Finding N.E.M.O.

Finding N.E.M.O. (New and Efficient Means Of) 

Surviving a Family

This is to respectfully acknowledge my indebtedness to humorist Erma Bombeck whose style has been the inspiration for this piece. Certain phrases and description of “Mother’s Eyes” have liberally been borrowed from Ms. Bombeck.

The nation has been in full Lenten mode since the month before. Now it is April, El Mes Sagrado (The Holy Month). School is also out. When these two phenomena collide, it’s bound to be a Holy Mess in our household. The incongruence makes it seem as if fate is waging a cruel war, and we are all in the middle of it.

Por Dios! becomes Mummie’s hourly mantra. Heretofore, she has endearingly boasted to friends and foes alike about her Seven Blessings, but now mournfully recites a litany of sorrows from the Seven Crosses she bears.

Such Blessings (or Crosses, as the case may be) come in different sizes and temperaments.

I’m the only girl in her pesky Magnificent Seven brood. I’m 12. Mum steadies herself on the stove each time I announce my plan to marry the youth minister. I boastfully tell my friends that I was conceived when Mum drank the blood of a rooster and spat three times at the full moon.

Ten and Eight-Year-Old Brothers like to compete crossing their eyes despite threats that they are going to freeze that way. They’re the ones who are always told, Not too close to the TV or you’ll go blind!

Six-Year-Old Brother is convinced that the hospital gave him by mistake. Four-Year-Old Brother likes playing with Dadee’s bottle of black India ink and thinks it’s edible, so he looks like he’s being raised by werewolves. When these two bicker, they make Cain and Abel sound like the Jonas brothers.

Two-Year-Old Toddler Brother belongs to the Tribe of Little People everywhere who can walk under the dining table. He is the only one in the house who can take the cap off the child-safe Cortal bottle.

Three-Month Old Youngest Brother cries around the clock. When he finally falls asleep, Mum gets up at night and holds a mirror under his nostril to make sure he is still breathing.

Meal­time takes on all the excitement of a missile at blast off. Leave some rice for Voltaire! Mum snarls. Voltaire is one of our six dogs. Yes, six.

12, 10, 8, 6, 4, 3… we recite at roll call. 

Who are you? Mum interrupts, barking at the Unknown Three-Year Old. She smartly notes that this year's even-age sequence is skewed. Where’s Two-Year-Old? 

We don’t budge. We’re used to Two-Year-Old going AWOL at mealtimes. The accepted rumor among us siblings is that he trades places with the Three-Year-Old Neighbor (he’s the 3 at roll call, if you’re paying attention).

Now picture Sunday, the holiest of days, as we walk one block to church – yes, walk! (everybody does it). It is like leading a caravan of wild pygmies in search of an oasis in the desert.

Church service has been ideal for Mum to shine and show off her expertise on the most effective means of communication known to men, The Mother’s Eye. It really varies with the situation and its gravity.

The Look of Death is unflinching and unyielding until the repartee, I’m telling! stops.

The more-commonplace Deadpan Glare is used when one of the siblings starts to crawl under the pews.

The Desperate Squint, a most-interesting study in pantomime, is performed when an enterprising brother tries to get change from the offering plate.

Finally, there’s the Martyr’s Countenance in which Mum will just sit and start knotting her dress sash into a rosary. We’re not Catholic.

You may wonder where Dadee is in all this. Well, he has been busy getting congregational approval to enroll boys in the army just as soon as they get potty-trained. He has also been campaigning to send the youth pastor ASAP on a permanent mission trip assignment to Borneo.

In truth, I do not know of any survival tips that may have worked. I suppose that we’ll just grow out of it, and Mum’s post-natal depression which started seven months before I was born will finally taper off when we go to college.

Amidst all the clamor, however, I’ll contend what a small marvel of a time it is. I have loved it then and, in retrospect, love it even more now.

El desorden tambien tiene su encanto.

Disorder also holds its charm.