A Good Mother

Truth and deception merge, in this mother's tale of childhood.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A Good Mother

by

Malenkov

 

 

Goodmayes Hospital, Essex

Great Britain, 1986

 

 

Well, doctor, her and her silver ware. Now, I mean, she wasn’t vain or anything like that. She hated keeping up appearances. But whenever I came into the lounge, there she’d be--standing, by the table, rubbing the silverware like it was going out of fashion. Bottle of cleaner in one hand. Rag in the other. Said it was therapeutic for her nerves. Whenever uncle Archie came round, he’d joke she’d stashed the Crown Jewels. Well, that used to tickle her pink. She’d puff her chest, My! she had the cleavage of a battle axe--and say she’d done forty years hard graft to get it. And it were only right to give back a little pleasure by it.

Well, that was my mum. Bless her soul. Heart of gold. Always putting others first like it says in the good book.

My Kids?

Well now. It’s not as if she was dead against Paredes taking me out to Angola--Tell the truth it happened so quick, she didn’t get the chance. But well, she could act a bit odd sometimes. I mean, my mother wasn’t exactly the academic type, if you catch my meaning.

There was the time I’d just got back from Angola. I was swollen up like a beach ball with my first, Nick--and I can hardly a been a stroke over eighteen at the time. So. I’m sitting in this arm chair, in me mum’s lounge. Minding my own business like. When all of a sudden, my mother leaps up from the arm chair, like some bloomin’ great jack-in-the-box,  clears her throat--well, she had a voice you could hear a mile off, the lungs she had on her--and says:

“The pianos got to be moved.”

Well, I do remember Essex was going through this sweltering heat wave at the time. The sweats pouring down me arms and legs. Well, I thought to myself. My mother’s gone round the bend. Mad dogs and English men--and all that. I mean it was a ruddy great baby grand piano. So I says to her, there’s no way I’m moving that thing--it’ll take two great grown men to shift the bloody thing.

Now you’d think she’d listen to reason. But would she hear any of it? That was Lilly. Stubborn as a mule. Well, arguing with her was like waving a red rag to a bull and I could see the Irish temper starting to flair up. Before I knew it, she's so worked up, she’s brandishing this walking stick in the air, like she was going to brain me with it. By god, she scared the living day lights out of me--the times she’s belted me as a kid. . . .Well, she starts screaming and raving, doesn’t she now?

“You’ll bloody do as yer told and I’ll have none of yer back chat. Now move yer arse along this instant and get that piano shifted if you know what’s good for yer--or I’ll have yer guts for garters,” me mother says.

Well, naturally, I protested again. Saying it needed two people.

But she just says, “Right, if that’s how yer want to play it, fine.” She waddles as fast as she can to the door. Little Diane’s huffing after her, tail wagging. Then my mum shouts up the stairs. “Yoo hoo! Roger. Would yer be a love and come ‘ere a mo, and give us a hand?”

Well, Roger the Lodger, big as a walrus, comes stomping down the stairs, half blind drunk again and reeking of whiskey.

And there I am--puffed up like a beach ball--and she’s only bloody insisting we lift that piano. I mean, the thing had bloody wheels on it, for crying out loud! It wasn’t as if you couldn’t just go ahead and roll the damn thing. But no, she says--I’m not a kidding you--No, she says. She didn’t want the wheels to damage the carpet. The carpet! Now the carpet wasn’t exactly brand new either--Bloody horrible thing it was.

Honestly, I ask you. Well, this piano hadn’t been moved, in donkey’s years. Now all of a sudden, she’s possessed with lifting the damn thing. I ask you, what a bloody funny thing to do. I was lucky not to lose Nick--as it was, he came a month early and I nearly lost him.

Well, my mother certainly must have had a screw or two loose. But bless her soul, she was only human after all. Actually, I was lucky, in a way--I mean, my parents still believed in old fashioned principles. Well, kids these days--with all that modern pampering lark--kids these days just don’t know what’s good for them.

What did she do?

