“When you grow up in Chicago overhearing horror stories about the Italian and Irish mobs, the world of drug cartels doesn’t faze you,” Mrs. Eisenberg alleges, pointing onward to her gate as if our conversation were as normal as chatting about the weather. I pass over her water bottle and drive.
“So, if you can’t eat it or sell it, why did David send you this stuff?” Mrs. Eisenberg probes, laying the packet down in between us. I don’t tell her I have four more like it at home, or about the check that was taped to one of the bags. The package was an early birthday present to me from David and Gabriel, even though they both know I hate acknowledging my birthday. All February 12 does is serve as a reminder that one more year has passed, and I am no closer to fulfilling my potential than I was the year before. To celebrate myself I take the day off every year to hole up in bed and pray the day passes swiftly.
The check came with explicit instructions to sign up for a course or two to get myself back on track to earn my college degree. My brothers also noted the money was not to be spent on another pair of ridiculously expensive leggings for Lou and Coco, that they’d cover those for the twins’ birthdays. The funds are still burning a hole in my checking account because though I should consider a biochem or calculus class, there is an entrepreneurial course for non-MBA students at Stanford’s business school that I’ve been eyeing. The course, however, would eat up the whole check, and it would not get me any closer to a bachelor of science. And then there is the nagging reality of my car’s bald tires.
“Oh look, Sam’s bartending at Yankee Pier. I’ve been meaning to ask how their clam chowder is.” Mrs. Eisenberg waves furiously in Sam’s direction. Only Mrs. Eisenberg can take us from the Midwest’s mob scene to New England’s clam chowder.I better bring us back.
“I have no idea what this stuff is. My brother David got it for me in Puerto Rico.” Unlike my brother Gabriel, who got my father’s gift of gab and is the chattiest mathematician you will ever meet, David is a man of few words. In addition to the check with strings attached, the box of powder came with a brief note that said, “A woman I knowin Puerto Rico had this powder. Not sure what it’s for, but I picked some up for you.” I didn’t ask for clarification from David about the powder or the woman he knows, there are too many to remember just one. David has gone against the family grain of marrying young by not marrying at all.
“Was he down there visiting your people?” Mrs. Eisenberg asks, and I shudder imperceptibly. I know Mrs. Eisenberg means nothing by it, but why is it that White people assume, if your skin is brown or black or a blended color like mine,your peoplehail from someplace other than, I don’t know, Burbank or Indianapolis? In this case, however, there’s no reason to correct my favorite desert dweller since she’s mostly on point. My tía Fernanda runs a popular empanadilla shop in La Plaza del Mercado Santurce in San Juan and, even though my mother has been in the United States for decades, she still refers to Puerto Rico as home. In fact, Tía Fernanda is where I got my empanadilla venture idea in the first place. Not that I was passionate about the food industry, but I thought maybe I could expand on her already proven business plan as a shortcut to my own success. Zwena tried to pitch my empanadillas to the district supervisor at Build-A-Burger, but it was off-brand and I should never have allowed Zwena to make the first approach. Her sales skills are more fish market than corporate cutthroat. It didn’t help that the dearth of Puerto Ricans in Northern California meant my empanadillas were unlikely to take off in the Bay Area like they did for Tía Fernanda in San Juan, but at least I know where my entrepreneurial spirit comes from.
“David’s stationed in Pensacola, Florida, but every so often he and some naval buddies hop over to PR to visit our tía Fernanda. When they visit, our aunt spoils those guys rotten. And just like my dad did, David loves to surf down there. He picks up a little something for me from time to time.”
“I know what your brother’s like, I listen to your tales. I bet that’s not the only thing he’s picking up.” Mrs. Eisenberg elbows me and points to the bag. The first day I met Mrs. Eisenberg at her gate, herhusband, Eddie, had passed away six weeks prior. Though, like my mother, she still wears her wedding ring, Mrs. Eisenberg now loves to dish like the single woman she once was more than sixty years ago. And she, like a lot of women, has a crush on the magnetism David inherited from my dad based solely on the stories I have shared with her.
