  I had a point.  Strong argument for my case.

You see, my parents were always strictly truthful with me.  They didn't tell me I was better at things than I was, let me win games, or tell me that shots don't hurt.  Santa Claus was DAD and no amount of convincing by my cousin would ever sway me again.  Dad said so and that was that!  I never doubted their word on any subject no matter how ridiculous it might sound.  Noemi knew this.  She couldn't conceive of my parents telling me that my eyes would stay frozen if I crossed them and things like that.  Sal was still skeptical and threw a few more barbs my way but even Noemi considered the subject closed.

It was two years later on a cold Missouri winter night that I said something to mom about earwax and talking too much.  Mom shook her head in disbelief.  "Who told you that?"  She was laughing. 

I stared at her in shock.  "Mom, you told me that.  When I was about five."

"Well, if I told you anything like that at all you must have been talking too much and I wanted to shut you up."

I stared at her.  MY mom???  M-Y 100% ALWAYS honest mother who never played games with me???  I couldn't believe it!  I remember going over everything I could think of that might have been a possible ploy for self-preservation.  I've never found another one though.  I did wonder about mom's jokes about different foods putting hair on your chest when I found a stray hair growing on mine once.  I decided it was a fluke and it really was a joke.

I'm sure I was right.  It had to be a joke.  Mom laughed.  She wouldn't say something so serious and then laugh about it!

Would she?

The word makes a lump swell in my throat.  I'm not sure why.  Maybe it's because I realize more every day what a treasure of a mother I have.  Maybe it's because I miss her so much.  Maybe it's both and a million other things.  Yep.  That's it.  I'm sure of it.

I have so many memories of mom.  I'd like to just start at the beginning and share every one I can think of but I'm afraid I'd rush and not do them justice.  I think, instead, I'll start with Boozer.

When I was fifteen, we moved into the "Triangle" between the Bakersfield cutoff, HWY 14, and HWY 58 in Mojave.  We lived in an 18ft travel trailer, hauled our water, and lived without electricity.  When the move was complete, I immediately wanted a dog.  I loved dogs.  They usually took to mom though.  I guess her being home with the dog all day while I was at school didn't help my cause.

At this time in my life, I'd made a new friend.  Roger.  We rode his motorcycle everywhere and sat around his house playing with his pesky sisters.  He wasn't a "boyfriend" in the traditional sense.  He was a boy, who happened to be a friend.  A good one.  There is a reason for this information.  Roger lived on Kemper street.  I loved the sound of that name.  Kemper.  It had a scampering frivolity to it that appealed to me.  Hey, if mom can love the sound of the word, "heifer", I can love Kemper.

So we found an Australian/Retriever mix and brought the dog home.  I started to name her Kemper.  It didn't seem to fit.  I was so disappointed but promptly tried Mitzi.  That's a good name for her.  And it was.  For three whole days.

Enter Aunt Marilyn, Uncle Lon, a motorhome, a trench, lots of beer cans, and a curious puppy.  Mitzi, being the silly pup she was, found the trash sack with all the beer cans.  She lapped up every spare drop and then entertained Aunt Marilyn with her funny little drunken side step swaggle.  I  have a picture of that somewhere.  I'll try to find it.  Aunt Marilyn teased the pup calling her a "little Boozer" and the name stuck.

Mom always had a special relationship with our dogs, as I mentioned earlier but she and Boozer were a pair.  Mom would sit in the folding chairs out in front of our trailer and point south.  "Clear the area Boozer" and off Boozer would go.  That dog would run in a circle, about thirty feet from mom as the center sending birds, chipmunks, lizards and jackrabbits as far away from us and Boozer as they could get.  Mom would laugh, praise the dog,and scratch behind her ears.  Boozer loved that.

Mom kept Boozer in bandanas around the neck. That dog wouldn't have been Boozer if there hadn't been a cool bandana flapping in the self-generated breeze as she raced to send all nearby "critters" from the area.

Then there was the welcoming horn greeting.  We drove down several dirt roads to get to our land.  As we neared the closest corner,  mom would start honking her horn and Boozer would come running.  Mary Kate Dannahur would have been so very disgusted.  "I'm not a woman to honk and come a-runnin!"   Boozer had no such scruples.

Now here in my story I  have to interject a sideline.  You see, this story is proof positive that I am not the most intelligent of people.  You see, I worked on my homework all the way home from school.  (almost a 30 minute drive).  It was hard on the dirt roads but I could read and circle multiple choice at least.  So every afternoon, in spite of knowing what was coming and knowing how stupid I was being, I'd be sitting there, engrossed in my homework and apparently deaf to the honking warning of what was about to happen.

Boozer raced to meet the car.  Mom would barely slow down and Boozer would jump through the window onto my lap.  I usually was able to pull my PACE out of the way before she landed all over my schoolwork but usually isn't always and sometimes I had some interesting dog prints on the paper.  Looking back, I should have told my Supervisor that "My dog did my homework, that's why I failed the checkup!"

That dog loved riding the rest of the way to the trailer where mom would refill the water bowl, give her a treat, and I'd finish my homework.  Those were some really good days.