Birdie
“Birdie, my darling.”
“Hi, Mawmaw,” I said into the phone, a big smile on my face. I absolutely adored my grandmother, and she was the person I missed the most living in San Francisco. I could picture her astute blue eyes, her big white hair, and the huge diamond rock on her finger.
“Birdie, your mother tells me that you might not be coming home for my anniversary celebration.”
“Mawmaw, I’m going to try, but you know how it is for a working woman,” I paused. “Well, you know.” I didn’t really know what to say. Mawmaw had never worked, and in fact, she thought it was abhorrent that any woman should work. She was still of the mindset that women should get married and be homemakers, and even though she knew that wasn’t what I wanted from life, she didn’t care.
“Birdie, you are my favorite granddaughter, and it would make me so happy to have you back home.”
“I know, Mawmaw. I’m really going to try, okay?”
“Well, when will you know?”
“I guess in the next week or so?” I chewed on my lower lip. I didn’t really want to go back home, even though I knew that it was my duty. “I’m going to try my best. Okay?”
“Okay, darling. I know that you will. Now, how’s it going in that big city over there? I hope you don’t come across too many criminals in the streets?”
“Mawmaw, how many criminals do you think there are in San Francisco?” I paused. “I mean, yes. There’s crime, but it’s safe. I’m safe. I’m okay.”
“Well, you know, your father was telling me that there were a lot of homeless people and a lot of drug addicts, and I would rather you weren’t around those sorts of people, you know?”
“Mawmaw, I’m not around any drug addicts. Yes, I do see homeless people on the street, but honestly, I mean, I feel bad. I wish there were more that I could do, you know?”
“I know. You always did have the most beautiful heart, Birdie.”
“Well, obviously my heart is not that beautiful because I haven’t really been able to do anything for them. I mean, I just wish I had more opportunity and capability, and I guess more money. I can barely afford to give people $5.”
“Well, if you came back home and—”
“Mawmaw, you know that’s not going to happen.”
“I know,” she said with a deep sigh. “So, what’s this I hear about the young Beauregard boy going to San Francisco now?”
“Sorry, what?” I pretended to be ignorant.
“That boy that you dated. What was his name again?”
“Which one, Mawmaw?”
“Don’t be facetious, now, Birdie, it doesn’t become you. Hunter, yes. That was his name. Hunter Augustus Beauregard III. What a poncy name.”
“Mawmaw,” I laughed. “I thought you loved him.”
“He was okay. But I hear he’s going to be in San Francisco?”
“Yeah. He’s going to be in San Francisco.”
“Are you going to meet up with him?”
“Oh, no way. You know I can’t stand him after what he did to me.”
”Yes. He was rather an immature chap, wasn’t he?”
“Mawmaw. Why do you sound like a British aristocrat all of a sudden?” I started laughing. “What’s going on?”
“Darling, I have been in the company of three of the queen’s cousins in the last couple of weeks, and I guess their accents have sort of rubbed off on me, so to speak.”
“What are you doing hanging out with the queen’s cousins? Like, her first cousins?”
“Well, no, not her first cousins, darling, her first cousins wouldn’t be in Bluffton. They’re … I think quite distant cousins, maybe third or fourth. I’d have to ask, but they are members of the royal family, however distant. And you know, I am a bit of an Anglophile.”
“Oh, my gosh, Mawmaw, really? Do Mom and Dad know that you’re talking like that?”
“Well, I don’t talk to them like that, do I, dear?” She started laughing.
“Oh, you are so eccentric. I love you, Mawmaw. I miss you so much.”
“I love you too, Birdie, and that’s why you must come home for this anniversary, or it’s going to be a really big bore and you know your mother and your father will drive me absolutely crazy.”
“I’ll see.”
“I mean, it doesn’t have anything to do with that Beauregard boy, does it?”
“No, of course not.”
“Well, then why aren’t you coming home?”
“I told you—my job.”
“Every job gives people at least a couple of days off. You can’t tell me that they won’t give you time off to come to your favorite grandma’s anniversary.”
“I’ll see what I can do.”
“And also, Birdie?”
“Yes, Mawmaw?”
“See that Hunter boy, give him another chance.”
“What? You just told me you didn’t like him.”
“I know how you felt about him, and you know, I think that with time, he may have matured.”
“Mawmaw, Hunter is never going to mature. If you saw the emails he sent me last week, you would realize he is nowhere close to being mature.”
