Growing Up Were, Conclusion

I sometimes wonder what would have happened if David Bowie ran track.

My sister in law is tall, has an English accent and rather ethereal and likes cross dressing on occasion so I will leave that question unanswered.

Sometimes I wonder if my mother was all that happy being a wolverine. Occasionally she would say something or get a look in her eye that made me wonder if she ever wanted to be something less terrifying, like a cheetah or raccoon. All Weres are predators but some are far less obsessed with hunting killing, tearing and rending. I have learned to manage and live with my wolf. On the full moon I have to run, but, if someone tosses a juicy side of beef in front of me I am just as happy to not have had to kill it myself. I don’t mind bringing down my dinner, but raw meat tastes as good either way.

For a wolverine, killing is everything. They do not just kill to feed. They live to kill. For someone who voted for every Republican from Eisenhower to McCain, who thought Sarah Paulin was a “fire cracker” and who felt the country’s problems would be solved if we only had a balanced budget and a wall to keep out the Mexicans, being welded for life to a cold killer must have sometimes been terrifying. My mother was at heart a very conventional woman who had spent most of her life being a monster.

Quint was definitely her favorite. First, he was a son, and she preferred sons. Sons were not a threat, and since my mother always was more comfortable with men than with other women, she felt she knew what to do with a son. I confused her, perhaps because we were too much alike and yet not enough alike. I liked dolls, wore makeup, swooned around the house singing love songs, wanted to be a dancer, wrote in my diary and wept at sad movies. These were girly things which she did not understand. She had either never been tempted to be a girly girl or her wolverine soul wouldn’t let her. My mother was intensely female, but despised the feminine. I painted my room, my nails and my life in shades of pink.

And yet that bass drummer disappeared. Mother was a puzzle to me and still is.

Quint always knew what he wanted to do. He might have been confused about what he was but he knew who he was. Quint was a poet who made music. He suffered, sulked, brooded, bought an ocean full of Clearasil, ran furry once a month, swooned over androgynous English pop stars, painted his nails black and bought size fifteen track shoes, drank Jack Daniels in public, diet green ice tea at home, but everything he was or wanted to be or was afraid to become became part of his song.

My mother, the wolverine, complained endlessly about her predator poet son. She snarled whenever she saw him writing some scrap of a lyric in a notebook he always carried. Once she even burned his guitar. (He did not speak with her for six months. Since he was still her favorite she let him live.)

My mother, the woman who had once dreamed about riding a camel with Richard Halliburton, haunting Marseille with the Comte of Monte Cristo and dancing on a Paris street corner with Gene Kelly, privately listened to Quint’s songs with a tenderness he never knew, and a love reserved only for him.

I had no clear idea about who I was, what I wanted to be, or how to go about getting there. I knew I was werewolf, I knew one day I would have to kill my mother, and I knew I was going to leave home as soon as I possibly could. Meanwhile I spent very little time at home, kept my bedroom door locked, and finally graduated from high school.

When I was sixteen my father took early retirement and for some inexplicable reason, at least to me, he and my mother decide to move to Vero Beach, Florida. They moved into one of those upscale, sprawling retirement communities where all the houses are spacious and bland and look the same, and built around innumerable cul- de- sacs with names like “Bluebird Circle” and “Spanish Drive” and everywhere there are swimming pools and spas with no one using them, and roads with no one on them and two eighteen hole golf courses wound their way around and through the property.

My parents had a three bedroom bungalow with two baths, a large living dining room, a deluxe kitchen and a screened in patio looking directly onto the 16th hole of one of the courses. It was filled with palm trees and perfect lawns, no fences, and no people to be seen except for the black and Mexican gardeners working silently along the road that meandered through the property. The entrances were gated so no visitor could just “drop by”, no Jehovah’s Witness could knock on your door, no girl scout could come selling cookies, and the only time you ever saw your neighbor was during casino night or Las Vegas night or Christmas Follies night at the club house.

