Explaining me

My mom is just like me, only blond. And with much bigger boobs. Whenever she comes to visit I hear the same echoing response, "Oh, this explains so much about you," or "I totally understand where you're coming from now," and so on.

I wouldn't necessarily call my mother weird (although on numerous occasions this is precisely what I have called her) but she no doubt has a quality to her personality that makes her a little, let's say eccentric.

"What in the world..." my friend Tammie exclaimed as my mom entered the basement in a battered old wedding dress, sporting a sizable baby bump. A faux cigarette which usually sat as decoration in a bathroom ashtray hung loosely from her lips. I was 15 at the time and my mom was definitely not pregnant. Tammie broke into a fit of giggles while I stared mortified in embarrassment.

"I'm having a shot gun wedding ladies!" Mom cooed in a Southern accent that forty-some years in Detroit had not naturally bestowed. I started bellowing for my father, the only other member of my family whom I deemed somewhat normal in those years. There was something more subtle in my dad's humiliating acts, like a little kid just trying too hard to impress. We referred to my dad fondly as a "funny little man" although he was neither intentionally funny nor all that little. But the name nevertheless always seemed to fit strangely perfect.

"There's my man!" Dad had entered the basement, a look of baffled amusement on his mustached face. After twenty years of marriage, this behavior was hardly shocking. Regardless, he stumbled with his words, not entirely sure what my mom was up to with this get-up on a Saturday morning in early August. Mom narrowed her eyes at him. "Don't stand there looking so shocked! You're the one that did this to me!" She pointed in exaggeration at her pregnant belly and spun on her heels to rustle up the stairs.

To be fair to my mom, the whole thing was not entirely out of nowhere. A manager at a home decor store in the mall, that afternoon she had a meeting with her staff regarding shoplifting. Apparently, mom later explained in the car (still sporting the bump but sans the wedding garb), a common practice is actually women who sport a fake pregnancy all the while stuffing goods under their grossly expanded maternity tops. My mom thought she'd make an entertaining entrance for the meeting.

As for the wedding gown, it was the first random piece of clothing she could find big enough to fit. And she found it just plain funny.

"You're mom is so cool!" Tammie later exclaimed. She had insisted on walking my mom through the mall to her store in order to see the reactions on her coworkers faces. My dad and I, dignified as always, waited outside in the car.

It took another few years for me to realize just how much her personality had rub off on me. Certain times I've caught myself repeating her odd phrases or unintentionally impersonating her actions. As a child my mom and I were hardly very close, although looking back, even then we were more similar than we really knew at the time. Because when it comes down to it, my mom is just plain fun. And I often think that may be the greatest gene pool trait she could possibly have given me. Although I wouldn't have minded inheriting the boobs too.