Mom Advice

In honor of Mother's Day, here's some memorable advice from my mom:

"It's best to be the second wife."

"Don't use a knife when eating salad."

"Don't sleep with your hair wet."

"Have a wedding. Unless you're over 35 when you get married. (pause) Which you won't be, right?"

"Never, ever, ever stop working. Always have your own money."

"A husband is not family. Family is family."

"Never tell your boyfriends what I say about them."

"Always carry flats in your purse when you have to wear heels."

"When in doubt, wear Chanel."

"The man should be at least 7 years older than the woman. 10 is preferable." 

"Don't leave the house without wearing perfume."

"Don't do anything for your husband on the first day of marriage that you don't plan to do for the rest of your life."

"Have a daughter. Sons leave."

"You have to take furniture OUT of its place and clean UNDER it."

"Why watch sad movies? To get sad? No, thanks."

"Money is good."

"Never make a mess in someone else's house." 

"Take care of plants."

"Order food that's easy to eat when you're with people you have to impress."


"Listen to your mother."


*

There's No Place Like Home

The minute I step off the plane, there's a feeling of relief paired with unease. It is instantly familiar and it is also no longer a place that holds my daily life, my routine, my habits, and my adult life. It has been nearly eight years since I left my home in Brazil, and I have made New York into my new home. New York has the lifestyle I like to live by, it has my career, my friends, my yoga practice, my dreams, and my ambition.

Brazil has my roots. I can stay away for a year or just a few months, I can forget what it's like to be Brazilian, I can even stop thinking, writing, and overall communicating in Portuguese if I so wish. But as soon as I land, it sucks me in, grasping me by my feet and grounding me. This is where you began. I can change my life as many times as I want to and I can choose who I want to be, but I can not change where it all started. And it all started right here.

I had not intended to fly alone. It is not customary for me to come home more than once a year anymore. When I bought my ticket, this was a trip planned for two. It was a meet-my-whole-family-and-see-where-I-come-from ordeal. It was a get-away-from-New-York-winter-together thing. It was that much-awaited-first-extended-vacation-with-you event. It was a lot of things that involved someone else.

The relationship ended, though, as you may have gathered from previous posts. And so this trip so full of togetherness with someone I was no longer with loomed before me. Changing the ticket would have been a little expensive, but not impossible. Did I want to go on this trip alone now? It is home, after all. That means: mom, dad, all my family, my old room, my bed, a really good shower, mom, a pool, warm weather, amazing food, coffee, mom, nothing to think about, beach time, cheap and perfect manicures, a car, coconut water, and did I mention mom? But it also meant there was a possibility I would do nothing but think of him and what we'd be doing together if he were with me. That could be very depressing.

As the days went on though, New York started to become unbearable. The reminders were everywhere. I could feel his presence in the things we used to do together, and, perhaps more saddening, I could feel his absence. To top it off, the weather kind of sucked. One warm-spring-like day was followed by freezing temperatures, which set the whole city off into a spiral of disappointment. I was tired of wearing my gloves, hat, scarves, layers, and boots. I wanted to wear a dress and flip flops. I wanted- needed- to get away. I kept my ticket as it was.

Yesterday afternoon, I got in a cab to the airport. The cab driver asked me where I was going. "Home. To my mom." He smiled. The hours at the airports and in the airplanes were interminable. It was a long, draining trip. I sat next to a very nice old man for 9 hours, though, who was very chatty. Under normal circumstances, I would have hated that. But when I got off the plane, I realized I hadn't spent my whole plane ride sulking and moping, and I was grateful to have had that nice man distracting me with his stories.

I've been home for all of twelve hours now. I am jet-lagged, pmsing, tired, and full of thoughts. But I had an amazing cup of coffee today, and coconut water, and steak, and fruits. I took a long shower in my pink bathroom that, after living in new york spaces for years, feels like the largest, most luxurious bathroom ever. I can't believe I showered in this bathroom every day for most of my life and took it completely for granted. After my shower, when my bathroom was all foggy, I was reminded of how I used to write the names of the boys I had crushes on on my fogged mirror as a teenager. And how I curled up, so many times, on the pink tiled floor and cried. These memories warmed my heart. I have survived so many things. I can survive this.

