Pour Some Sugar on Me!

My mother would make a brilliant scientific study–she is a 72-year-old woman in perfect health who has pretty much lived on candy and dessert her entire life. You may think I jest, but let me give you an example. She came to help me out when I had my second baby. My first baby had just turned two and never tasted candy. The first thing my Mom did when she got in the car was give my toddler a bag of gummy sharks. When my husband told her Annabelle didn’t even have the right amount of molars to chew such a thing, coupled with the fact that we didn’t give her candy, my Mom was awestruck. “Wow, you’re really serious about this candy thing,” she said.Yup. As long as I have control over what goes in my children’s mouths, it will not be candy.
My mom, however raised us on candy. We were the envy of the neighborhood with our kitchen full of candy jars. Dirty kids with long stringy hair would come to our sliding glass door, shield their eyes from the glare with their hands over their eyebrows, and try to catch a glimpse of our candy jars. It was a bit creepy.
Cavities were par for the course when we visited the dentist, but no dental visit was complete without a beeline straight to the drive-thru for a milkshake.
On the same visit to help me with the baby, my husband asked my Mom what she might want from the store. “Oh, just some little cookies,” she said, not missing a beat on the rocking chair. She had come to help with my toddler, but ended up holding my newborn in the rocking chair for hour upon hour being waited on hand and foot by me. It was like having three children.All these years have finally taken a toll on my Mom and her stomach is just not what it used to be. For years we have all marveled at her “iron stomach.” This is a woman who could sit in the back seat of the car, reading a book and munching on cookies as we drove the winding roads of the Redwood forests, while the rest of us turned green and hung our heads out the window. This is a woman who wore a red bouffant wig and black go-go boots and piled her six children into her orange VW bus every Sunday for church. This is a woman who, at 72 years old, still has peaches and cream skin, big brown eyes, thick black lashes, and looks at least 15 years younger. This is a woman who told me that my 10-month-old baby girl was too pale and I should put a little blush on her cheeks.
This is a woman who has finally met her match–an aging stomach.
She recently got a blood test and was floored to find out she had food intolerances to almonds and wheat and flour and gluten. She spoke to me over the phone in amazement. “You wouldn’t believe it–everything has flour in it!?!”I told her that if she went to a health food store she could find gluten-free cookies. She said,, “Yes, but they’re too expensive! Can you believe, even those little cookies, what are they called? The little round ones–vanilla wafers! Even “they” have flour in them!”
Yes Mom, I would immediately assume vanilla wafers would be the first to go when you have stomach issues. I’m not even sure they qualify as real food.
And so I hear from my sisters that she is shrinking smaller and smaller. She was already getting smaller from walking on her treadmill. She started doing pilates last year and said this is the first time in her life she has muscle tone. “Wow, this exercise thing really works!” she told me one day.
So that’s my Mother. It took her 72 years to figure out that exercise is a positive thing and cookies are not. Will I miss all the cookie jars filled with gummy sharks around her house? Will I miss the jar containing 2 year-old yogurt-covered pretzels? (“They still taste good!”) Will I miss her constant experimenting with which salty food tastes best with Junior Mints? Almonds or peanuts or cashews? Will I miss her long distance calls to my friends to tell them her latest Junior Mint discovery?
Now I’m waiting for her to realize that real foods have a shelf life. She doesn’t cook anymore so when I went through her spices to find some cinnamon, I was shocked to see an old jar labeled with masking tape that said “mole.” “Mom? What is this?” I asked her. “Oh, Lupe gave that to me.””Grandma Lupe? Mom, Grandma Lupe died more than 20 years ago! Spices don’t last that long!””Of course they do! Spices don’t wear out!””Mom, I get rid of my spices if they’re more than a year old.”She grabbed it out my hand. “I like these spices. Grandma Lupe gave them to me. I want to keep them.” And she put them back in her cupboard where they sit to this day.
I am consistently awestruck by my Mother and her amazing diet. She loves it when I come to visit because she says it’s the only time she eats vegetables. I called her today to see how she was doing. She was in the car with my father going to get a Diet Pepsi and then a frappucino. For some reason, her blood test didn’t tell her she was intolerant to soda pop and coffee milkshakes.By gummy shark or frappucino, that sugar will find its way into her system. I think she’s lived on preservatives and sugar for so long her system has been permanently preserved. And if that’s the case, all the better for us to keep her around forever, gummy sharks and all.