Well before the guest house, she’d be down at the Sunrise café, with my father Jack--beavering away like a pair of Trojan’s. The pair of ‘em, frying up eggs and bacon, bangers and chip butty sandwiches for the lorry drivers and cabbies that used to come down Belgrave Road.

I hated going down to the tiny café. Even if the stench of greasy fat didn’t do you in, I was usually zonked out after school and then me mother’d have me running around like a galley slave until I thought my legs would drop. Well, you know how teenagers are. One time, my mother happened to be doing the dishes in the kitchen after we were closing up.

I got into such a row with her, I reckon you could a heard us shouting at each other from the other side of town. Then before I knew it, she grabbed this pressure cooker--and she growls at me:

“I’m warning you Janie. If you don’t stop. Right this instant. . . .”

Of course, I didn’t expect her to throw it. Did I, now? Well, I was just unbolting the latch on the kitchen door, when I felt like, like I’d just run smack bang into a brick wall. Out of the blue, like. Well, I thought. That’s strange. There’s no wall in the kitchen.

Next minute--What do you know?--I’m flat out on the lino, and looking up my mother’s drawers. You’ve got to laugh! She’s got her sleeves on her apron rolled up, and a look on her face like she’s about to do ten rounds against Ali. Well, she snarls at me:

“Yer satisfied now? Yer bloody satisfied what yer gone and done t' yerself?”

And I’m wondering, what the hell am I doing on the floor? And what the hell’s my mother doing, standing over me? But what cuts me most was the look. The look she gave me. It was pure. . . . Well, it was just as that moment that I felt the back of my head and I said to myself, ohwa, blimey! What’s that? And my hair and neck was all gooey and wet.

Well, I thought. That’s bloody funny now. Now, I don’t remember there being a puddle on the floor. So I runs my fingers along the back of my bun…now it must have been in the sixties and I’d saved up to have this brand new hairdo. Well, anyway. I looked at what was on my fingers--and I saw all this red sticky stuff. Just trickling everywhere. And, of course. The only thing I could think of, was whether the blood would ruin the highlights I’d just had done.

Well, then you should have seen the look of horror on my poor mother’s face. And I knew then--really knew--that she hadn’t really done it on purpose like.

You know how it is, when you get angry--it must have just sort of slipped from her hand. Well, my father creeps into the kitchen at this point. Probably wondering what on earth all the commotions about. He takes one look at me mother. And one look at me. Well, by this time I’d stood up, hadn’t I? And there was this blood seeping all down the shoulder of this lovely summer outfit--nice pastel cream it was, too. Absolutely ruined it. And I’d only just bought it a week ago from Top Shop. Well, I never did hear so much f,ing and blinding from my father, in all my life.

“Ya gone out yer f**k’ng mind, Lilly!” he shouts at me mother.

Now. Next to her, well, my father was only a sparrow, I mean, he must a been only half her size at most. But my mother. Well. There was no doubt about who ruled the roost in our home. I mean, she was such a big strapping woman--my father used to tease her and call her the Kaiser.

Well if there’s one thing my mother couldn’t stand, it’s foul language. So she squares her shoulders up like Henry Cooper, purses her lips and her jaw clamps so shut you could have jammed a bloody steel plate in it. Well, he must have really got her back up, because she gives him the down-your-nose look. I tell you, she had these cold, cold grey eyes. She had this way, this way of looking at you--when she was angry. That could freeze the flesh off an elephant. From the look she gives him, I reckon she must a thought it was her that got the pressure cooker!

Well, like I said. My father’s only half her size. But he’s a plucky Irish lad. Besides. At this point, he’s so steamed up, he rounds on her and screams at the top of his voice--in this thick Irish accent most sane people could hardly understand.

“What the f**k yer gone and done? Ya silly tart. What the f**k yer done. Yer f**k'n stupid silly tart. Yer bloody could a gone ‘n killed ‘er.”

Then my dad practically flew me to the hospital.