Yes, I have thought of him. Of course I have. I've thought about how I'd show him my house, how I'd explain its rooms and their particular memories, how I'd let him see pictures of me in high-school when I was awkward and not-so-pretty, how I'd show him my neighborhood, how I'd introduce him to all the people who have been in my life since the beginning. I'm hit with pangs of regret and guilt and sadness which, though temporary, are very painful. I tell myself, It's okay. I can have these thoughts. I have to mourn what I've lost, and what I'll miss, in order to move past it.

It isn't easy, but I had to come here. I've lost touch with a lot of parts of myself- parts I like, parts I don't like, parts I repress, parts I celebrate- and I need to attend to myself, bit by bit. I don't want to ignore myself or my feelings anymore. I've learned that can have a very high cost, and I'm not willing to pay for it again.

A little while ago, I wandered into my mom's room and, mid-conversation about a totally unrelated topic, I burst into tears. My mom didn't ask any questions or give me any cheering talks. She hugged me, the way only a mother can, and I knew that this was why I had to come here. I needed to remember that there are people in my life who believe in the best of me and love me, for better or for worse, unconditionally. Whatever wrongs I have done, I am always worthy of forgiveness and love in their eyes, even if I think otherwise. This is a place where I am safe to be Larissa; good, bad, nice, mean, pretty, ugly, mature, childish, happy, sad, accomplished, failed, and everything-in-between Larissa.

This is a special place. This is my home.

The Cutest Boy in Town

I had just turned 14. It was the end of July, and I was going to spend a few days in Quata, my mom's hometown, with my family. I took my friend Anna along, since she was about to move to Sweden and we wanted to spend as much time together as possible. For city girls, one would think Quata would be incredibly boring. It was a small town built around a church, surrounded by farm lands. There was only one main avenue, where everyone hung out. There were no movie theatres, no malls, no parks, no clubs. But, perhaps most importantly, it was not dangerous like a big city, and one didn't need cars to get around, so we found ourselves independent in a way that was completely intoxicating for two teenage girls.

I had cousins who spent their vacation time there as well, and a group of friends I saw only during these trips, whom I stayed in touch with through letters. We were happy to be reunited there, in that tiny town where nothing ever happened, a couple of times throughout the year.
We went out every night and sat on the benches in front of the church, to chat and play games and flirt; the rush of freedom keeping us warm through that miserably cold July.

One night, a really handsome young man walked by and said hi to us. We giggled, unable to reply, and he kept on walking. My cousin told me he was the cutest boy in the town. He didn't live there anymore, as he was already in college, and he only came back during the holidays. All the girls wanted to kiss him, she assured me. I agreed that he was incredibly good looking, and decided that if he said anything to us again, I'd reply.

The following night, we dressed up a little bit. We sat on the same bench we'd sat on the night before, the one closest to the street corner, in full view. As we had hoped, he walked by again, said hi, and I said hi back. My cousin elbowed me in the ribs- I had broken a rule. Respectable girls didn't talk to strange boys, no matter how cute they were, in that small old-fashioned town. But I couldn't help myself, there was a storm inside me, a hurricane of thoughts and wants and desires that bubbled up and crushed my good girl mask mercilessly. I asked him if he'd like to sit with us. My friends were as mortified as they were excited when he smiled and sat down next to me. He told me his name- a name that would find itself scribbled all over my journals and notebooks for years to come- and I told him mine, which he immediately said was a beautiful name.

I don't remember our conversations. I think we talked about Anna being from Sweden and I think I asked him about college life (he was 21, mind you). The hours went by, and when we all said good night, he held my hand and said he hoped to see me tomorrow. My heart skipped right up to my face, which didn't know yet how to hide how happy I was that this boy, this super cute college boy, was paying attention to me. When we got home, Anna and I analyzed every possible scenario for the following evening. It was very possible that he would kiss me. I had been kissed before, but it was clear that he had more experience than I did in that department. Focused entirely on how I could hide my innocence and youth, I completely forgot to devise a plan that was mindful of keeping everything a secret from my mother. A few months earlier, she had nearly killed me when she saw a hickey on my neck, so I knew that if she saw me kissing a strange (much older) boy in public (in that little town no less), I would face disastrous consequences. But I was 14. I had the confidence and courage that inexperience provides, plus screaming hormones. I was certain I could get away with it.

