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| No. 7 |
Fall 2004 |
Michelle McEwan
All I Know About My Aunt Philomena
I remember my Aunt Philomena, I do, with her big hoop earrings, big hair and big hands. Her hoops were always the biggest, and the silver-est, and the shiniest, too. They touched her shoulders and swung when she talked, especially when she cursed. She told me once how she would keep on those hoops even when she and Harvey did it. "Oh," she said, "Harvey loves when the sunlight hits the hoops just so!"
My mother hated, though, for me to talk to Philomena and she often said that Philomena had no business telling me about the business she should have been handling in a place of her own. So, while Philomena stayed with us, my mother tried to make it so that Philomena (and her many, many men and her tales about those men) stayed in the back of the house -- the part of the house my mother had fixed up just for my Aunt Philomena. This is where I should tell you: Philomena isn't really my aunt; I just call her that because she thought I should and because we look quite alike ("It's as though I birthed you myself," Philomena used to say to me). Also, I should tell you: Philomena's an old girlfriend of my father's. She's the one who snatched my father from right under my mother's nose. My father ran off shortly after meeting Philomena, and took up with her in her place at first; then they got a small house together two towns over. Later on, though, my father kicked Philomena out for -- as my mother says -- fussing around with other men. And where do you think Philomena came when she was thrown out in the middle of winter? She came here, begged my mother to let her stay until she got her act together. Of course, my mother let her stay; this way she could keep an eye on Philomena.
We got close right away, Philomena and I. It was Philomena who, upon seeing an old photo of me, suggested I call her Aunt Philomena. "It looks like we could be blood, sure does," she said, and I agreed. She even brushed her hair back so that it looked like my hair. "See," she had said, "we could be twins!" I fell in love with her that day, I did! I even clasped my arms around her waist and exclaimed: "I can see why my daddy loved you!"
***
All the while Philomena lived with us, she never stayed in her part of the house for too long because she loved to cook and eat and there was no kitchen on her end of the house. Philomena talked the most when she cooked. Often, while she seasoned and buttered and stuffed and fried and stirred, she would tell me about her men; her Harvey, her Hector, her Andrew, Ernie, Harry One and Harry Two, plus Leo (who is my father) and Abraham. I remember all of Philomena's men, I do, all of them with their tiny waists, wide shoulders, and stuffed wallets. Abraham had the tiniest waist of them all. He wore his belt cinched tightly to keep his pants up and he would wear an extra long shirt to cover up that cinched belt. He never tucked in his shirts, even the button-down ones, and because of this he looked as though he was always in a constant state of undressing. Abraham didn't last too long, though, because Philomena caught him kissing on my mother's neck while she (my mother) stood at the sink washing dishes."What do you think you're doing," Philomena said to my mother, and I knew she was talking to my mother because Abraham, at the sound of Philomena's voice, ran off as fast as he could. And that was the end of Abraham.
"That fool better not come back here!" Philomena warned my mother.
"You didn't care about him no how," my mother said. She turned to face Philomena and she shooed me away with her wet and soapy hands (but I didn't move). She said, "Philomena, you know you couldn't care less about that man!" My mother then shook dry her wet and soapy hands right in Philomena's face. But that was not true what my mother said about Philomena: Philomena did care for all of her men -- she did -- but Harvey was the one she loved most of all. She told me about her love for Harvey once while she and I snapped string beans at the kitchen table.
"I love Harvey," she told me, "the way your mother loves your father and the way your father loves me."
And to that, I asked her why she hadn't loved my father enough to let the other men alone, including Harvey, and she said, "Because no one's better than Harvey, not even your father; especially not your father! Leo couldn't stand it when I talked about Harvey." She smiled and snap-snap went our string beans. She added: "When Harvey stops playing around, then I will, too!"
"What if Harvey doesn't ever stop playing around? Won't you move on then?" I said, remembering the way Harvey -- when Philomena would bring me around him -- always acted as though he had better things to do. I remember thinking (the first time I met him): Why, Harvey doesn't love Philomena at all!
"Won't you move on then," I said again when Philomena chose to snap her string beans louder than ever rather than answer me. "Won't you move on then, Philomena," I asked yet again and you should have seen how big her eyes got!
