Sharing Mom and Grocery Shopping

Ah, the grocery store. Affectionately known as Big Y. We all wanted in on those shopping trips with Mom.

It'd be a fierce verbal battle over who's turn it was to accompany Mom to the store and help her push the cart and fill it with the week's groceries:

2 gallons of milk
2 cartons of Jumbo eggs
Only 2 varieties of snacks: fig newtons, pretzels, fig biscuits, those Italian cookies that were only good if you ate the chocolate ones
1 special dinner item such as stuffed crust pizza, chicken nuggets or (if Mom went shopping unguided by us kids) the dreaded fishsticks
2 boxes of chicken burritos, my personal favorite
1 box of bean burritos, dad's favorite and no one else's
12 pack of toilet paper for all 3 bathrooms
12 pack of paper towels for all 12 kids' messes
3 family packs of Chicken, including breasts, wings and thighs... but mostly thighs. Mom liked to bread those for dinner
1 big block of cheese
1 large bag of potatoes
3-4 selections of cold cuts
1 large jar of Jiffy peanut butter
1 jar of strawberry jelly
1 24-pack of Popsicles
3 bags frozen vegetables, usually broccoli or peas or mixed 

Usually always the same. Sometimes it wavered in one direction or another. Some weeks called for more milk. Others for more dinners.  Mom could't be trusted to shop alone, we all knew that as youngsters. She needed our attentive eyes and watering mouths to help her make her decisions. Besides, we loved playing "avoid-the-red-lava-squares" up and down the aisles. And we all had grabby hands.

She also never brought along more than 2 of us. If she did, we were doomed to waiting patiently in the 12 passenger van, aching to know what she was placing in the cart. Once she was spotted exiting the mysterious 4 walls of the supermarket, we would rush out the van and offer our help with the bags, poking our eyes and noses in each one in inspection.

The summertime called for fresh veggies from Dad's garden rather than the frozen selection in Big Y's deep ice boxes. But, that also meant picking the green beans by hand. 7 of us would line the large patch of earth, our tiny bottoms atop an overturned bucket, snapping away the crisp vegetables-- eating half as many as we tossed in the bags alongside us. It was a hot, pleasant summertime activity. We would laugh and fight, but stayed under control when dad entered the premises of the garden. Dad always commanded attention.

And once the fight for shopping with mom was won, you knew you couldn't win the fight for sitting next to mom at dinner.  Always sacraficing one grand event for another.

Sharing mom was the constant battle.

Junior High Sass

Mater Dolorosa School was small, private and very Catholic. Uniforms were required. The girls were not allowed to roll up their skirts (we showed off our knees anyway) and weren't allowed to wear nail polish that wasn't beige or clear (we painted on the blood reds and sparkly blues) and we weren't allowed-- whatsoever-- to wear makeup or heels of any kind. We were the Children of God and were meant to be severed from all that was vain. We were meant to be close to Jesus and as far away from sin as possible.


But, I could not allow that. I was a hyper and outrageous 13 year old teeny bopper in the 8th grade, makeup splashing up to my eyebrows and perfume soaking my want-to-be-a-woman neck and wrists.  My turquoise platforms clumped along with me as I maneuvered the halls toward homeroom.  I was inconsiderate and thought that the world was mine and mine alone.

Typical, right?


I had a sassy mouth on me.


Sister Inez did everything she could to teach her students the intricacies and beauty of Science. She recreated the sounds and reverberations of the squawking and hissing rain forest for us. She guided the building of bridges and tried very hard to instill the passion for the Periodic Table into our cluttered, young minds.


And I did everything I could to get under her skin.


It was pop quiz day. A Friday. A miserably sunny Friday that mocked each and every student through the glistening classroom windows. Birds seemed chirpier and the clouds looked fluffier. With the bottom windows cracked open, it was horridly depressing sitting in my cramped, pencil-graffitied desk. I was in no mood for a quiz on the elements.  


Sister Inez was no taller than five feet. She never dressed in the traditional habit, but was always true to the color scheme. Grays. Blacks. Navy blues. She wrapped her frail, compact body in frilly button down shirts, topped with a mundane blazer not worth speaking about. Her ankle length skirt barely scraped her bulging ankles, nyloned feet stuffed into charcoal orthotic shoes.


"Please cross out each answer in the word box with one, neat line. Once you have completed the quiz, turn it upside down on your desk and fold your hands."


Okay, right. 

I started the quiz, scrawling my name messily at the top of the sheet. Looking up at the small nun, I watched her slide her way through the aisles, checking papers and keeping a keen lookout for wandering eyes.


And then.


I did it.


I took up my pen and scribbled out my word bank selections. Dark, ugly clouds of ink over each answer, blocking out any understanding of what the word might be. My eyes sparkled with disobedience.


She stood over me for a moment. I could feel her breath before I could sense her presence. I turned up my head slowly, a toyed smile creeping up on my lips.


"Those are not clean, straight lines Miss Barbara Powell."


"Of course they aren't, Sister.  I wanted to mark the words out completely."


With a huff grander than the winds of God and the power of the Holy Family,  she grabbed my arm.


"To the office. Now."


"Fine. My pleasure."


With a clunk and a swishay, I was out of the classroom and heading down the stairs to the office. To the bench outside Sister Corinne's door.


I had a sassy mouth on me.