“Where do you come up with this stuff?” I tease Mrs. Eisenberg. She leans over and pulls out her latest romance novel, a blissful couple entwined on the cover.
“This year I’m trying to spend more time with books than movies. You should really read this one. I’ll give it to you when I’m done,” Mrs. Eisenberg promises, fanning my face with the book. I suppose if I had a successful six-decade love story like she had instead of a runaway husband, my hopeful self would be reading romance novels too. Instead, I stick to business memoirs written by tech unicorns who made it in America by the time they were thirty. Inevitably, these books make me feel like a failure, but a romance novel would as well.
“What’s this?” Mrs. Eisenberg inquires, reaching for the recycled peanut butter jar filled with white cream sitting on top of a napkin in my cart’s cup holder. “Oh, heavy.” Balancing the jar in one hand, she jiggles it up and down.
I smile and direct Mrs. Eisenberg to unscrew the metal top. Since her arthritis has been flaring up in her hands recently, I purposely left this jar a bit loose so Mrs. Eisenberg wouldn’t struggle.
Leaning forward to take in a cautious sniff, Mrs. Eisenberg says, “Smells nice,” and I can’t quite tell if her head is bobbing in approval or question. Optimism churns in my stomach, overtaking a blanket of exhaustion. I was up late whipping up batches of this lotion, trying to capture the unique aromas of eucalyptus and bougainvillea that are widespread in the Bay Area. Many people in California hate the non-native eucalyptus tree with its blue gum and voracious thirst that sucks soil dry, but there’s no denying the smell is soothing.
After observing the numerous bottles of lotions that litter my mom’s vanity, a reminder of wasted money and eventual landfill addition, I’mtrying to figure out how to make a top-to-toe, one-kind-works-for-all-body-parts cream. Rather than women having one lotion for body, one for dry hands, one for calloused feet, and still two more for their morning and evening facial routines, I want to capture the market share of women who don’t have the time or money for all that. I’ve been at work in my kitchen playing with combinations of water, unrefined shea butter, eucalyptus oil, sodium hydroxide, glycerin, and a whole host of other natural ingredients I have invested in to create a product that addresses every crack, crevasse, and cheek. Basically, my latest business idea is stealing from the one-size-fits-all concept in clothing and applying it to skin care. The only problem is that one size never fits all, and for weeks my efforts have made my kitchen an official disaster zone. My desire to keep at it is evaporating.
“Go ahead and try it on your arms and hands,” I encourage Mrs. Eisenberg.
She looks at me suspiciously. “You aren’t trying to poison me because I was skeptical about your food heater idea, are you? Remember, I was very encouraging of that nitrogen ice cream experiment. That one I could have gotten behind. If you had really put in the time, you could have been the first to get that concept up and running. Now that stuff is all over the place.”
Mrs. Eisenberg’s not wrong, I could have been first. For six months she listened to me geek out over every detail as I explored the process of making ice cream with liquid nitrogen, trying to create the smoothest, creamiest texture possible using the freshest ingredients. I read every physics book from the library I could get my hands on and started building a messy prototype in the backyard with parts off Craigslist. Weekly, I would haul a cooler full of ice cream and taster spoons to the airport so Zwena, Krish, Mrs. Eisenberg, some of the United ground crew, and a few of my other trusted regular passengers could sample my flavors. Being part of the invisible workforce at an airport occasionally has its upside. In the chaos of a concourse, no one policed for food safety regulations as I scooped from my cart.
The group enthusiasm for my ice cream venture was high, and Mrs. Eisenberg loved to make the joke that my mind was “churning,” but in the end, I didn’t have any sort of network to raise seed funding. Between work, parenting Lou and Coco, and worrying about Simon, I never got around to filling out the paperwork for a small business loan. Ultimately, another woman with an MBA from Wharton beat me to the top of the ice cream heap, and now she has four wildly popular shops in San Jose, Oakland, Marin, and San Francisco. I’ve had a scoop of her balsamic raspberry raisin flavor. It’s tasty for sure, but I know mine would have been better. I would have left out the raisins. Still professionally treading water in the exact same place, I’m now applying a few of the principles for creating a smooth, creamy dessert to my lotion and still using Mrs. Eisenberg as my test subject.
