“No, Mother, he is not. Thomas dropped me off at my front door like a respectable gentleman.”
“That’s nice to hear,” she says, contradicting the excitement of her previous question.
“He’s a wonderful man.” I tell her every little detail about our evening and she gushes appropriately.
“When are you going out again?” she asks.
“We’re supposed to have another date tonight, but …” I let the remainder of the sentence dangle in the air.
“But, what?” she demands.
“I don’t know if we should go out again. Thomas still isn’t sure he’s going to stay in Elk Lake, and I could really fall for this guy, Mom.” I release a pathetic moan before adding, “I don’t want him to break my heart.”
“Remember what Alfred—Lord Tennyson—said.” My mom loves Tennyson to the point of ridiculousness. She quotes him all the time.
I know exactly which quote she’s thinking about, but I’m not ready to agree with her. I intentionally guess wrong. “Knowledge comes but wisdom lingers?” I figure that’s as close a one as I’m going to get to support what I’m feeling.
“You know which one I’m talking about, Finny.” Then she says the words I dread hearing, “Tis better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all.”
I kick off my fuzzy socks and feel the cold sheets against my feet. Then I tell her, “If you’ve never loved, you don’t know what you’re missing. Therefore, you can’t be sad to have lost it.”
“Balderdash!” Ah, another one of her nineteenth century words. She continues, “If you’ve never loved, you willalwaysknow you’ve missed out on something big.”
“But if you find out how great love is and then lose it, you’ll mourn its loss forever,” I tell her.
“Finny, life isn’t for the faint of heart. You’ve already come through a lot and you’ve made a nice life for yourself. But there is so much more. I want you to experience all of it.”
“I want that for myself, too, Mom. I’m just not sure I have the kind of courage it takes to go for it.”
“Says the girl who’s met every challenge life has thrown at her.” I know she’s trying to motivate me, but it’s not working.
“I’ve struggled, Mom.”
“Everyone struggles, Finny.Everyone.You’re not special in that.”
I hate feeling defeated because I’ve worked very hard not to be that person. It’s just that I’ve never felt I’ve had as much to lose as I currently do. So, I tell her, “Other people have more options than I do.”
“How do you figure?”
“They can live in places I can’t. They can do things I can’t. Don’t pretend you don’t know what I’m talking about.”
“Honey, everyone has their stuff. At some point you’ve got to just throw it all against the wall. I promise, something will stick.”
She’s used this metaphor my whole life. It originates with old Italian women who used to throw cooked spaghetti against the wall to see if it was done. If it stuck, it was time to eat. It’s not my favorite saying because, you know, sticky stuff. But Mom loves it.
I’m silent for a moment before telling her, “I’ll think about it.”
“While you’re doing that, dear,” she says, “Remind yourself why you calledme. You knew what I was going to tell you. You knew I was going to encourage you to open yourself up to possibility.” Before she hangs up, she adds, “I love you, honey. You’ve got this.”
I suppose she might be right. The reason I called her instead of Allie is that my friend would have told me what I wanted to hear, regardless if she thought it might really happen. Girlfriends do that for each other, not because we want our friends to get hurt, but because we want them to enjoy the dream even if the dream might never come to fruition.
My mom, on the other hand, would never lie to me to protect my feelings. If she thought going for Thomas was going to be bad for me, she’d tell me. But that’s not what she said. She said that even if it doesn’t work out in the end, the experience might just be rewarding enough to make the journey worth my while. And it will never happen if I don’t give it a chance.
I have a lot to think about.
I’m about to get out of bed and get ready for my shoot with Thomas today when my phone rings. Speak of the devil …
“Hello?” I say in my most seductive voice.