Well, by this time I’d already managed to get through a roll of kitchen towels--trying to stop the blood from ruining more of my dress. And my poor mother, my poor mother. She’s sitting in the back of the car. Sobbing and wringing her hands, like somein’ out a Hamlet. And I tell you, all the time she’s saying:

“What a bloody silly cow I bloody am. What a bloody, bloody silly cow I gone and been. I swear by almighty god in heaven, I swear. . . it were an accident. Oh god! Oh god! I’d never lay a finger on yer in a million years.”

Then she gives me a look. Gives me a look like I’d just run a spear through her heart.

“Whatcha go and set me off like that Janie, girl.”

And that’s when she starts to pray--praying, I tell you!--in the back of me dad’s car. For crying out loud! And it really does my heart in--to think of my own mum praying. Well, she’s praying and she’s, she’s balling her eyes like a new born kid. The way she did at Aunt May’s funeral in Romford. And there I am, poor me, sitting quiet as a dickey bird in the front of the car!

Now meanwhile, my fathers calling her all the names under the sun, and shouting at her to keep her bloody great trap shut--so he can think straight and drive us to King George’s Hospital.

You should have seen this bloody queue in the emergency room. I’m not a kidding you. Well I think to myself, I’ll bleed to blimmin’ death by the time they get round to me. Well, this prim and proper looking old girl on the reception just stares at me a moment. Then her mouth drops open, and she bends. Bending right forward, ‘till her lips graze the Perspex  glass--So close, you could even see her breath steaming up around the air holes.

Well, you have to laugh. She must a thought she’d seen a ghost. She damn near swallowed her tongue.

But to cap it off, I thought I’d just die of bloody embarrassment. There’s all these people in bandages, and crutches and kids--all slouching around the emergency room.

Suddenly all the jabbering and yammering stops.

Now, you could have heard a bloody pin drop.

And they all ogle me--like I was something that just walked in from Night of The bloody Living Dead. And what I remember most, even to this day, I’ll never forget how this beautiful boy, a beautiful little African boy in shorts, takes one look at me. Me, with all this blood running down me. Then he turns those beautiful deep eyes away and buries his head in his mum’s arms and bosom and starts whining his poor head off!

Well I’m asking myself. What the hell’s all the fuss about? Don’t these people have their own bloody business? Well. You see, doctor. It never occurred to me to think about how I might have looked to them. I mean. I didn’t feel a thing. But I must have looked a right state--with all this blood dripping down my ankles and on my high heels. It’s trickling along the corridor where I’ve been walking. Even my dad’s got blood on his shirt sleeves at this point.

Well, you’d never guess. Next minute, it’s total bloody chaos. The receptionist starts to run to this big red buzzer on the opposite wall in the reception room--but she only goes and crashes into this stack of bloody chairs, which she must have forgotten are behind her. Well, she goes flying over, arse over heels. Poor girl almost breaks her neck in the process. Well she finally manages to press this bloody bell, or whatever it was.

Then all of a sudden--as if from nowhere--this doctor and nurse come barging in through a door, into the reception room. Well, the doctor looks at the receptionist as if to ask, what’s going on? And the receptionist’s just stands there frozen, hand-over-her-mouth and pointing at me like she’s seen a ghost.

Well the doctor takes one look at me--and you would a thought, he’d at least have the decency to ask me name first. But no. He just blanks me and barks to the nurse: “Take her in now!”

Well, this nurse, she practically plonks me in a wheel chair and zooms me along--The rate she was going she must a thought it was Formula One. Next thing I knew I’m in this bloody great big operating room. All white. This bloody cold bench smack bang in the middle. A bloomin’ great light above it, that’s damn near blinding me. Now. I’m shivering like it’s the Artic. To tell the truth, I hate hospitals. Never could stand the sight of them. Can’t stand injections neither. Let alone the sight of blood.

So anyway. They stick this bloody great needle in me neck. Then they’re clamping the back of me head with something and stitching me up. All the while the threads tugging my head--hurting like crazy even with the anaesthetic. Then they shove me in front of this blooming X-Ray thing and tell me to put my head under it. Then they go running for their lives behind this blimmin’ great wall of lead--telling me not to worry! It won’t harm me! And all the time that’s happening, the nurse is standing beside me, plaguing me with a thousand and one bloody questions. What day of the week is it? Where do you live? Can you remember what you did yesterday? What school do you go to? What’s the name of your mum and dad? I reckon they were checking I still had me faculties intact.

