Slowing Down

Godammit! I thought, as car in front of me slowed and the car I had just gotten around in the right lane passed by me easily.


"G-osh darnit!" I yelled into the phone, realizing my mother would probably rather hear the tamer version of my anger, "How come every time I get in the lane that I think is going faster it freakin' slows down!" I remembered to use "freakin'", too.


"You just need to slow down, then," my mom said in her i-know-what-you-are-going-thru-and-as-your-mother-take-my-advice voice. "Slow down a little, and just let go." I know she knew exactly the weight that those words would have, after all I'm more like her than I would like to admit. The constant desire to be doing something productive, the persistant need for company, the scatterbrained way of retelling stories and forgetting names- all these I inherited and from my mother. But today she's telling me to slow down, and tears immediately jumped to my eyes.

The past few days had been frustrating, to say the least. The one roommate I had formed a good companionship with after moving into a new place four weeks ago was out of town for three weeks, I felt like I was using up my welcome with the random other people still in town for the summer, and then the rest of the housemates were going home for the weekend. I hadn't been able to go home for the weekend since I first entered college 4 years ago, and staying in the same college town for the summer didn't increase my chances of spending a few days at home. After staying one night in the rather old house accompanied by just two cats and lots of shady, shadowy trees that made the lots a few shades darker than every other house on the street, I decided that staying in Columbia was not what I wanted to do this weekend. I needed to get out of the city for just a little bit and, I hoped, escape all the frustrations that I associated with it, but my finances couldn't allow for any weekend trips of much expense. Plus I didn't want to make a trip only to sit by myself and remember how lonely I was. So I called my grandmother. I could never go home for weekends in collge, but I could visit my grandmother, and a weekend at her house surrounded by her amazing cooking (southern fare is the greatest comfort food known to man) and sense of protection. The kind of protection of a tent made of sheets, or mug of hot chocolate. I didn't even have to invite myself over; as soon as I said I had spent the night all alone in the house with some cats, my grandmother had exclaimed "Well come on down!"


I was relieved; I'd felt lonely all week and thought that perhaps a day at Grandmommy's would get me out of my funk. Going to work to do nothing I felt was consequential, arguing with the boy who wasn't even my boyfriend, arguing with myself for continuting to let him frustrate as much as he did, and remembering that my closest friends were miles away was filling my mind to insanity. I tried to stay busy in order to not think about all these things, shoving them into the back of my mind without even bothering to compartamentalize them. I at least had the wherewithal to run to the protection of Grandmommy's kitchen, and on the way I decided to call my mother.


I don't remember how much of my week I shared with my mom, but I could have sworn it wasn't enought for her to so uncannily pick out that phrase out of all the motherly phrases she has stored up. Of course, in the state I was in, probably any of her motherly phrases I would have called uncannily perfect. But as it was, it only seemed to nicely frame the question I had been putting off asking her for the past two days.


"Mamma, have you ever, even in your married life, felt lonely?" I blurted it out. I wasn't sure if I wanted her to say yes and remind me that I have years of shitty weeks to look forward to or no and make me feel like the relationship I was currently having trouble with was even worse than I thought.


"Yes," she said, drawing out the yes as if she'd been saving it up for the past 21 years. Great. Here's to those weeks of feeling shitty and like no one will ever give me what I need.


The rest of the conversation consisted of the basics I'd learned to expect from my mom: you've got to be happy with yourself and who you are to not feel so lonely so often/you've got to stay tuned into God's plans to make sure you're on the right track/other people don't complete you/pray more. I heard it all, really I did. After the initial purge of emotion, and when the converstaion turned back to my being on god's track, I returned my somewhat more guarded "yes, i know"s and "you're right"s. This was the point in the conversation that I wasn't sure where I stood anymore, so I went ahead and agreed with most everything, my thoughts turning towards the sunday dinner I knew I could look forward to, and the certainty of my finishing the novel I had picked up two hours before deciding to drive the hour to teeny-town South Carolina, where my grandmother's small and quaint house waited.


When I arrived, I pulled into the driveway of the small white house just off the old highway and finished up the conversation with my mother, which had now turned to my younger brother's newest rebellious habit. I must have spent too long in the car without showing up at the door, because both grandfather and grandmother appeared at the gate, my pot-bellied grandpa insisting on carrying everything in for me, even though it was only one duffle bag and a purse. It had never ceased to amaze me how, no matter how round his abdomen could get, his face maintained the same high cheekbones and slim shape, handed down from his Cherokee grandma, as it had since I could remember. My grandmother's upper lip was beginning to dissappear, thin as it had been her whole life, under more wrinkles, but that didn't lessen my gratitude for the welcome kiss she placed on my cheek. The dogs barked their high-pitched hellos, wagging all over with the delight of my visit, and the lonliness I had carried on my shoulders began to fall off in large chunks.


I never watch what I eat at my grandmother's house. It's as if that large fluffy comforter feeling of protection carries over into the food she puts on the table: none of it can really affect me. I ate with plenty of enthusiasm, feeling like I was being fed a feast. Having just recently entered the post-graduate and broke stage of my life, my mostly leftover meals faded in comparison to baked chicken, garden potatoes, rolls, black-eyed peas as only my grandma can make, and a pound cake that tasted like heaven. I am catered to as I am nowhere else: they don't have whipped cream to eat with the pound cake, but they do have ice cream. Do I want any more tea? Would I prefer less or more tomatoes in my spaghetti sauce? I should eat some more, I look too thin. I can't help but smile and feel like only a grandmother knows exactly how to spoil children. I settled comfortably in being the almost-grown-up grandkid, needing every bit of the attention I was getting.

Going to my grandparent's house isn't quite like going home. At home I feel I have to prove my adult responsibility, while still enjoying some perks of being a little girl with her Mamma and Daddy. At Grandmommy's I may have to prove responsibility, but not quite in the adult way necessary to make my parents proud of me. I can still be a completely capable adult who needs to sleep in til noon after watching tv late, and not be expected to agree with every idea and ideal. I may think that global warming is a threat while my grandmother mistrusts anything coming from Al Gore, and she may think that her taxes shouldn't be wasted on keeping murderers alive and comfortable while I don't see any court as having the power to take life, but we disagree without stress and without argument. Although I only stayed for a night, the entire visit had the same affect on any subject I thought was urgent only the day before: it slowly faded. Nothing is urgent in that one-story house with porch swing in front except the recent antics of the dogs and what the next meal will consist of. Showered with food, comfortable laugher, treats, and unconditional companionship, I was without the need to feel lonely, and with out that need the other issues seemed to fade away.

When I left my grandfather begged me to return more often so he could enjoy the meals and leftovers that always accompanied my visits.
"Of course, I'll come back just for you," I joked as I got into my car. We waved good-bye and I turned out of the driveway and back to the city. I turned my stereo up and sang happily to the cd in my car, not dreading the return back to work as much as I thought I would. It wasn't until I was ten minutes down the road that I realized I wasn't speeding.