Write about predictability.

January 8, 1977
Ethel, with her death grip on my arm

Ethel's opiate is attention. She is adept at manipulating an entire room of people until she is at the absolute center. She joins every women's group, worms her way onto the board with her exceptional 160 wpm shorthand skills -- starting as secretary she soon rises through the ranks to president. If there is a committee to be formed and chaired, she's does it. If there is a cause to be taken up, she takes it. If there are sweets to be baked, she bakes them. Anything to be noticed, to be approved, to be "lovely" in the eyes of the community.

Ethel's addiction for attention came at a price, as high as if she were actually taking out a needle, filling it with a 7% solution, and injecting it into her veins -- she was as ruthless, demanding, irrational, moody as any junkie. As her daughter, the one loathed and resented, her behavior was as fierce as any retribution of Mother Nature and as predictable as the rotation of the earth's orbs, the coming of the seasons, the swell of the tides.

It was the last 1960's. Life in Southern California was simultaneously idyllic and unpleasant. Diamond Bar was a bedroom community of Los Angeles. Rolling hills, miles from any freeway access, were gently carved to preserve their natural grace and beauty and to build cookie cutter homes in five sprawling neighborhoods. Ethel's castle was the largest model in the nicest track of the Deane Homes development, a two story colonial of more than 2,200 square feet, pearched atop the highest peak of the Diamond Point development, purchased brand-spanking new in the spring of 1965. The neighborhood of 656 properties was filled with young families, hundreds of children, and mothers who stayed home to keep house, have bridge parties, and participate in the activities of the Diamond Point Women's Club and the Diamond Bar Women's Club. Right out of the pages of Better Homes and Gardens, for which two of the models had won awards in the prestigous Better Homes and Gardens 1965 Better Homes for All American Program.

I was eight years old, in the middle of 4th grade, when we moved from a lushly landscaped ranch-style home with a split-level back yard that included a small orchard and garden in the hills of Sierra Madre to the barren, clay of Diamond Point. Within a few years my father's green thumb and hobby for landscaping and building, and turned our yard into one of the most beautiful in the neighborhood, and Ethel had made herself a fixture in the community and had worked her way to the presidency of the Diamond Point Women's Club.

Adopted at six months from the arms of an unwed, uneducated 18-year-old on welfare, I did not possess Ethel's darting cow-brown eyes, board-straight hair, large Jewish nose, and short, stubby stature. I was long-legged with curled locks, blue-eyed with long, thick lashes. I captured the attention of men and photographers because of my uncanny resemblance to Shirley Temple. The first time I was photographed and appeared in the paper, I was in nursery school.

Ethel was not an attractive woman. In fact, her resemblance to Queen Elizabeth II is uncanny, although whereas the Queen has a hint of loveliness, Ethel has a hint of homeliness. I don't remember exactly when I understood that Ethel despised me; I've understood it for long it is ingrained in me. I was held responsible for her moods, for the way strangers, aquantances, and good friends perceived her. Ethel concerned herself more with how others thought of her than how her children thought of her.

Every year the Diamond Point Club held a mother daughter luncheon the Saturday before Mother's Day. Mothers and daughters dressed in their Sunday best and sat at tables decorated with flowers, which would later be carried home by lucky raffle ticket holders. In the front of the room was a stack of prizes, donated by local businesses. In the late 1960's, the door prizes were huge, and could include televisions, stereos, and cruises. I always went home with something, but never anything of any significance. The Mother's Day celebration also included a letter-writing competition -- and the Mother of the Year title went to the mother whose daughter had written the most convincing letter of adoration.

Ethel and I did not get along. I knew she despised me. I saw it in her eyes, I experienced it in her behavior, I felt it in the tone of voice with which she addressed me, I cringed at the endless reprimands that I had "humiliated" or "embarrassed" her in public. In kind, I loathed and despised Ethel. And it all came to head one Saturday before Mother's Day at the Diamond Point Clubhouse annual Mother-Daughter Luncheon when the Luncheon Committee initiated the "Mother of the Year" award.

