She invited me to coffee one cold morning and we agreed to meet at the Neighborhood Cup. I miscalculated how long it takes to get there and arrived a half an hour early and saw Mo’s Mom sitting outside waiting for the coffee shop to open. She was facing the street and didn’t see me as I was parking the car. From a distance I can see that she was having an imaginary conversation with someone. It was full of all the emotions and gestures of a mother reprimanding her child. She was looking down as if talking to a small child and wagging her finger in the air, almost in anger. I could only guess who the recipient of that imaginary conversation was. I walked closer and closer ever so carefully so she wouldn’t hear me.
This is what I heard: “You are such a bad boy. Didn’t I tell you not to stick cigarettes in my ears when I am sleeping, I especially told you not to put lighted cigarettes. Look what happened, it zinged some of the hair in my ears. You even made one of my ears droop lower. Why do you have to do that? Now, one of my ears looks like a Hush Puppy dog”.
Then, she turned around as she heard my footsteps. At which time I was greeted by a wonderful smile. “Hello, there”, she said. “Oh, hi”, I said. “They don’t open for another twenty minutes”, she said. “It’s a good habit to always be early, I said. “Whom were you taking to?” I asked. “I was practicing what I was going to tell Mo when I get home. I didn’t realize what happened until I saw myself in the mirror when I was about to put on my earrings. I didn’t remember putting earplugs in my ears last night. It was only when I took it out that I realized they were cigarette butts. I can’t tell you how yucky they were, and more than that something happened to my ears. Somehow it hears and feels foggy, actually it’s more on the side of smoky than foggy all because of those butts!”