“I promise, I’m not trying to poison your pores. Not intentionally anyway. I’ve been playing around with formulas for lotions since you are always complaining how the drier climate and intense sun in Scottsdale are rough on your skin. And with global warming, skin is crepier now in California too.”
Mrs. Eisenberg rolls her eyes at my doomsday commentary before she dips her index and middle finger in for a hearty dollop.
“The texture reminds me of the Nivea cream I used for years.” Mrs. Eisenberg massages the cream between her fingers. I slow my cart so I can observe her rubbing the lotion on her arms while still moving safely through the terminal. As she starts at her wrists, I note that the absorption rate into the skin should be much quicker than it is. Lotion shouldn’t take work.
We both stare at her chalky hands and forearms. Mrs. Eisenberg says what I can clearly see: “This rubs in too white. Reminds me of sunscreen.” I notice with every stroke it’s true. Black and Brown women are used to white lotions and sunscreens not rubbing into our skin well, but for a Caucasian woman, even though Mrs. Eisenberg’s skin carries a darker Mediterranean hue, there is no reason for lotion residue to settle on top.
“You do have something with the smell, though,” Mrs. Eisenberg reiterates. I know she’s trying to give me something to keep me going, to not give up, even if the product, meant for the whole body, for now only appeals to the nose. I blow out a huge sigh, one she has heard many times before. I hand Mrs. Eisenberg the napkin in the cup holder to wipe off what won’t soak in. “I’ll take this jar with me to Arizona to use, but in the meantime, you keep at it, Antonia, and I expect you to have a new and improved sample for me to try when I return.”
“Maybe,” I appease, deflated, thinking of the wasted gallons of apparently nonabsorbing lotion I have sitting on my kitchen counters. It’s going to take some serious research and small-batch trial and error to figure out how to alter the consistency of the product for use on all skin types. Particularly, because I don’t have the money to start again from scratch after buying Lou and Coco new dresses for their first school dance this weekend. While their Catholic school touts being in service to others, when it comes to the monumental life moments of teenage firsts, it is all about looking good—better known in the kingdom of puberty as being in service to oneself.
“Maybeis for the weak,” Mrs. Eisenberg pronounces, dispensing her biting truth.
I drop my chin and don’t say anything in response, but in that instant, memories ofmaybespast run through my mind. When my daughters begged to go to Disneyland and I knew we couldn’t afford it,maybe, I’d said. When thoughts occurred of treating myself to massages when my lower back ached from sitting for hours in my cart,maybe, I’d wish. Hoping Simon would realize he’d made the biggest mistake of his life,maybe, I’d pray.Maybewas often all I had to cling to as a single mother who still had big dreams. Feeling the sting of Mrs. Eisenberg’s admonishment, I have to accept that life moves on an upward trajectory for a woman like her. Maybes do not exist. She may think my uncertainty weak, but that single two-syllable word continues to give me hope.
Seeing my face fall yet again in defeat, Mrs. Eisenberg places her lotioned, gluey hand on my forearm. “Antonia, I’d rather you hate meand grow, than like me and stay the same.” Mrs. Eisenberg is not at all moved by my pouty face. I nod in wounded understanding, but also with gratitude that at least someone in my life believes I’m capable of growing. That my life can get bigger.
“Oh, stop. Stop!” Mrs. Eisenberg commands, now waving frantically, her face shifting from stern to sweet.
“Mrs. E! Where are you heading today looking so shiny in that lavender getup?” Zwena bellows, striding through a sea of people lining up to board a flight to Washington Dulles, her presence parting the crowd.
Not hiding her girl crush on Zwena, Mrs. Eisenberg blushes. The way these two talk, we are definitely going to be late to the gate now, and I’m still recovering from the harsh words Mrs. Eisenberg just doled out.