Well, I’ve always had the constitution of an ox, haven’t I? I never did take kindly to people pandering me. So I tells them to shush the nonsense and just get on with it. 

Well, to cut a long story short, they stuck sixteen stitches in the back of my crown. And the surgeon that’s sewing me up--he was a nice fella, had a kindly manner about him. I’ll always remember the way he says to me.

“You’re a lucky girl, a very lucky girl. We got you just in the nick of time.”

Well. Finally, the nurse wheels me out the theatre, and into the doctor’s office. And the doctors so tall, he stoops over me with this bloody great stethoscope hanging down the front of his dirty white overalls. And I’m in the wheel chair, head pounding away like I been dropped off a cliff on my head. Now, in the meantime, my mum and dad come trotting in the office. And they huddle on a bench in the corner, quiet as a pair of church mice. 

Now I reckon the doctor must a cottoned on--from the way my mother was wringing her hands, and my father was cursing her under his breath, with his filthy French, if you pardon the expression.

Well, the veins on the poor doctor’s neck bulge so much, I thought he was going to bloody explode like something out of Scanners! Now you wouldn’t believe it. You just wouldn’t believe what the doctor goes and does next. . . .

He whips off these specs. All business like. And swivels round to face me in his chair and rolls right up to me, so his trousers are brushing up against me knee. Well, he fixes one long burning look on my mother that just murders her. Then he glues me with these drop dead gorgeous blue eyes. Takes one of my hands in both of his--I always remember, he had such lovely, strong, gentle hands. It set my heart all a flutter.

Well, you’d never guess what he says to me--I almost swooned. He had such a lovely deep voice. Well, he says to me, dead serious, drawing out the words slowly, like honey:

“Janine. Is there anything, Janie. Absolutely anything you should tell me? Janine, you know that’s a very serious thing that’s happened--”

Then he blasts my parents again--who are still cowering in the corner--with a look that could smelt pig iron. He squeezes my hand soo gently, my knees go weak:

“Janine. Whoever, whoever did this. . . to you, this . . .criminal, criminal act, deserves prison. Janine, I want you to know that I’m here for you. . . .The hospital is here for you. . . .Should you want to press charges. . . .”

Well at this point, my mother and father go deathly pale. It was so quiet it was like standing in a cemetery. Me mother’s lips are so busy mousily twitching away, she has to clamp her finger tips over her lips, to keep them from taking off. And my father’s gone so blue in the face, I reckon he’s on the verge of choking on his own tongue.

Well the doctor inches his brogue a step closer between my knees, and squeezes my hand a little harder. Then throws me mum and dad another scalding look, saying: “Whoever, whoever abused you, may abuse again.”

Now the doctor stares me square in the eye. Squeezing me hand so hard in both of his, I thought my hand was about to bloody drop off.

“Are you really sure you don’t want to tell me what happened?” he says.

Well, by this time, the way my mum’s lips are quivering and her fists are shaking, I thought she was going to go ballistic, there and then.

But the doctor just stares right through her. Like she was a piece of dirt. He was livid. I honestly thought he was going to hit the roof. Honestly. There and then. Then he spits the words out, like they were a bad taste in your mouth.

“Because . . . whoever did this to you. . . ought to be shot. . . .”

Well, that does it. My mother’s trying to squirm out my fathers grip, who all this time’s been trying to get her to sit still--and whispering through gritted teeth to shut her damn beak. Now, if it’s possible to imagine, her face goes even redder than a beetroot.

Well, I says to myself. Prison? Charges? Criminal? What on earth can the doctor be going on about?

Well. Then the penny finally drops for me. It goes all quiet. The doctors looking at me, leaning so far forward our noses virtual touch. And my father must a been frantically trying to keep my mother in her seat. I reckon, if the doctor’d had his way, he would a practically wrung a confession from me, there and then.

