Growing Up With My Mother

            by David Adams

 

             One of the first memories I have of my mother is of a heated discussion regarding the age at which I would be allowed to watch PG 13 movies. She speculated that perhaps I would be permitted to view some of the less repulsive ones at the age of 13, but she would have to wait and see. This initial reserve perfectly describes the first about 11 years of my life with Sara-Ethel Adams. I am proud to say that this concern for my development, and natural matriarchal protective instinct have been all but crushed by my brash, savage life style.

MOURNING WOOD

            My mom has never really understood the concept of ‘individual space’. For instance she can often be seen rummaging about my brothers and my bathroom for no apparent  reason. ‘Cleaning” as she calls it. Complete rubbish if you ask me. If she really wanted to clean the bathroom she would have clothes on in my opinion. Or at least rubber gloves. (To be honest that little bit was added in for comic effect. For future reference my mom will be playing the roll of straight man in the rest of this piece er... straight woman.)

            7:42 A.M. The sun slips through my window and gently caresses my peaceful countenance, as I lie sprawled across my bed. My alarm summons me to consciousness, and I reluctantly stumble to my bathroom. However, instead of being greeted by my usual porcelain fortress of solitude, I am put face to face with my mother standing arms crossed with a look of perturbed puzzlement on her face.

            “David, is this pee all over the shower? Do you know any thing about this.”  Yes.

            “No” I reply with the most innocent look I can muster at this ungodly hour. I can see the cogs in her mind working, a deep rumble of cogitative effort staining her intellect to the upmost.

            “You are lying to me.”  Blast! Well there is nothing to do now but come clean.

            “Alright Mom, you caught me. This is kinda hard for me to say but do you know what morning wood is?” Her eyes widen, and I continue. “Well basically, during these hormone heavy years of a man’s life, he can’t help but wake up with an enormous erection everyday.” I then preceded to explain, along with detailed diagrams, and mime work, that it was physically impossible for me to hit the small target of the toilet in the dim half light of the morning, with a stiff pipe, and gonorrhea ( JK ... or am I ???). Then I demonstrate, using a spray bottle, a banana, and the mornings supply of milk, how the shower was indeed a much easier target.

POOP

            This story makes my previous story look like a Disney Movie.

            One day when there was no school I woke up at like, 10: 14. It was an abnormally sunny day for Berkeley so naturally I went out to the living room to sun my nude form of the couch. My mother, used to this exhibitionist behavior on my part took it in passing and continued about her morning yoga regimen. By the way walking naked around the house was once my most powerful weapons, however over the years my parents learned that their awkward mannerisms gave me power so they learned to embrace my nudity thus taking away its fundamental power. So anyway ,I was on the couch remembering the good old days when my nakedness would throw my mom off kilter, and then I got a crazy idea. I slowly got up and walked across to stand on the other side of the room. I then proceeded to enter a crouching stance as if I were about to wrestle a sizable opponent. I then began to build up the pressure in my bowls for release. ‘This is gona be big’ I said to myself . With every second the power of the fart grew, the trick was to know when to unleash it at the apex of its destructive potential. If nakedness plus farting wouldn’t give me a victory over my Mother then I didn’t know what would. Then, I felt it. My ears perked up for the expected crescendo of flatulence, but instead silence. Then a small thud. Odd. I looked down puzzled. Where seconds ago their had been open carpet, their now rested a small turd, solitary and proud. Standing alone like a miniature meteor descended from the heavens. Shit.

            If asked, I would defiantly consider myself a moral man, a man of boundaries. A man who knows when he has gone too far, and this time I had gone too far. I slowly turned my head towards my mother, praying to God that she was still engrossed in her intricate yoga exercises. It seems, however, that the Lord had deemed it right for me instead to suffer the wrath of a woman, whose floor was just pooped on by her 17 year old son.

            I awkwardly attempted to cover up the turd, but I only succeeded in rubbing it into the carpet with my heal. This was bad. My mother looked at me from her inverted badger position on the floor. I could see the anger radiating from her. A ball of rancor and fury lay 15 feet away from me stretching its upper quadricep muscles. Before I knew what came over me my fight or flight instinct kiked in. I suddenly ripped the phone from the wall and hurled it at my mother with surprising force and accuracy, then dart from the room. This combination of both flight and fight seamed to be quite appropriate for the situation. I spent the rest of the day barricaded in my room. Occasionally picking up bricks throne through my window, and the occasional typed list of curse words that my mom felt described my actions that day. All in all, a good time.

GIANT PENIS

            Well I don’t really have any other stories that have to do with my mother so I am just going to tell a good one regardless of her lack of inclusion.

             My friends and I had been waiting for senior year our whole lives. The parties, the power, the steps, but most of all THE PRANK. This towering testament to the grandeur of the senior strata. Naturally we conceived of a brilliant plan. We were to construct a giant penis, and mount it atop the roof of Berkeley High School. We began construction on the first day of school, senior year. It was massive. For the spine of the penis we used a 16 foot PCP pipe, measuring 4 inches in diameter. Then we took chicken wire and formed a light weight skeleton around the PCP pipe. We stuffed the open space with newspaper, to fill out the chicken wire. For the final touch we added paper mache to give it that smooth penisy feel. It was flawless, the most perfectly sculpted phallic rendering ever to be brought to earth.16 feet long, with a 1.3 foot diameter. Weighing only 10.5 pounds due to the light weight construction materials, it was perfect for a speedy erection on top of the school. Then we waited.