While the suffocating civility of these grounds would seem at first thought, the last place one would ever find any Were, in fact they were ideal. Lots of grounds to run on, and no one played golf after 9pm, no noisy neighbors who might want to pop over with a casserole at the wrong time because that just was never done, and all social life restricted to a specific time and place, i.e.: the Club House, the center of all social life in Live Oak Gardens Estates.

Even with my Were nose I got lost leaving our house every time I drove out. I finally had to Change, and follow the scent as a wolf to learn the best method for exiting the estate on two feet or wheels. Of course when I was on four feet, it was much easier.

Mother quickly became a valued part of the Ladies’ Entertainment Committee where her dominant nature soon cowed a few aspirants and within the year she was elected chairman and my father was asked to join the Club Board. Dad loved golf and found the other fellows congenial. His low handicap and easy manner made him immediately popular and along with Mother, they were delighted with their new home.

My brother and I hated it.

To begin with, there were no one under fifty. Neither of us were all that social and preferred being by ourselves but it would have been nice to have one or two other teenagers we could snub on occasion. Instead everyone we saw was white. White hair, weirdly tanned white skin, white golf shirts, white athletic shoes, and pale khaki or blue shorts or slacks, male or female. And clearly the developers felt that the endless blue sky and sunny days of Florida would best be reflected in tan stucco houses, with light beige trim and white doors, walks and window trim. Inside our home, our walls were ivory, our wall to wall carpet was pale beige and the furniture which mother chose was a soft blonde wood with ivory cushions and a lot of glass table tops.

For two teenage werewolves suffering the angst and self-centered alienation of adolescence it was like going Goth on a Disney Cruise. Even we did not believe it.

I didn’t’ know what had happened to our mother. Previously she had banged with great enthusiasm on her piano, with the loud pedal in constant use, and now we had NPR 2 all day, every day. She had discarded the paintings which had hung on our walls up north, large loud pieces of indifferent talent but tremendous passion she admired and purchased over the years. Now our ivory walls had collages of shell fish drawings, sketches of sail boats, pieces of drift wood in acrylic, all mass produced and all screaming, “Nothing to see here, just walk on by, we do not offend.” My father had been a martini man and Mother hated alcohol in any form. Now Dad drank beer, a glass of white wine at dinner and mother had a pinkish, frothy thing every evening before the dinner hour.

It took me a while to realize her game plan. Mother was hiding in plain sight. I don’t know if Dad ever catch on, he truly loved golf and thought the Live Oak Garden Estates was as close to heaven as a good man was likely to find, this side of the grave. But mother had found a place where she had all the privacy she needed, a large, unchallenged territory since there were no other were wolverines within five hundred miles at least, acres to roam, and prey. And the school system was excellent.

The enormous development we lived in backed onto another development, even larger, which adjoined a third. A four lane county road fronted our property and from our gate for the next five miles in either direction, there was nothing to be seen but speeding cars, palm trees and grass. Vero Beach is development heaven and all the couples from Chicago, and Saskatoon and Des Moines who moved down to Vero Beach to play golf and die, wanted privacy, quiet and gates to keep out all the undesirables they had had to deal with back up north. And the easiest way of doing this was to wall off each development, disguise the walls with palm trees and azalea bushes and gate and secure their estates against all outsiders.

The drivers, with nothing else to do, and no place they needed to be, insisted on driving as fast and aggressively as possible to get wherever they thought they should go, so no one noticed a dark brown predator slipping along the sides of the road, over or under a wall, around a distracted guard and feasting on a possum, raccoon, coyote or family pet. My blood thirsty mother was in her element, and when some committee woman complained that her Fluffy had just disappeared and she was so afraid some alligator might be on the grounds and something should be done, mother just patted her hand and asked her whether they should serve mahi mahi or drum as the fish option for the monthly birthday dinner.

In fact, mother was rather judicious about devouring local pets. If she liked you, she generally left little Missy alone, unless little Missy had pissed her off by barking too often or just being obnoxious. She was judge, jury and executioner of the small dogs and pet cats in Live Oak Gardens Estate. Of course, outside of the estate, she showed no mercy.