Well, finally. Finally, my mother manages to wiggle free of my father and stands, facing the doctor like it was one of them duels of long ago. You know, with the pistols and things.

Now she’s dressed up to her nines in this bloody great mink coat--which is open at the front because of the heat. Well, next to me dad, this fur coat makes her look like a bloomin’ great grizzly. And she’s got this dead fox, or mink, or whatever it was--bloody snout and all, that’s swung round the collar of this coat like a scarf. Well, by this point she’s so shook up, she starts fiddling with this fox’s snout. Of course, her hands are shaking like jelly. So much so, that this bloody fox’s snout falls down the front of her cleavage!

Well the doctor starts laughing his head off, and even my fathers doing his best to stop sniggering.

Well, from the look on her face, I reckon she was about to slay the lot of us--Looking ridiculous in front of company ’s something she just hated. So she flings my father a glance to skin you alive, as much to say, and what the heck d’ yer think yer doing just sitting there?

Well. My poor father. He doesn’t want anything to do with it--he’s got his head buried in his hands and looking at the carpet, like he’s just landed from Mars and never in all his life seen the pair of us. Well, she takes no blind bit a notice of him, and squares her shoulders back. Sergeant major style.

Then she turns, all business like, to the doctor, like she was addressing the milkman who’d just short changed her.

“Thanks a bundle for yer kindness, doctor--I appreciate the good job yer done ‘n all. But it is getting very late in the day and I think it’s high time our daughter, our daughter ought to be getting home.”

And with that she puts one hand on the back of me wheel chair and swivels me in the direction of the door. 

“So,” me mother says, “if you don’t mind, we’ll just be gettin’ along and let yer get on with yer own business, and we wont be troublin’ yer no more . . . .”

Well, I could hear my dad fuming and cursing my mother under his breath. And I could feel the doctor’s eyes boring into the side of my head. But I just dropped me head. I didn’t have the heart to look him in the eye.

I felt such a coward.

I just knew he wanted me to say something.

You know, now I think of it. Now I think of it, maybe, maybe I bloody should have said something. I mean, It’d given her a bloody damn good lesson, for starters. Wouldn’t it now?

But well. I just couldn’t bear the thought of my poor old mum being cross examined by policemen, judges, and gawd only knows what else. It would have done her in. Broken her poor old heart.

And you know. In a way, I’ll always admire the way my mother stood up to that doctor. She had a will of steel. My mother was right, you know--for saying afterwards, “Yer can’t go mixing other people in family business.”

I mean, besides. Who the heck did that doctor think he was, anyway?

And I reckon you’ve got to respect that in the end.

Water? No thank you, doctor.

I mean, you’ve got to laugh about it. My mother said it’s a fine thing I’ve got a skull as thick as granite. She was good about it afterwards--even got me a nice dress. And my father gave me extra pocket money and let me off working at the café that weekend. I mean, you can’t say fairer than that, can you now?

Yes, doctor, it was three breakdowns.

Now I come to think of it, I wonder how on bloody earth, I survived three breakdowns in a row. It’s a miracle when you think of it. A bloody miracle. Discipline. That’s what I put it down to. Or will power. The strength me good mother gave me. Yes, that’s what got me through. Taught me to stand on me own two feet--as me old mum used to say. If it hadn’t been for her, bless her soul, I don’t know where I’d a been . . . .

Do I think my mother had something to do with my breakdown? Now, Doctor. That’s the silliest notion I ever heard in ages! I’m no expert, I’ll grant you that now. But anyone with half a brain, and a bit of common sense, can see that a person can’t go blaming their parents, for every little thing that’s ever happened to them in life. Can’t they know?

I mean, well, sometimes. Just sometimes. While I was stewing in that bloody psychiatric ward. It may have crossed my mind. Once in a while. I mean, how long was I in there? Must a been four, five, six years? Three admittances in all.

No. She was a good woman. Always there for me, when I really needed her. I know deep down, she must have loved me. I mean she wasn’t one to show emotion, or love, or anything like that. But deep down, really deep down, she must have loved me.

