Under the Willow

Mother is late.

It’s not unusual. She’s always late. But today should be different. I check my watch again. Thirty minutes. I didn’t even check the time until 20 minutes past because it’s just so normal for her to run behind. But today is still a surprise, she’s usually on time for stuff like this. I decide the ground’s dry enough and take a seat beneath the weeping willow she likes. No need to text her, she’ll be here soon.

My mother is the kind of person you expect to be late. She’s the kind of person who you think you might need to tell them the event starts at 7:15 instead of 7:30. She’s the kind of person that when she tells you she will be there at 5:00 “on the dot!” you know that she actually means 7:00pm. There’s always an excuse though, and it’s always an excuse that you can’t quite be mad at her for. Last week she got a flat tire on the way to a doctor’s appointment. “Mom”, I said through the phone, “Did you reschedule the appointment? Where are you? Do you need help replacing the tire? Let me come pick you up.”

“Oh hush, Matthew. I’ll get there when I get there.” She laughed, “I always do!”.

She’s right of course, if she says she’ll be there, she’ll be there. Just don’t count on the time. When she does finally show up she makes you forget she was ever late at all. How many times, I wonder, has she been 45 minutes late to a dinner I’m hosting, making all my hungry guests grumble and roll their eyes, before she shows up with 4 expensive bottles of wine, a bouquet of flowers for the vase in my kitchen, and a whirlwind of a story. “I saw a celebrity a the Krogers, look at the photo I got with him!”, “There was a crash on I-71 and a car flipped over! I saw the whole thing!”, “The cat I’ve been feeding snuck into the garage last night. Guess who is finally going to be a grandmother!”

I used to be embarrassed when our family walked in late. Especially the times we were late to Mass and everyone in the room seemed to turn to look at the same time and say, “Here comes the late family again.” I was angry with Mother for making me look stupid in front of the town. As a teenager, I started driving separately from the rest of the family so that I could be there on time. She objected to it of course, but Father assured her it wouldn’t last for long. He’d tried this method before, and like me, soon realized that if you’re not late with Mother, you don’t get to live the stories she’s going to tell. You have to hear the story with all the other strangers, instead of laughing along and telling everyone “It’s true! I was there!”

I lean back against the willow and gaze up into its branches. Mother likes this tree, I think, because it reminds her of Father. Its large and strong, the base so wide that she can’t wrap her arms around the whole trunk. It’s a beautiful tree and stands out from the oak and the ash and the maple. Father was like that. Not because he was loud or obnoxious, just because he was unique. That’s what Mother says anyway. Although he has a gravestone on the other side of the gravel road, she prefers to sit here and tell him her stories instead. “Trees listen better than rock, Matthew.” She wasn’t late to Father’s funeral, but it might have been easier if she was, because then at least she’d have a story to tell us.

You can’t help but love her. You can’t help but smile and laugh along with her story while she goes into so much detail you feel like you were there. She’s one of those people who can tell a painfully boring story but still manage to have everyone in the room on the edge of their seat. I didn’t even realize the stories were boring until I tried retelling one. I shared the punchline “The dog was brown!” to a table of coworkers who were inspecting their cuticles and spinning a finger around the rim of their wineglass. Boring, boring story. But when Mother tells it, you wouldn’t dare check your phone.

I start to wonder what kind of story she’ll tell this time. Maybe she helped an older lady pick up groceries that she’d dropped, and she was given $100 as a thank you. Maybe there was a funny looking dog she needed to pet. Maybe a fire hydrant burst on Main Street and all the children were playing in the puddles, and she just had to jump out and join in.

I don’t know when I started crying, but I instinctively reached up to wipe my face as I watched the hearse turn onto the gravel drive. The crunch of the rocks and pebbles under the weight of the tires and frame broke me from a spell of sobs I hadn’t even realized were coming out. I go to wipe my face again but stop myself when I see the watch on my wrist. The one that Mother gave me as another apology for being late, “I was just about to leave the house when I saw that the crows I’ve been feeding had dropped this off on my doorstep! I had to leave them a little extra today to say thank you. Look at this watch, darling! I think it would look just handsome on you.”

I stood from the bench and met the driver at Mother and Father’s newly engraved headstone. He removed his hat, shared his condolences, and shrugged a “you’ll never believe this,” gesture. “I guess the high school senior prank is today,” he apologized, “there’s a dozen cows wandering around in the town square”.