Quint and I had a more difficult time remaining invisible. However there was a definite preference among the Vero Beach residents for large golden retrievers and huskies. Neither of us looked like a retriever and we both were much larger than a husky, but Vero Beach is not an inquisitive society. We could have been a husky- retriever cross if you throw in a little malamute and German shepherd, and we were careful to not parade around the grounds during the day. We rarely ran together and always late in the evening. So if someone spotted a very large dog slinking behind the cabanas at the pool, by the time they took a second look we were gone. Hunting was good for us as well. The area is still underdeveloped and deer is not hard to find. Rabbits and rats and other vermin also love golf course grass and grubs and so neither of us had to worry about taking out a neighbor’s Siamese or Pekinese.

I believe I disliked Vero Beach more than Quint. He was more concerned about his sexual preference and then, when he started running track, he discovered a group of friends who didn’t much care if he seemed weird at times, wore a Frieda Kahlo is the Goddess t-shirt, or named his car, Lorca. He was fast, he showed up, and he was basically a nice guy, funny, a good listener, and he always brought his guitar to parties. So Florida worked for Quint and when he finally took off for New York, he left happy.

I missed him but I was busy being a high school senior and having friends who, inexplicability, all adored my mother and loved to hang out at our house. My mother suffered Quint’s absence deeply but I believe she enjoyed having my friends hanging about, helping her in the kitchen, dropping by after school, talking to her the way they would never to their own mothers. She enjoyed the attention and the respect and god knows, she got little enough of both from me.

It is still strange to me to realize my mother is dead. For a lifetime she was the pivot around which I revolved. I pulled further away from her as I grew older, was terrified of ever getting within arms’ length, (Literally. I disliked hugging my mother, avoided physical contact whenever possible) but never detached and drifted away. She was a powerful mother.

As we both grew older our similarities compelled us both into a relationship based on mutual prejudices, passions and an inchoate need for each other’s love. This was best managed on weekly phone calls when we were safely thousands of miles apart.

Now that she is gone, (and I did not mourn her death) I am increasingly absorbed by her. I realize I am more like her than anyone else. Her best source of escape, reading, is mine as well. Her distrust of others I learned from her. In her case, it was concealed behind charm and confidence and coercion. In my case it has lead me to avoid claims on my feelings, and compelled me to constantly move, seek new homes, new friendships which I cannot nurture as I should.

Her insistence on being an individual, standing on her own, being seen, being recognized, being respected, is my primary goal. I am not as successful because I am less neurotic and suspect I do not deserve nor can gain recognition and respect. I still find myself alienated from my peers, insisting on being seen as someone different, someone special, some one of worth. And yet I am not worth much. The demands she made of life she was able to realize through her denial of reality. I am not as fortunate. I see my failings every day.

I want to be kind, and know I fail at every turn to be a good friend, to help, to justify my place in this time. She was confident she was worth her place on the planet and never sought justification. Friends liked her because she never doubted they should. I don’t trust friendships because I have a life long history of my failure. So we seem quite different and yet, I am a spoiled copy of my mother. I am learning how to live with that.

Looking back, I believe my mother never understood what to do with me. She may have loved me, but I will never know. But as my siblings expressed their esteem for her, accepted her view of life and then abandoned it when they were ready, she was aware I was the uncertain element in her world. She distrusted women and I was female. I followed her like a puppy when I was a child, fascinated with her success, her romance with herself, and her views on the world. This was flattering for a while, then she would slap me back if I presumed she loved me as much as she did herself. For years I would bounce back and then finally I didn’t. The line still held but it was no longer a rubber band, and I spent the rest of our relationship keeping my distance. I think it hurt her, but not too much. She was much nicer when I stayed far, far away.

I left home for university and never really returned.

My grades were decent, I had put in enough time on the school paper to become circulation manager, and I wrote well enough for the application essay so I won a partial scholarship to the state university. Like most other freshmen in my situation, having no direction and merely giddy to be away from home, I became an English major.

Say what you like about liberal arts leading to a degree in burger flipping, it is a good choice for late blooming teenagers who would rather not choose between the lady and the tiger. It gives them four years to keep both doors shut and have plenty of time to do the fun stuff, like argue all night about the meaning of life, have sex, read books they do not in any way comprehend, smoke pot and drink beer.