No, I don’t think my mother had anything to do with it, you see? I mean, I was still only seventeen when I had Nick--all I wanted was to get out that bloody house and all that work, you see?

Well, and when I came back from Angola, I was so hurt by that two timing git--I only found out after three kids the b*****d was already married. Well, I had three kids in tow, I couldn’t just get rid off ‘em, now. Could I?--not that I wanted to, mind. Even if I had the choice.

When I think of what my poor kids have gone through in that children’s home--while I was stuck in bloody Goodmayes. . . .But well, my mother couldn’t have managed all that alone, see? I mean, not with three kids. Not with her hip. Not with the guest house and all. 

But well, when I came back from Angola, on top of three kids, on top of all that, I still had to help my mother--her hip was going, see. She had me doing all the housework in the guest house, cooking three square meals a day for the guests, doing the laundry, and well. To top it all off, she gets this bright idea. This bloody great idea, of all things. To hitch me up to that bloody creep Peacock. . . .Thought it would do me good, she says. As if. I didn’t get much say in the matter, either.

Well, it must have been too much of a strain on me nerves in the end. That’s when my mother first put my put me in Goodmayes. I was only twenty one at the time. Now it might have been different had my father still been alive. But, well, he went and stuck his head in a gas oven, poor soul.

But I do know my mother was only doing what she thought was best for me. Now, I don’t think you can blame her for that.

Not that it’s something I’m really angry about. Not at all. I mean. Getting uptight about a bloody stupid little thing like that. I mean, why get bloody angry anyway? What’s the use? Bloody stupid to do so, if you ask me. I mean, I was angry, sometimes, at being stuck in that f*****g hospital. But I don’t blame my f*****g--

I don’t blame anyone.

It’s all water under the bridge. Why get all worked up about bloody water. That’s bloody stupid.

Do you mind if I smoke, doctor? Christ, these bloody hands, giving me the shakes. I can’t get this f*****g cig lit. Would you mind, doctor? Lighting me? Thank you.

 

 

--END--

Author's Note

Interconnected stories:

o For Your Own Good
o Under The Ginko Tree
o A Good Mother
o The Kirby Guest House
o Mr. Peacock goes to Sainsbury's
o The Visit

Reviews

[Vanessa Whiteley]

I think the characterisation is interesting. I like the way Janine essentially seems to be in denial about her mother and her understandable resentment becomes the more obvious as the story progresses.
I understand that you want to create a conversational tone and that the writing is expressive of Janine's speech but I'm not sure why you use two sentences here when one would work separated by a comma. 'Bottle of cleaner in one hand, rag in the other' and I feel would be easier to read.
The story is interesting and you manage to hold the reader's attention throughout. The description of the piano is well done and I like the idea that it was on wheels but the mother didn't want to damage the carpet. Slightly quirky and eccentric but does it tie into the rest of the story? What purpose does it serve and is Cameron Probert right that you could cut this part? I'm not sure. I think you need something but if there is a connection beyond temper with the rest of the narrative � I don't know. However, I think just beginning with the pressure cooker would be too sudden you need something to lead in. I think the symbolic and rather ironical use of the pressure cooker in relation to the explosion of anger is well done.
However, the transition feels very sudden and I have mixed feelings about Janine addressing the doctor and essentially answering her questions. There are a number of places that this just doesn't work for me. Especially here:
'Well, kids these days-with all that modern pampering lark-kids these days just don't know what's good for them.
What did she do?
Well before the guest house, she'd be down at the Sunrise caf�, with my father Jack-beavering away like a pair of Trojan's'.
Also while I really like Janine's voice, sometimes I think you overdo the colloquialisms. I love the following picture however.
Of course, I didn't expect her to throw it. Did I, now? Well, I was just unbolting the latch on the kitchen door, when I felt like, like I'd just run smack bang into a brick wall. Out of the blue, like. Well, I thought. That's strange. There's no wall in the kitchen.
I also appreciate the way you blend humour with pathos which seems to emphasis the viciousness of the mother's abusive temper and the horror of this young girl laying on the floor with blood everywhere. There is also something intensely human about this young girl wondering if it would ruin the highlights. There is also a pathos to the way Janine insists to herself that her mother is innocent of any real intent to do harm - even in the face of logic.
You know how it is, when you get angry-it must have just sort of slipped from her hand.
Again I realise that you want to echo speech with some of the shorter sentences but I don't think that the single 'Now' before 'Next to her' works that is just difficult to read and I don't understand why you are making this sentence more complex than it needs to be. Perhaps a dash if you want to add emphasis as you do later.
'Now � next to her, well, my father was only a sparrow. I mean, he must a been only half her size at most. But my mother. Well. There was no doubt about who ruled the roost in our home. I mean, she was such a big strapping woman-my father used to tease her and call her the Kaiser.
On the other hand I think the father's voice here is great.
"What the f**k yer gone and done? Ya silly tart. What the f**k yer done. Yer f**k'n stupid silly tart. Yer bloody could a gone 'n killed 'er."
I have read this story through a couple of times now and it is certainly worth it. But to do this story justice I will post a review part 2 shortly. If there is anything that you would like my opinion on let me know and I'll focus on those parts.

