In which we all cry on Christmas
Playing the long game
Recently, I announced to a few of my kids that I was thinking about getting the mole on my forehead removed. It’s been there for as long as I can remember and usually, I don’t even notice it. It’s as much of a part of as who I am as my eye color and terrible skin.
I have a friend who shares similar ancestry and dermal woes and calls it her “cheap Irish skin.” Name an affliction, and we can point to it. Acne. Chicken skin. The backs of limbs that look as if we’ve stuffed 10 pounds of pebbles underneath. It’s a dermatological potpourri of woes.
But unlike all my skin ailments, which I spend an inordinate amount of time and money trying to reverse, I’ve never given much thought to the beauty mark. A couple of times during an annual inspection, my dermatologist has paused at the top of my face and asked if I wanted to remove it. But not in an outright way. More like, “It’s probably a part of who you are, but we could take care of this.”
Of all the things I wanted to spend a few hundred dollars on, the innocuous beauty mark removal, like deleting a period at the end of a sentence, is not one of them. Frankly, I’d rather have toxins pumped into my forehead to raise the thing up a little more. Have it stand at attention.
During the holidays, I stood in my kitchen and used my phone to record myself dipping a tiny spoon into my milk frother and licking off the sweet foam I like to add to my afternoon coffee when I’m feeling especially naughty. My daughters think it’s absolutely disgusting that I stand and dip the spoon in and out of the whirring frother as it heats up the sweet cream and lick it off the back. So of course, I wanted to share with them what they were missing as they went about their own lives.
I am horrible at taking pictures or videos of myself. I always start thinking I know just what I’m doing after all the scrolling I do through TikTok and Instagram, but when I look at the results I’m sadly reminded that I’m 56 and aged out of those types of skills. I should know better and leave those things to the young and agile-fingered.
When I went to watch the results of my efforts, I was horrified not by all my mugging for the camera, how I raised my eyebrows in ecstasy and opened my eyes super wide when the spoon went into my mouth, but by the giant beauty mark bouncing on top of my face. The afternoon lighting in my kitchen and maybe the angle of the camera, which I had held overhead for the filming, showed the mole in a whole new light. It had a depth and dimension to it that I don’t normally see standing in front of my bathroom mirror.
“Holy shit,” I thought, “that thing is gross.”
So, I decided I’d pull a Gwenyth Paltrow (she had one, too) and get it removed.
I felt really good about that decision until I casually mentioned it to my two younger kids when everyone was home over the holidays. My younger daughter was like “Really?” as in, “You’re really going to spend money on that?”
But my 20yo son, who I didn’t think had ever actually looked at me in his two decades of life, or at any rate, really notice me or what I looked like, got really excited.
“Don’t get rid of your beauty mark!” he said forcefully. “You won’t be my mommy any more.”
He was really emphatic about this. I want to say he even placed his hands on my shoulders to emphasize how strongly he felt.
My daughter and were like, “Whoa, you’ve got feelings about this,” and he said he loved it and it’s what made me — me, I guess.
“But if you do take it off, can I keep it?” he said, and then we all started goofing around about what we could do with the sliced-off mole. Keep it in a jar or plant it in the ground. Weird shit.
I thought about it later, how strongly this kid — who always seems to be trying to back away from me to disappear up to his room or out the door — felt about not just the mole, but about me. “I think he really likes me,” I thought.
In particular, the way he jokingly referred to me as his “mommy.” It was funny but also, sweet. Sometimes I feel like I failed that kid because my life blew up when he was so young. While I provided concierge-level services for some of his older siblings, my youngest was left to mainly fend for himself. It’s family legend, how he taught himself how to ride a bike and tie his shoelaces, but what we don’t talk about is how he also learned to navigate chaos and complicated relationships on his own.
On Christmas morning, we always go around and exchange gifts and watch each other open what we got them. Stockings are always first. I love filling the kids’ monogrammed ones with a collection of weird and practical things. Socks and underwear. Magnets of cat butts, their tails sticking straight up in the air.
This year, halfway through, my youngest announced he wanted to give out his gifts, and he handed me a wrapped rectangular package, and I was surprised because he doesn’t always get me something. Sometimes his name gets attached to something one of the older kids gives me.
But this was just from him and his smile was really big, like I could tell he was excited. “Open it,” he said.
I tore the paper and saw that it was a framed illustration of a photo of the two of us taken about ten years earlier on a spring break trip to San Francisco. At the time, he was crazy for anime and all things Japanese (Bakugan and Naruto). We visited Chinatown and one afternoon strolled through a Japanese tea garden in Golden Gate Park and stopped in front of a statue of the buddha to have our picture taken.
There are a bunch of pictures of the two of us that day, standing in front of the statue and smiling at the camera. In the last shot, I turned my face away to bend down and kiss the top of his head, while he stared straight at the camera and smiled, his hands tucked into his sweatshirt pocket.
That’s the one he had a friend draw for me, and she perfectly captured both of our faces. The moment of the two of us standing together on our trip out west.
Needless to say, the picture made everyone in the room cry on Christmas. I mean, my younger daughter will cry if you get a splinter. But that morning, we all got teary-eyed over the picture. Even my youngest child, my always baby boy, had tears welling in his big blue eyes as he watched my reaction.
Later, I told my girlfriend about the picture and sent her a photo of it on my phone, and she responded, “Nick won Christmas.”
But I think I'm the one who really won this one.
It reminded me that life is a long game. It’s not the one amazing gift, or the really shitty fight, that defines our relationships. It’s the things we do day after day, year after year. It’s how we show up the next time. And then the time after that.
And then one day, someone who you really love wants to keep a piece of you. They love you so much that they can’t stand to see you change. But of course, that’s what we do. We change all the time. Sometimes for better, sometimes for worse.
I’m not sure what this all says. All the missteps. The failed attempts. The occasional wins. The failed conversations. The hurt feelings. The showing up. Every day. No matter what. Except: it’s worth it.
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SUNDAY SHARES: Read, watch, cook, buy
I started the Yellowstone prequel, 1923, this week. It's the one with Harrison Ford and Helen Mirren that you can watch on Paramount Plus (they make it so frigging complicated to watch any of those Yellowstone shows, so good luck finding it). My review is that while the backdrops are beautiful (including both the Montana mountains and African plains) and the cast is stellar, the plot and dialogue are so tired and predictable. But also, I find myself wondering what's going to happen next and tuning into the next episode. That's entertainment.
I am a saucy person. I like a gravy or a dip to go with my meal. To perk up the bowls I put together of roasted veggies and chicken cutlets this week *sigh* I whipped up a tahini sauce the other night that I can't get enough of. Also, I really am into this website.
My sister gave these magic lighters out for Christmas and they have changed my candle-burning life.
If that doesn't change your life, this pet hair remover thing will. I had been STRUGGLING with some giant adhesive roller thing that I could never find the ends of to rip off and find the sticky part underneath. That thing can now fuck off.
Finally, this really used to be my life, always screwing Future Amy. Especially when I was drinking.
xoAmy
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