I loved college. Fortunately the university was in the middle of a large, heavily treed park, called the Endowment Lands, and it was easy for me to slip out of the dorm when necessary and run as wolf. If anyone noticed me sneaking around naked, they were likely in a state of undress themselves. Sex in the dorm involved cycling room-mates and left you open to a charge of slut (if you had a busy dance card) or made changing partners awkward if they happened to all live in the same dorm so there were few times the weather was so bad that sneaking out doors to “do it” was not the easier option.

After college I headed to New York, slept on Quint’s couch for a few months and then found a job, and apartment and started my adult life.

Quint had met Shelagh before I joined him and they looked as though they might be getting serious. I liked her and thought she was a great fit. She “got” him and even though I still had not found a place of my own, Quint asked Shelagh to move in. I suspect Shelagh may have actually asked Quint if she could, because he can be a bit slow when it comes to this sort of thing, but he was pleased and excited and as long she didn’t mind a younger sister hanging out I was happy for them both.

She was thin, graceful and did some modeling. Because she was African American and gorgeous she did well for a few years. She didn’t talk much and tended to be ironic in her outlook on life but she was never nasty, often funny, and much smarter than she first seemed. It is a misconception that models are dumb. Some are, but the really good ones are not. She had moved to New York from Orlando because she, too, had to get out of Florida and everyone told her she should be a model. Modeling was somewhat successful but the competition was fierce and, since she also had a BS in website design, she ended up working for one of the tech firms in Manhattan and making beaucoup money. And, the best of it was she could work out of their apartment.

Shelagh was never able to merge her expectations with New York’s realities. Quint, who was more of a romantic and less of a realistic, had fully integrated all the songs and dreams and the myths of the “big apple” with the 21st century truths he encountered every day. He pulled into his lives his own heroism, his friends, the culture he craved and managed to turn his life into a tale he would never tire of telling.

His New York was the setting for each day’s adventure. He rose every morning, slipped down to the deli on the corner and bought two coffees, 1 regular and one black, and two rolls with butter. When Shelagh rolled out of bed he handed her one of each and the front page of the Times. He knew better than to say more than “Hi” until she had finished the roll and half the coffee, and even then he usually waited for a sardonic comment about the all the news fit to print before he ventured a conversation.

“How did you sleep, what are your plans for the day, don’t forget we have that thing tonight,” were usually safe. Then he kissed her, grabbed his pack and slipped out the door. She knew as soon as the door shut he would revert to his usual bounding stride and happy grin as he headed out into the city to sample and savor the day. She would usually gather the rest of the paper, put on a pot of coffee, grab the invariable bag of Oreos and go back to bed. There was little outside that door she liked much. She had tried it, and it had not come up to scratch. The noise, the dirt, the traffic, the crush, the fucking energy and all the damn people were the worms in the Big Apple which had disappointed her when she arrived and irritated her whenever she had to deal with them, which was seldom.

Quint loved every minute, and he loved her. Since she knew she was not very lovable at the best of times, she found it amazing when she thought about it, which was also seldom. But then African pythons are solitary creatures and her werewolf husband gave her the space she needed to lie in the warm sun and ignore the city altogether.

I, on the other hand, as much as I enjoyed my new sister in law, felt for my sense of self-worth and even my own safety, I should move. So Shelagh helped me get a job in the same tech firm, in marketing, and I found a place in Queens I could afford. And for the first time in my life, I was completely alone. I loved it.

I am surprisingly domestic, both as a wolf and as a 21st Century woman. Perhaps it is the wolf in me that brings me such contentment when I am creating my den. I spend hours looking at a wall or window deciding the precise style of drape or paint color I want.

Do I want long curtains or shutters, blinds, or roman shades? I didn’t even know about roman shades until I started shopping online. I clicked through dozens of sites and thousands of pictures fascinated by all the possibilities. Then, in the ageless tradition of women, I asked a girlfriend what she thought. She had better ideas, I knew what colors made me happy, and eventually I had bamboo roman shades and long drapes covering my windows, a bright orange on one wall, softer colors on the others, rugs on the floors and color coordinated pillows everywhere. I spent hours just looking from corner to corner, soaking up the pleasure of my home.