[Paza]

Great story. I loved the way the way the character of the mother unfolds. We learn a little...and it's not so bad...then we learn more...it's a little worse...until we get quite a clear picture of what's really going on. Janine making excuses for her and defending her as a good mother completely punctuates what we've learned through the telling of the tale. Wonderful read.

[Tomás Ó C..]

So many Irish mammys hammer values into their kids instead of gaining respect for them they reject them. And Irish mammys never learn!!!

[Marie]

Nicely written.

[Cameron Probert]

So I'm going to answer your questions first.

1. My initial reaction as a reader is a bit tough. Emotionally, it felt a bit diffuse. Although I think it's because we're only getting a sidelong glance into the main characters true emotions. Which I think is really neat mentally but it does end up distancing me a bit as a reader. I had two problems as I was reading along. The first is pretty simple to fix. I didn't realize that the present was happening in a doctor's office. And my second problem was the entire piece feels a bit unfocused. I think what you're getting at here is the relationship between the mother and the daughter, and how her mother is abusive and demeaning to Jeanine, but Jeanine writes it off. If I'm off base on that I apologize. As a collection of scenes based around the theme of love and abuse, I think it's okay.

But... I think it could be better. Which leads me to your second question.

2. Cut the beginning. The best part of the story starts with the frying pan to the head. And her reaction. The scene with the piano is good, but doesn't have the power of a frying pan to the head. Honestly, you might want to create the illusion that she's talking about it to someone else, without having her actually talking to someone else as well. Mostly because it robs some of the power out of the scene if we know that she's going to be okay. Overall, I think you desciptions focusing on that were really good, and that we see the concern through the eyes of the doctors. Although she doesn't really seem to worried, which is good and bad, I suppose.

3. Okay, so I really like the voice. There's something about the accent that really works here, and doesn't over power the piece. As far as hating anything, hate is such a strong word :) I had a hard time getting into it at first. Granted I've been around these characters for a bit, so I kind of knew some of the stuff that was going to happen, so I don't know how much that influenced my thinking about this story.

To be fair, overall this really felt like a backgrounding piece. Like you were stringing together scenes trying to get to know the characters better. But... I still like where you're going with these pieces.

As always all opinions are that of the reviewer and not indicative of the actual merit of the piece :) Any questions please feel free to ask.

[TL Boehm]

I especially loved the language. I still remember Janine although its been a few months since I read that piece - this one is funnier than that piece. I'm not much of an editor so I don't know about how you would trim this. I found the pace to be fine and the dialogue is what really cracked me up. well written.

[TL Boehm]

I especially loved the language. I still remember Janine although its been a few months since I read that piece - this one is funnier than that piece. I'm not much of an editor so I don't know about how you would trim this. I found the pace to be fine and the dialogue is what really cracked me up. well written.