The first year the award went to a mother and daughter who lived just 10 houses, but a world away from me. A Catholic family, whose children attend private Catholic schools, I knew who the girl my age was, but had very little contact with her. As her letter was read aloud over the crackling microphone, mother and daughter embraced and looked lovingly into each other's eyes. "Talking with mother," read the chair of the committee to pick the best letter, "is like looking into a mirror. I see eyes that reflect back at me with love and compassion. I see a face I can trust. I see my best friend."

I remember being floored, and if a 12-year-old's mouth can drop, then my was most certainly to the floor. I could not fathom her words. Like looking into a mirror!? I looked at the woman who had adopted me and visualized the wicked step-mother in Snow White glaring back at me. I stared in disbelief as tears formed in both their eyes, and the room roared with applause as mother and daughter rose to walk arm in arm to receive the plaque, potted plant, and local restaurant gift certificate that was the prize for their incredible relationship.

I knew Ethel wanted to make eye contact with me; I could feel her gaze burning on my right cheek. I purposely ignored her, fixing my eyes on the award and its recipients. Every cell in my body knew what was coming next -- it was as predictable as the clubhouse pool filled with children yelling "Marco Polo" on the sweltering hot days of summer. Ethel wanted that prize, and she would depend on me to deliver.

I don't remember exactly what year it was, only that I was probably around 11 to 12 years old. Ethel brought me the flyer announcing the Mother-Daughter Luncheon and the "Mother of the Year" contest. The deadline for submitting my letter was established; the expectation that my letter would win the coveted prize was laid down.

As I sat at my maple desk and stared out the window above me, I could not locate even a modicum of affection for this woman. Physical and emotional abuse in my home were rampant. Ethel was so jealous of my curly locks, she kept them shorn like a boy's. She made all of my clothes -- nothing stylish or pretty. I was overweight. I was the kid that everyone bullied. I was the "ugly" kid whose mother "dresses you funny." I sat at my desk, haunted by the words of the previous year's winning letter, crippled by an incomprehension of that type of connection between a mother and a daughter, and detesting the monster who was forcing me to create a lie to make her look good in front of of her friends.

Night after night I was questioned at the dinner table about my letter. I stayed the inquisition initially by claiming I wanted to keep the contents a secret so that my mother would be surprised.

However, she who raised me "investigated" by calling the Mother-Daughter luncheon chair and determined I had not submitted my letter. The deadline was less than a week away, and I had been caught in a lie. I was punished, beaten, grounded, and had privileges taken away, first for lying, and second for humiliating Ethel in front of her friend (the chair of the luncheon). There were only a few days left before the deadline, and I had better write that letter or suffer the consequences.

The lined notebook paper before me taunted me. My fingers gripped my yellow pencil. I cold not think of one thing to write. Finally, I decided to plagiarize what I'd heard the year before. It was the biggest pile of bullshit I'd ever created in my life, but I piled it on until I stunk.

The next day Ethel drove me the long mile down steep hills to the Diamond Point clubhouse, and while she kept the care idling in the clubhouse's horseshoe driveway, I walked up to the front desk window and slipped my envelope through the arched hole in the glass, and submitted my letter. There was no joy in my heart as I returned to the car and slunk into the car next to Ethel. There was no excitement at the possibility of winning. There was only relief that tonight I would not get screamed at and beaten for humiliating Ethel.

My letter did not win Ethel the "Mother of the Year Award," but she did come in second place. It didn't matter -- she's gotten something! My letter was read aloud, and faces turned and looked at us, filled with broad smiles and gentle eyes. No one seemed to notice my plagiarism. No one seemed to notice the indents in my arm as I leaned my body and pulled away from Ethel's gripping embrace. No one seemed to notice there were no tears of emotion in my eyes as I rose with Ethel to claim our prize. Ethel beamed, looked proudly at her friends, sang my praises. No one seemed to be able to see to the abuse that lay behind the lies. It was all so predictable.