I looked forward to laundry day, carefully sorting through all my clothes, sheets, towels and using my new washer and dryer to return them to pristine perfection. I got a thrill every time I changed the toilet paper in the paper holder coordinated with the towel holders and robe hook in my ensuite bathroom.

But above all, I loved to shop for groceries. This was the one task I always wanted to do in person, not online. I could spend hours walking up and down each aisle of my local Safeway, filling my buggy with the necessities and all the luxuries I wanted. If my hips did not need those gourmet tortilla chips or the right out of the oven bread pudding and cornbread, I believed they were needed by my soul. And with a half dozen bottles of white wine and a six pack of Sam Adams, the world had nothing more to offer than I had captured in plastic bags in the trunk of my SUV. The mighty hunter dragged home her kill and once it was in my home, put away in cupboards and frig, and I sat on my deck with the open bag of chips and a cold beer, I was content.

I also grew fat. As my soul expanded so did my thighs. Popular belief is the werewolf metabolism is sufficient to burn off any extra calories leaving all werewolves lean and fit, looking like Sports Illustrated bathing suit models. Such is the dream, but in reality, within six months of sucking up the suds and crunching on the pre and post dinner chips I was a chubby woman and a hefty wolf with sagging tits and jowls. So I got a dog. Dogs and werewolves do not always do well together. Dogs tend to recognize the danger of hanging around the den of a superior predator of the canine variety and they either become aggressive or submissive depending upon how their natural fear comes out. Neither choice makes for a particularly pleasant pet, nor since we don’t need a guard dog, (I mean really….why would we?) werewolves generally end up killing and eating the dog, living up to their pet’s expectation from the beginning.

There is one breed which does not mind sharing a werewolf’s den and that is the greyhound. Perhaps because they are an ancient breed themselves, perhaps because their instincts are directed toward racing, because they just don’t give a shit, most greyhounds, when moving into a werewolf’s house find the most comfortable couch, claim it and immediately fall asleep.

They don’t mind sharing couch, bed, meals, anything they can forage off the counter, so a détente between dog and greyhound quickly turns into a compatible and mutually satisfying relationship, respectful and affectionate. In some cases, when dog and wolf are opposite genders, it can get a little squirrelly but, frankly that is an exception and frowned on by both breeds.

Long and short, if you see a person walking a greyhound, odds are the person holding the leash is a werewolf or some kind of were. If you come across a loose greyhound running on a golf course or woods and it appears to be accompanied by some other large animal, leave immediately if you can and hope we have other prey in our sights. Whatever you do, do not run. We will hunt you down and eat you. Try to hide until you know we are a very long way away. Remember, they may call greyhounds “sighthounds” but they also have a keen sense of smell and we are both carnivores who love to hunt our dinner.

My greyhound, Ali Baba, preferred sleeping to much of anything else but, when I took him out for a run, in human form I could barely keep up. Of course he was a sprinter whereas I could run for miles but even walking, I was getting more exercise than sitting around drinking my daily half a six-pack and eating pizza.

I had been in New York for a few years when my father died, suddenly, peacefully, on the 16th hole, right outside our patio. Mother noticed him fall, was able to get to him in time to say good bye, and that was that. Of course Peter and Shelagh, who were now married, and I all come home for the funeral. They were clearly impatient to get back but I stayed. My job was tedious, I was tired of Manhattan, running in Central Park was getting crowded, there are a surprising number of Weres in NYC, and the west coast was tempting me.

I wondered if Mother would leave Vero Beach because she never enjoyed golf and the three bedrooms were not needed. I mean we only all showed up for funerals and there weren’t going to be many more of those. But she liked where she lived, agreed that she might considering moving to one of the smaller townhomes if one came up for sale, but she was “not about to move into some retirement community.” Actually she and Dad have lived in one for years, but Mother is as much of a home body as I am, and she had set down permanent roots.