The next night, after brushing my teeth eleven times, packing gum and lip gloss in my pockets, we headed out. We sat on the same bench so that he would surely find us- I didn't think to find a hidden bench somewhere, to take precautions so as not to be seen should he indeed kiss me that night. He found us, as planned, sat next to me, and once again we talked about things that didn't matter. And then, at some point, rather unexpectedly, he kissed me. My friends kept on talking and goofing around while we sat at the edge of our bench, making out. Even though he was older, it was pure adolescent bliss. We did nothing but kiss and compliment each other. Why did it feel so good? How could it all be so perfect? I didn't know. I didn't want it to end. I wanted to remember all of his details, I wanted to memorize his face, I wanted to remember what kissing him felt like for as long as I lived.

I didn't get caught that night. We went home, my cousin and Anna wanting to know everything- even though they had been sitting right next to us the whole time- and inspecting me for hickeys or any sign that I might have been kissed that night. I was on the clear. I had kissed a boy, an older boy, in public, and gotten away with it. I was as delirious as a child caught in a fantasy world, imagining what it might be like if we started dating, how I'd tell my friends at school that I had a boyfriend who was in college and lived in another town, and, more than anything, hoping that we would see each other the following night and kiss again.

We did. We were completely wrapped up in each other, my friends deeply entertained with their own conversations, when my mother walked by. My cousin elbowed me. But it was too late. My mother had seen it all. She didn't say anything. She just walked home. Everyone stood around me, frozen. They knew my mother was strict and that I had just done something monstrously wrong in her eyes. I didn't know what to do. For a moment, I considered never going home again. My partner-in-crime was scared that she'd come beat him up too. There was nothing to do. I had to go home and face my mother. Trembling, I walked home.

I was met with a beast. My mother was beyond furious. Anna went to our room and I sat in the kitchen with my mother. (A word to teenagers in trouble- don't pick the kitchen as the spot to get yelled at, there are weapons of all kinds in there). As I apologized over and over again, she screamed at me at the top of her lungs. She said I was not the daughter she had raised, and that she was ashamed of me. I was sent to bed after many hours of being reprimanded for my actions, which I didn't know how to justify or explain yet.

The holiday ended, we went back to the city, and life went on. I was left with the memory of those perfect kisses from that older boy, and my relationship with my mother was strained for years. Holidays came and went, the years passed and, eventually, he- and the fantasy I had attached to him- faded. I started to forget the details I had tried so hard to memorize. With time, he became a distant memory.

A few days ago, I was in my mom's hometown again. It is still where we go to celebrate Christmas. The ghosts of the past are always looming there and I am constantly distracted by my memories. I see my friends and I laughing around the ice-cream shop, I see my younger cousins and I playing by the pool, I see my mother and I going to visit her aunt in an old house, and so on.

This time, I was met with a great sadness as I walked by the church and saw that the benches around it had been removed. The bench that held my 14-year-old self's fantasies and fears was gone. I had never considered that someone might touch that memory, that anyone could have the power to remove the place where it lived. I walked away, unable to fully accept the impermanence of life's most precious moments.

I wondered, then, what might have happened to that young man. Might he have known, when he kissed a 14-year-old girl, that he was imprinting himself on her still unguarded heart? Was I just part of a collection of holiday flings? I laughed at myself for having these thoughts. I shook my head, realizing that if he walked by me now I wouldn't recognize him.

I have, after all, forgotten that face. The face of the cutest boy in town.

Mother

People who see me with my mom now usually think we have the perfect mother-daughter relationship. We do, in fact, have a great relationship nowadays. We are very close, and very loving towards each other. When we're together, I can't go a day without kissing her cheek, pressing my nose against her face, squeezing her hand, or cuddling next to her on the couch. She is incredibly supportive of my career and my life-style, taking on tasks like helping me find the right belt for a character I am playing or finding 10 lamps for a play I'm directing as though they were of life-and-death importance- because, to me, they are, and she recognizes that. When I started grad school she came to live with me, under the disguise that she was taking English lessons, because she knew that in order for me to fully take advantage of that first year, I wouldn't be able to have a job or worry about house-hold chores, so she lived with me- cleaned my apartment, cooked my meals, packed me a lunch every day, did my laundry, and stayed up with me at night as I discussed all the breakthroughs and breakdowns I was experiencing during that year. I was 21 years old, but I needed my mommy, and she was there for me. As a result, I excelled as a student, benefited fully from my education, and grew incredibly as an artist. Recently, I took on directing and producing a play, and without hesitation she stepped up to help me with costumes and props, running around cities looking for the most impossible things, spending days sewing, and putting together collages of every image I gave her. Let me just add to that- my mother had never been involved in any theatrical production before in her life, she knew what to do simply by watching me do what I do all my life.

