The Mom I Never Knew
I don't know exactly how it all happened or what exactly did happen. Sue told me some of it and when we cleared out the stuff from the Argyle house that we might still want I snatched up a pile of old letters, negatives and one of Mom's journals. The journal was an old one. I think she had stopped writing when this was going on or at least I haven't run into a journal about it. I did find in the packet part of a letter she had written to me but never mailed.
She had met some older man at the flea sales where they sold stuff to try to make money. I don't know if he was older than her or if I'm just calling him an older man because I think he must have been older than me for sure. I also think he must have been younger than Dad when he died because Dad was always old. I hope that makes sense.
Dad had been dead a few years, I think when this happened.
The man must have led her on and for whatever reason I don't know. He made her think they were "in love" (*I don't know if I'd gotten that letter or if she written to me about him in the beginning if I would have felt it was my place to try to say something to her or not. She was most definitely an adult and single, so what could I have said that might have made her wake up and smell the coffee?)
In any case, Mom thought she was in love and the feelings were returned. Sue is pretty sure the whole place was laughing at Mom from the very start. Everyone else knew that the man was married but Mom acted like he wasn't.
In the letter she wrote to me she said she did know but she didn't say when she found out so there is no crystal clear way of knowing. I have no photo of him that I know of. I have some photos of men that neither Sue or I knew who they were but Sue had seen this guy the whole time and none of the photos I have are him.
How long this "affair" went on, I don't know. I put the quotes around that word because as far as I can tell there was no sex so I figured that means it wasn't an affair and yet I think it was similar because from what I've read and heard there would have been if he could have made that happen.
When he started paying attention to her, she perked up and lost weight and fixed her hair up. She got nicer clothes and had Sue, I think take photos of her. Sue says some of them she doesn't remember but maybe she wouldn't.
While all this was happening, Mom and Sue had very little money. They seldom had enough food or enough money to pay the bills with. Sue tried as hard as she could to sell things but Mom went along with her to the sales and flitted around like a social butterfly making nice and chatting with everyone while Sue did all the work of unloading the truck, setting up the tables and trying to sell stuff. Then at the end of the day packing it all up to take it back home and usually not making enough to barely pay for the space rental.
I was going through my own troubles out there in Ohio but I would still have wanted to know what was going on and helped if I could.
Whenever I did talk to Mom she never said anything about this but maybe it all happened when things were getting real bad for me. I don't know the timing on any of this.
I have to say this about Mom even though it sounds mean of me. She never let Sue go anywhere with any one, without her right there to "protect" Sue, like she really felt Sue was dumber than a stick of stove wood, which she wasn't.
I think the straw that broke the camel's back was when she and the man tried to do the deed and he couldn't perform. By then she already knew he was married because she told me so in the letter she wrote to me. Not the part about trying to do the deed, though.
After this Mom fell apart. She was also suffering badly from un-medicated diabetes and years of having stomach and bowel disease. Mom was never healthy. She'd spent most of her life working her butt off to raise her little brothers and then all of us and then when her and Dad got old and no one was there but Sue things got rough. When Dad died, they suddenly had to live on very little money that was never enough.
Maybe she felt this "whatever it was" with this man was her last chance at happiness. When it all fell apart she went downhill fast to the point where she "forgot" who we were. She forgot everything. I think I wrote somewhere how Sue came home from a grocery run to find her stuffing things into the stove and burning them in the middle of summer. She was stuffing papers and photos and even her clothes in there.
That was it for Sue. She knew she could never trust her alone and was in fear of her burning the house down.
A month or so after Tommy and I came out there Sue took us all to a flea sale to try to sell stuff. Mom came along. I was afraid to go because Mom still thought we were strangers. I think she made some remark about us but we were in the back so I didn't quite hear it exactly but close enough.
We got there and Sue and I and Tommy unloaded and set up the stuff. Mom stayed in the car and refused to get out. People she knew would go over to the car and talk to her. She was acting pretty out of it, I thought. Eventually, they started coming over to Sue telling her she ought to take her home. Mom was not ill then. I could tell. She was just dramatizing. I knew maybe she didn't feel well but her skin looked fine, she didn't have a cold or a temp. She was just being ornery and seeking sympathy which she got.
Even though Sue was desperate to make money, we packed it all back up and went home. Sue left us at our apartment and took Mom back to their place. When Sue got it all unpacked and went inside, she found Mom all cheery suddenly and acting like nothing was wrong.
During the heyday of this business with this man Mom would take gas and food money and buy expensive things for this man. Even if they went without, Mom got stuff for this guy and his son. I think he had a child who was autistic and Mom felt he was ignored a lot.
Mom always thought the only way to make friends and keep them was to buy them things. I've always felt if they liked me, fine, if they didn't it was there loss. I never had many friends but you can bet the ones I do have and have had in the past would never have dumped me if I couldn't afford to give them treats.
I think now, that maybe Old Tom was the same way as Mom. I could be wrong on that but he always gave stuff and bought stuff for his buddies. He loaned them all money even when we didn't have much.
When Tommy and I were living on our own in New York, we were always living with barely enough to survive on. There was no way I could have given anyone anything in those days that I had not made with my own hands.
Don't get me wrong about Mom. I think she had a right to look for happiness. I just don't think she should have done it with a married man or the first man that showed an interest in her. I sure don't think she should have been spending money they couldn't afford just to attract a man, ANY man. A man like that, one who would be impressed by a woman spending money on them, is not worth it.
I should know because that was the most that JB wanted from me. Having a man who respects you is much more important than ones who likes you only because you pay for his gas.