            Before this time I thought that the dreaded senioritis disease only affected the patient when attempting scholastic activity. I was misinformed. After this initial burst of expeditious, focused energy we quickly got lost in the senior year experience (sans penis). Whenever the subject of the giant penis that was resting in my friend Michelangelo’s back yard came up, we simply pushed it into next month’s plans.

             “When the weather gets better man.”

            “Next weekend, I got stuff to do now.” And so it continued well into the fall, and then winter. Then before we knew it spring was upon us. Talk of graduation was buzzing in the air all around us, and the giant penis was still not perched above the school. We had to take action.

            On the last night of spring break, my friends and I went for it. We set our alarms for 1:24 in the morning. We were to meet at Michelangelo’s house where the penis was being kept safe through the winter months. Unfortunately Michelangelo couldn’t make it because he was sick. Although this was slightly annoying it wasn’t that bad. One less person to get in trouble if we get caught, and one less person on the blizo.

            At 1:36 Raphael picked me up, and we went and got our co-conspirators: Young Donatello and Master Splinter. After a quick stop at King Pin Doughnuts we arrived at Michelangelo’s  house. Donatello and I went into the backyard to get the penis. We managed to hop over the sleeping dog, make our way through brambles, and over the lava mote to the penis located atop a fantastic flaming pinnacle of rock in the back yard. After slaying the evil skeleton guard unit we finally reached the penis. Alas she was destroyed. It had been left out in the rain too many a day, and was in a sorry state of repair. It was water logged, and the skin was falling off in several places. Not to mention that the carefully sculpted head was disfigured and smashed. What were we gona do with a 14 foot giant peace of shit ?? It didn’t even look like a penis any more. In our hearts burned a cold rage, against the cruel gods of winter, for destroying our most beautiful creation. We decided to make the best of it. We drove to the Lawrence Hall of science and smoked a, Swisher Sweet Cigarillo, that had been gutted and then stuffed agian using Marijuana. The sweet smoke filled our lungs as we calmly passed around the trudged ‘blunt’, bursting with seedless grapes. Our minds drifted out time and space, as we lay on the hood of my car listening to the sweet sounds of Jimmy Cliff. With all of the Bay Area spread before us and a giant penis in the back of our pick-up truck,’ we were sitting plum we was’. Then it hit me. Perhaps it was the sweet grapes in my brain whispering sweet nothings into my consciousness, or perhaps it was God himself bestowing divine inspiration unto me. Whatever the source of this wild  idea, it was good. Real good. I excitedly told my friends. They hopped on right away. It was the kinda of prank that you would laugh about to yourself, for years to come. We were to mount the penis on Cindy Alright’s door step. Cindy “scooba’ Alright was a sweet girl who would never heart fly. She was kind, gentle, and smart. For this she would pay dearly. Cindy Alright was perfect for several reasons. First, her house was the closest house we could think of. Second, we knew that her reaction would be priceless. Third, she would not hold a life grudge against us for this most heinous of stunts.

            At 2:46 we slowly pulled up outside of Cindy’s house. The moment was ready to seized, and we knew there and then that we were just the men to seize it. We quickly deployed the penis against her door, so that when opened the penis would come crashing down and pin the unlucky person to the ground helpless against its wet girth. It was at this stage in the operation that we made our first mistake. Raphael, wanting attention, knocked loudly on Cindy’s door in an attempt to wake her family. We quickly ran away from the house to the car. By the time we reached the car we had forgotten why we were running and decided to stick around and watch Cindy’s reaction. This was the worst possible move that we could have made. We waited for a good 8 minutes and nothing happened. After this long steak-out we decided to pack it up and go home. Then everything started going really fast. First Raphael’s car stalled as we were leaving. When we were in the middle of road, we saw a car approaching us. I made a joke speculating that it would be quite humorous if it were the police. It was the police and oddly enough it turned out not to be humorous at all.

            Ten minutes later we were all on the side of the curb sitting down surrounded by about 6 cop cars.

            “So tell us again son. Where are you coming from?”

            “Study session.” “Badminton practice” “UHH”

            “Where were you going before we pulled you over?”

            “To drop our friend off.”

            “Which friend?” Both me and Greg raise our hands. This is wasn’t good at all. The cops could see that we were trapped in a web of lies.

            “Well boys, if there is one thing I have learned, folks out past 2:30 in the morning, ain’t up to no good. And boys, its 3:30, so I know you ain’t up to no good.” I could see their trigger fingers shaking. Were they going to execute us? What should I make my last words? Something that will stick it to the man. Something that I will be proud off. Something epic.

            “See you in hell, copper.” I suddenly exclaim. FUCK. At that moment I realized that if I had ever considered myself a smart person, that I was wrong in doing so. Luckily that didn’t happen, and I am smart, and I made up those last couple lines for comic effect. What really happened is I decided to come clean. Police officers are trained interrogators, we had no hope of fooling them. I spoke up over the din of Donetello crying like a little punk.

            “Sir. What really happened is, that this is all just a senior prank gone wrong.”

            “What was the prank son? You gona vandalize the school?”

            “No sir. Well this is hard to say. But we... we...were going to put a giant phallus on top of the school. I know it is wrong and immature and....” I stopped because my voice could no longer be herd over the laughing of the police officers.

            “Well, shit, son. Why didn’t your just say so in the first place. We was doggone ready to execute you boys. Get on out of hear.”

            That is the end