But it wasn't always like this. Unfortunately, like most teenage girls, I hated my mother. I mean, I thought she was the devil. If I trace it back, I think it started when I was 13. I came home from my first experience "going out at night with friends" and had a hickey on my neck. Well, my mother had not raised a daughter to come home with hickeys on her neck. I wasn't really allowed to go out again for about three years. If I was, it was an exception, and I was thoroughly checked when I got home. Naturally, I thought she was overreacting and overprotective and did not understand me at all. I blamed her entirely and solely for my parent's disastrous marriage and the consequent war-zone that was our house-hold. I did not understand her fearful and explosive behavior. She did not understand my obsession with acting and did not know how to be supportive. She wanted me to be a journalist, and when people asked her what I was good at, she'd say, "Writing. She's going to go to school for journalism." Needless to say, that pissed me off and hurt me immeasurably. She was always telling me to go on a diet or fix my hair differently, since she placed an abnormal amount of importance on looks. I always thought she felt I was ugly, and it made me shut down from her completely. We simply didn't understand each other, and our communication throughout my entire adolescence was pretty much limited to fighting. If we weren't arguing, we weren't talking. And with my mother, arguments turn to fire. She once broke the mirror behind my bedroom door because she slammed the door so hard while we were fighting. The mirror, by the way, is still broken. She also sneaked into my room, read my diaries, went through my things, and prohibited me of keeping anything in locked compartments. I actually used to dread coming home from school, and got involved in as many after-school activities as I could find, sometimes spending up to 13 hours at school a day. I didn't want to be home, I didn't want to be near her, I did not understand her, and I was absolutely certain that would never change.

At 17, I graduated from high-school, left home, and moved to a different country for college. It was the time in my life I had been looking forward to for years, and the relief I felt in being out of my house, away from my mother, was instant.

And it was then that we started getting along.

I got sick a lot that first year in college, and, guess what, I started missing my mother. Although I had friends who took care of me, and started to grow my own feet to walk on in the world, I missed her. We started writing each other letters. I started to share things about my life in college, and suddenly I felt like an adult talking to another adult, and that relationship of equality turned out to be what we needed from each other. She came to visit me after I'd been gone for three months, and things were already very different. I had grown up. She made more sense to me. And she started getting more comfortable talking to me about herself, about her life, about her marriage, about her relationship to me. And so I started to understand my mother a little bit at a time.

A real shift happened when I came home for the first time after being away, for christmas break. With some distance from the home I'd been raised in, I was able to see the love and care that resided there. And one night, I don't remember why, I found the college essay that had gotten me accepted to Sarah Lawrence and read it to my mom. It was about my journey through theatre and what it meant to me. When I finished it, both my mother and I had tears in our eyes. She had never understood how much theatre meant to me because I had never told her. She may not have known what theatre and acting were about, but she knew what love and passion were about, and she was able to piece together how much I need and love what I do. She became my number one fan that night, and never turned back.

As a teenager I had envied my friends who had great relationships with their moms, who could tell them everything, who called their moms their best friends. But now I'm grateful for everything I had with my mom. The rough years showed us both that we could love each other through anything, even our opinions and judgements of each other as people. The friendship we have now was something we had to work for and build slowly, and we are therefore able to appreciate it.

There are still bumps. We disagree on trivial things like what "cleanliness" is, and then heavier things like what "beauty" is. She is not the type of person who sugarcoats or hides what she's feeling. If she thinks I need to lose weight, she says so, even if I tell her I don't need to be stick-thin to be happy. If she doesn't approve of how I keep my apartment, she won't leave me alone until I make it look like what she thinks is presentable (impossible standards). I can't tell her everything about my romantic life, she's still very protective of her children's hearts. She's still married to my father and it's still pretty much a disaster, but I have learned that people choose their lives for their own reasons, and there isn't much other people can do about it once they've made up their minds.

But we know each other now. We appreciate and understand each other. Our love and friendship rises above those bumps, and we learn something new about one another every day.

I do see my mother as a queen, because all mothers are queens, but even more importantly, I also see her as a human being, because all mothers are human beings, and if we learn to love them for it, they are honored.