The Trouble With Mother | Previous Challenge Entry

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TITLE: The Trouble With Mother | Previous Challenge Entry
By David Stewart
05/09/05
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Over a ten year period, I must have tried two hundred times to disguise my voice to make my mother think I was someone else phoning her. Out of all those times, I may have succeeded in fooling her three or four times but I am ornery and I am persistent.

We would laugh and she would say ‘nice try’ or ‘I suspected it was you.’
The last time was the best. I had her thinking I was a very rude obnoxious phone salesman. I’m not sure how I managed to stay in character but I had talked to her in my best Bubba voice for over 15 minutes. She was so mad but I was rude, persistent, & wouldn’t let her end the call. She finally got mad enough to hang up. I called her back & in my own voice said, “What’s the matter? Was Bubba too rude?” I could almost see her face over the phone as she realized it had been me. We laughed and laughed. Those were good times.

They were not to last. Sadly, things change. Things would soon take a turn for the worse. A few months later I called mom.

“Hi Mom! What’s up? Ya doin’ okay?”

“Hi Honey. Everything’s fine. How are the kids?”

“They’re good.”

“My pet chicken ran away.”

“Excuse me mom. I’m not sure I heard that. What did you say?”

“My pet chicken ran away and I think my trees have been moved to a different place in the yard.” She said rather softly. “Oh and the butter dish keeps yelling at me.”

My mind was spinning. So this is how it happens. I thought.

“Do you think you can come by & move my trees back one day this week?” she asks like it was normal. She says more but my head is getting cloudy & I want to cry. I was sure my poor mom has snapped.

While I’m holding the phone to my head in daze wondering what I’m going to do I pick up something she’s saying.

“Gotcha,” she whispers.

“Gotcha? What?”

“Gotcha” she says again.

“Huh? What?” I mumble. The fog in my head is still thick. I was still having trouble processing the fact that my mother had lost her mind. I was no longer really listening to her ramblings.

“Gotcha!” she says trying to penetrate my confusion. “You thought your old mom had flipped her wig, didn’t you!” she says confidently.

“What? NO! You couldn’t… I uh…NO!” My mind was reeling by this time.

She had set the bait, and played the line and I had swallowed hook, line and sinker. I never saw it coming. It was so out of character for her. It was different for me to be on the receiving end of a practical joke. We laughed until we gave up trying to talk and hung up agreeing to phone each other later when we could speak again.

When I phoned her again a hour later we started laughing again & had to hang up again.

My mother has always been there for me. When I had nightmares, when I was sick, she was there. She taught me by example how to love my kids & how to sacrifice for them. Every hug my kids get or every boo-boo I kiss is a heritage my mom passed to me.

Now she has shown me who the superior practical joker in the family but there is always next time!

“A merry heart doeth good, like medicine…” Proverbs 17:22 NKJ

“Let your father and your mother be glad, And let her who bore you rejoice. Proverbs 23:25 NKJ

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