the sign of the teaspoon

My mother has Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. Not the cute kind where you occasionally need to pick your cuticles until they're bleeding (I assure you it's adorable) but the scary kind that is accompanied by screaming, violent hair tearing madness. The obsessions were focused upon cleanliness and order.

When it snowed, our dog - who lived mostly under the deck so as not to get dog hair anywhere in the house - was not permitted to play in the backyard because the paw prints would mess up the otherwise perfect white cover. I would have to take the dog out to the park to play, which was a good escape for both of us.

If anyone disturbed, with the act of walking through the room, the parallel lines she'd carefully combed into the tassels of the rug, my mother would indiscriminately damn us all to burn an eternity in hell. She's not a very religious woman. Her cuticles didn't look too good either.

I would sometimes go outside in the snow and march around on the lawn to spell out my name in gigantic letters, jumping from the end of one letter to the top of the next. I wanted to make sure she would know it was me who had ruined the lawn and not blame the dog.



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