Forget Green Gables

A Surrogate Mother

Since early childhood, I have played traveling summer softball. The feel of the glove on my right hand, the grip of a bat, the dull thud of a line drive being caught - these sensations wake some part of me that slumbers during the school year. Softball flows through me with more energy than anything else...so it makes sense in some cruel way that my mom makes the game I love the first casualty of summer.

Mid-morning the second Friday of the break, I knock on the door of my mother's darkened room. I don't expect her to be glad I am coming in search of her, but I don't exactly have a choice. My paperwork isn't signed and without it, I won't be allowed to play. Furthermore, I need a ride. My father assures me when I call him that my mother will get up and take me to my game, but what I find is my mother, sound asleep, a bottle of some prescription or another open next to her. I check her breathing- she is deeply asleep.

"Gracias, Mama," I mutter. I am annoyed, but not the least bit surprised. I tie the laces of my cleats together and string them over my bike handlebars. My gear bag I lace to the back of the bike with bungee cords, a neat trick Mr. Ashburn showed me a couple of years ago, the last time my mom went AWOL and I had to rely on Jamie's folks for basically anything except a place to sleep. I peddle over to Jamie's house, a whole diatribe of things I want to say to my mom running through me.

Without comment, Mrs. Asburn hugs me tightly. I loathe the idea of adding even a second of work to her load, but she holds me as long as I need, not for the first time either. There is something about a mother's hug that soothes the soul and assures me that all will be okay.