"Move on," she said, "humph, move on! You don't know me at all then!" She threw a handful of string beans at the wall. "Oh, if it were as simple as that!" she said and stormed out of the house. I just drew up my shoulders and laughed, thankful I hadn't asked her my next question: "Well, what if Harvey gets married?" If I would've asked that, Philomena, no doubt, would have thrown me at the wall.
***
"I don't know what made Leo fall for Philomena -- with those big earrings of hers ripping her earlobes, disgusting! And she's crazy, too, that Philomena, always throwing something!" My mother said this to me on the day that would eventually become Philomena's last day staying at our house. At the exact moment my mother said this to me, Philomena waltzed into the house with a basket full of just-washed clothes. Philomena heard: "She's crazy, too, that Philomena." And that made Philomena so mad.She bit her lip to keep from screaming; she stamped her feet; she said, "No, you're the crazy one." Philomena then set her basket full of clothes on top of the oven.
I wanted to jump in and say, "You all are both crazy!" but I didn't say a thing and so Philomena carried on:
"Leo used to tell me about all the crazy things you did, hiding money all over the house. For what! You should have used it on some new clothes! Leo took what you had hiding in the pantry and got me this dress!" Philomena pulled from the laundry basket a yellow dress with white polka dots -- the very dress my mother loved and wanted to swipe from Philomena's closet.
"Okay, Philomena," my mother said through clenched teeth, "where are you going to stay tonight, 'cause it won't be here!" That's when my mother snatched up that laundry basket and in no time, Philomena's clean clothes were all over the kitchen floor. My mother poured buttermilk all over those clothes, too.
"Oh, you won't put me out because you know Leo would take me back just like that! All I have to do is show up on his step . . . " Philomena said, and she was right; though not about my mother not putting her out, but about Leo (my father) taking her back. He would take her back.
"If she knows daddy will take her back, why won't she go back to him?" I had asked my mother this once while Philomena was fast asleep on her end of the house.
"I believe she's scared of your father; Leo is a jealous fool when it comes to her," my mother said and then she ran upstairs; I never heard anyone cry so loud!
My father really did love Philomena. I saw the letters he mailed here for her (yes, he knew she lived here with us, but he never came by because he was scared of my mother; he knew that if he would've set foot on our porch, my mother would have strangled him! And she would've used Philomena as the rope, too!). In one letter, he wrote: 'I want you back, Mena.' Then there was that letter Philomena left out on the windowsill so my mother could catch a glimpse of it. That letter had: 'Philomena I'm so lonely I could die . . . It's rotten, the things you do to me Mena, but I want you here.' Poor Father, I thought after I read that letter; but then again: what about Poor Mama? Poor, poor mama who did put Philomena out.
"Get out of my house dirty girl and run along to that fool," my mother said to Philomena later that day after she had re-washed Philomena's buttermilked clothes and packed them all up. And after she had all of Philomena's suitcases lined up in a neat row on the porch, she said, "Go on Mena. Leo knows you're coming. The cab will be by shortly." And that was the end of Philomena's stay at our house.
But before she left, Philomena cupped my chin in her hand and said, "I'm your friend, you're my friend. We friends. Let's stay friends, okay, Little Philomena." Sometimes she called me Little Philomena or Little Mena. "If you need me, Little Mena," she said, "I'll be at your father's for the time being."
"Take care," is all I said to her and I meant it, too. I loved Philomena because my father did. I still do love her, but I haven't seen or heard from her since she left; since she shoved her head and hand out of that cab's window and waved to me until the cab was out of sight. I tried calling her once at my father's place, but when I called he answered and said, "Mena, that you?"
What a shame! And what a mess she made of my father! He's in jail now for trying to kill Philomena, it's true. I don't know where Philomena is, though there is one thing I know for sure about Philomena: she isn't with Harvey. I saw Harvey once at Rusnak's Grocery Shop and he was hand-&-hand with a mighty pregnant girl.
He said to me: "How's Philomena, have you heard from her?"
"Naw," I said, "have you?" Harvey shook his head and walked off. I shook my head, too, and thought: Poor Philomena!
Copyright 2004, Michelle McEwan nidus is an online publication supported by the Writing
Program
at the University of Pittsburgh's English
Department.