I flew back to Queens, bought a car, packed up my stuff, put my dog in the back seat and took off for Seattle. Washington State has a great many wilderness areas, is a beautiful place to live, and is a good 5000 miles from Vero Beach. The time I had spent with mother convinced me that the two of us should always stay at least a state away from each other, and preferably, if we could live at opposite ends of the country, it would be a good thing. She was old but she was still and Alpha Wolverine and there is little more deadly than that. And I was a single Alpha Werewolf who found myself showing both claws and fangs when we got into those “what are your plans and when are you going to lose that weight?” discussions. If I had not left when I did, I still am certain we both would have changed and she would have killed me. I am good but she is better, and she does not feel remorse. Second thoughts are dangerous in fights to the death.

I have never had to kill a person, even a now and then person. I know how. I am a successful killer, but I just don’t have it in me, down deep, to be the monster I was born to be. Quint doesn’t either but he is not alpha, though Shelagh is, and they are a safe and balanced couple with a great marriage.

I know many very nice people, people who are civilized, have friends and are considered to be good folk whom, if you dig a bit deeper, have at their core rage, and sometimes hate. Hate they have carefully corralled into a certain sarcastic disdain, strong moral judgement, and politically correct outrage.

I admire them, in the main, because there is so much to hate in this world and I believe their outrage is not only justified but deserved.

But, when I am in my cups, when I let down the curtain and look at all the stuff going on around me, the fat ladies, the men wearing socks and sandals, the obnoxious children, the stupid politicians, the inane conversation, I feel love.

So I got a good job in Seattle, marketing again. Marketing is the fallback career for English majors who know they have a great book in them, if they ever have an idea of what to write. I had a couple of long term affairs, nothing deep, and took up hiking to enjoy the woods and lose weight.

I called Mother every Sunday, and we had great talks. She filled me in on Quint, the neighbors, her community activities and I told her about my work, my life and how much I loved the Pacific Northwest. She visited me once or twice and left before the increasing tension led to blood. I guess this was the best relationship either of us had with the other

And then one Sunday she didn’t answer the phone. I called a couple of times, and again the next day. Finally I called the neighbor, and asked them to check. Her car was in the garage but she did not answer the door. Wednesday I flew home. I still had my key, and when I opened the door I knew. Mother might have been the only wolverine in Florida but not the only Were. And someone had come hunting. The place was tidy, but the stink of Grizzly Bear permeated the house, female bear.

She must have been formally challenged because they had not fought in the house. She and the bear must have gone in the surrounding woods, both in human form, and changed. I scoured the area, as woman ad wolf, and I found their tracks. And deep inside the woods I found the spot where she died. They fought in a small clearing by a branch of a bayou, and mother died. There was no body. I suspect a gator took her, but she would have been dead then. There was a lot of blood, too much of hers for her to live, but a lot of bear as well.

She had left her sweater on a tree branch, the one I had given her the previous Christmas, cashmere. I took it with me.

I returned to her home, gathered a few pictures of Quint, my father and me, with pictures with her, Christmas snaps with Santa Claus, one I didn’t know she had, of Quint playing his guitar in the garage, and one of the two of us as wolves, asleep under a tree in our old back yard. I put her clothes in a couple of suitcases to drop off at the Salvation Army, left her key under the mat and left. Since there was no body her disappearance would be considered suspicious and I preferred being gone before the neighbors brought in the police. As I headed down the road toward the gate I saw a large woman standing, staring at me. I stopped the car and rolled down the window. She limped up to car and looked in at me.

“I met your mother” she said.

“You killed her.”

“She ate my cat. And besides, she pissed me off.”

“I can imagine.”

“Until then I liked her, but the fucking bitch challenged me. I’m a Kodiak, for fuck sake.”

“Sounds like Mom.”

“Well, sorry. No hard feelings, eh?”

“Fuck you,” I said and rolled up the window and drove out the gate.

I called Quint and told him what happened. He wasn’t that surprised. Apparently Mom had told him about the Grizzly Sow who was too uppity for her own good. Since there was no body, there would be no funeral. I promised to send him copies of the pictures I'd taken, told him I loved him and sent off for the airport for the flight back to Seattle.

I miss her.

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