Ninety-Seven And Horny
Sex is still on her mind
Wanted: A man.
Plain and simple. But not so simple if you knew who was asking. Not that finding a life partner is ever that simple. But in this case, it’s beyond reality.
Because the person asking is my ninety-seven-year-old mother. Yep, every night when she goes to bed she complains of loneliness. And that she needs a man. Tells you in what generation she was raised.
“Where is Cal?” she asks, looking up at me with child-like wonder. “Why doesn’t he ever come to see me anymore.”
A bit of my heart breaks. I know there is more to come so I can’t let my heart fall all at once.
“Did Cal die?” she asks. Another piece breaks away.
My father died ten years ago at the age of ninety-one. They were married for sixty-seven years, longer than some people walk the earth. Theirs was truly a love story. And as the whole family has been told time and again, filled with lots of sex.
Sometimes she travels to the past and questions when my father is coming home from the war. Other times she’s in some alternate state and wonders who she has been sleeping with.
I wonder that, too.
I tell her we can put an ad in the paper.
Her eyes widen and she says, “Really? We can?”
To be honest, I’m not sure if personal ads still exist.
People her age are still reading the paper and would be the only demographic not using a dating app. But if they have all their wits about them, they won’t be looking for a bed partner. And if they have dementia, they won’t remember putting the ad in the paper. And if my mom were to answer, they wouldn’t know what she was talking about. But then, neither would she.
I tell her we can visit a lobby of an assisted living place and she can chum up to an old geezer.
I can’t imagine how that conversation would go.
“Do you want to go down the street to the Belmont Home and find someone?” I ask.
“What for?” She looks at me like I’m suggesting a trip to the moon.
“To find you a man.”
“Why would I want a man?” Her blank stare falls into the cracks of my heart. “Your dad is the only one. I’m waiting for him to come home from the war.”
By this time, it’s getting late. The dogs and my husband are asleep. And I’m losing patience.
I tell her it’s time to go to sleep. She can see my father in her dreams.
I stand in the kitchen looking out the window at our enormous Chinese Elm. Watching the leaves sway against the moonlight sky.
Maybe I’ll place an ad.
Wanted: My other mom, the one who used to remember.
Thanks for reading.
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