Hey Mom, Watch This!

When you’re seven years old and your dad owns a carpet store in town, that’s where you go in the afternoons when the school bell rings. Whether you like it or not. When he wasn’t selling or installing carpet, Dad worked at the Lockheed Aircraft Corporation, which would have been an infinitely cooler place to hang out after school. Seriously, can you imagine the unbridled awesomeness of watching military aircraft practicing touch-and-goes while you’re not doing your homework? That’s probably one of the reasons I landed among the shag carpet samples every day instead of the grassy hillside near the runway. Anyway, on the days when he was helping build the C-130 Hercules, Mom minded the shop and I tried to mind Mom. But when you’re seven and covered in wall to wall monotony, it’s hard. Plus, this was back when games were played on fields, courts or table tops, not on video screens. Fun was not near as convenient and was usually of the do-it-yourself variety.

One of those days, when boredom lay across my soul heavy as industrial grade carpet, I discovered a pile of scrap wood behind the store. To a boy languishing in the tedium of continuity, it was more than just a jumble of discarded lumber. It was an invitation to imagine. All I needed was a hammer. And some nails. And I knew where Dad kept his tool box.

I don’t remember how long it took to complete, but the finished product is ever green in my memory. I built an airplane. Its wingspan was at least as wide as both my arms stretched out. Using a permanent marker, I drew a wicked set of snarling teeth on its nose. I drove two 16 penny nails down through the wings close by the fuselage to serve as landing gear. It was, if I do say so, magnificent.

Of course, a feat of aviation engineering such as this needed a proper test flight. And test flights, as well as boys who have staved off boredom and accomplished something of significance, need witnesses. Who better to behold my success, any boy’s success, than the one who gave him birth? So I transported my creation into the shop, lifted it into the launch position, announced, “Hey Mom! Watch this,” and threw it. I threw it with all my might and it flew! The darn thing flew like a dream right across the shop. And stuck its two 16 penny landing gear right in the side of my mother’s head.

The blood from the puncture wounds was copious, the human scalp being generously lined with vessels and veins. Tributaries of red ran down my mother’s neck, onto her dress, trickling down her arms and dripping off her fingers. I collapsed onto the floor, horrified. She grabbed a towel and pressed it to her head to stanch the bleeding. Then she piled me, my younger brother and sister into the car, and drove herself to the emergency room. It’s a bad day for a boy of any age when he makes his mother bleed. It’s a terrible day when he’s the reason she has to be stitched up and stuck with a needle to prevent lock jaw.

That evening, at the end of that awful, awful day, Mom drove us home from the hospital. She set a table before me in the presence of my siblings, and made me eat my vegetables. She ordered a bath, then made me to lie down at a decent hour. Mom reaffirmed her love, listened to my prayers, and kissed me goodnight. All this for the son who made her bleed.

If she’s still alive, call your mom today. You probably have a story of your own, one in which something you did caused your mom pain, and she loved you anyway. But it’s a fallen world, and sometimes the people in our stories who are supposed to protect us and love us even when we fail, don’t. And that makes Mother’s Day hard. Which is why it’s important to remember that other story. It involves wood and nails and blood and forgiveness, too. It’s hard to read, but it changed everything. It can change anything.