“Oh, so you’re emailing back and forth, are you?”
“No, we’re not emailing back and forth. He sent me an email and I responded, and he sent me another email. And let’s just say I’m so over him, he is completely inappropriate. If you saw what he wrote, you would not like him.”
“Oh, but you know, boys will be boys, Birdie. Boys take much longer to mature than women do.”
“I guess, but we can’t make excuses for them. I’m not going to accept that behavior. He treated me very poorly and—”
“Birdie, you love the boy. I saw you together.”
“I loved him when I was in high school and I didn’t know any better. Now I’m a grown woman and I have really good friends who are in really good relationships with really good guys, and I see how those guys treat them. And you know what? It is head and shoulders above how Hunter used to treat me. There’s no way I would ever go back to that sort of crappy relationship again.”
“Oh, well you do sound quite heated, my dear.” She paused. “I take it that you’re not dating anyone else?”
“I’m going on dates here and there. Do I have a new boyfriend? No, but—”
“Oh, Birdie, you know, you‘re not getting any younger. I wish—”
“Mawmaw, I’m not going to marry someone just because you think I’m getting old, and I’m not going to pop out a bunch of kids for some random guy. You know that’s not who I am.”
“Would I ever ask you to do that, Birdie? Who’s the one that gave you the $5,000 so that you could make the move to San Francisco in the first place?”
“I know, Mawmaw, and I thank you. That was amazing and I love you, and I want you to know that I am prospering here. I am being the woman you want me to be, just not in the way you want me to be.”
“Oh, Birdie,” she sighed, “you know that I love you, and I want you to live your life. And I mean, I know Bluffton, South Carolina, isn’t the whole world, but it is a pretty darn great part of the world. After you sow your wild oats in the wild, wild west, I do hope you’ll come home.”
“Grandma,” I started laughing. “California is not the wild, wild west, and San Francisco is—”
“Oh, Birdie, it’s full of heathens and hippies and liberals and God only knows who else.”
“Mawmaw!”
“What?” she laughed. “You can’t forgive your old grandma?”
“Of course I can forgive you, Mawmaw, but I’m one of those liberal hippies as well.”
“You’re not a liberal and you’re not a hippy.” Her voice was firm.
“Grandma, I—”
“Birdie,” she said in her no-nonsense voice.
“Yes, Mawmaw, whatever you say I am, I am,” I said, with a small smile. There were some things you didn’t bother wasting your time arguing about when it was your beloved grandma. “But I do have some news, Mawmaw.”
“Oh, what’s that?”
“I’m actually going to be meeting up with Nellie Beauregard for lunch tomorrow.”
“Oh, Hunter’s little sister?” There was a smile in her voice.
“Yes, Hunter’s little sister.”
“And Hunter’s not going to be there?”
“No, he better not be. If he’s there, I’m going to …”
“You’re going to what, my dear?”
“Nothing. Nellie knows I don’t want to see her brother, but it will be really nice to see her. I’ve missed her. She was like a little sister to me, and when Hunter and I broke up, well, I really regret that I wasn’t able to keep my relationship with her.”
“I’m sure she understands.”
“Yeah, so it will be nice to see her and catch up.”
“Yes, my dear, and you know, you might as well see how Hunter’s doing as well.”
“Mawmaw! I’m not going to see how Hunter’s doing. I don’t care how he’s doing. He can jump off the Bay Bridge for all I care.”
“Well, now, Birdie, that’s not a very nice thing to say, is it?”
“Well, he’s not a very nice person, and I don’t think that I have to be nice—”
“Birdie,” she cut me off. “Don’t get emotional. What have I always told you?”
“Let me think. Never wear red nail polish because I’ll look like a whore?”
“Well, yes, there’s that as well.”
“Never wear ankle bracelets for the same reason?”
“They’re so tacky, dear.”
“I don’t know. What else have you told me, Mawmaw?”
“I always told you never let them see you sweat. Remember, dear, never get angry. Never raise your voice. Never look annoyed. If they think they haven’t affected you, then you’re winning. Remember that dear. We’re winning if they don’t affect you.”
“Okay, Mawmaw. I love you. I’ll speak to you later, okay?”
“I love you too, Birdie. Come home and make an old woman happy?”
“I’ll try my best, Mawmaw. I promise.”
And as I hung up the phone, I knew I was going to have to go home. There was no way I wanted to disappoint the most important person in my life.