The Magnolia Chronicles: Adventures in Modern Dating
Kate Canterbary
To all the women waiting for the world to evolve around them.
Prologue
"There's something I'd like to discuss with you, Magnolia Lynn."
I watched my mother, waiting for some clue into the first-and-middle-name treatment. She reserved it for only three occasions:
Big Trouble. Even at thirty-four years old, I was subject to my mother's expectations. These days, it took the form of forgetting to call one of my seventeen aunts on her birthday, leaving the house with any part of my underwear visible, or walking my dog after nine o'clock at night. Per my mother, it was the witching hour for rapists and serial killers.
Big News. This often involved reporting on the health issues of people I barely knew. My Sunday School teacher's nephew was diagnosed with Lyme, our old neighbor—the one from the apartment building we'd lived in when I was an infant—lost his glass eye again, my uncle Carl's sister-in-law had a suspicious mole and she was going in for a procedure, my father's second cousin in Philadelphia was cutting back on red meat on account of the gout. That type of news.
Big Asks. These were few and far between, due primarily to my mother keeping up with an I can do it all complex. That mindset made me sound like a mom-shaming monster but the truth was my mother asked for help once every leap year.
She would've mentioned any news on the car ride from my parents' home in New Bedford to Providence, the location of our annual post-Christmas, pre-New-Year's spa day. She would've disciplined me then too. This was an ask, one she'd waited to drop on me until we were swaddled in plush robes and kicked back in a dimly lit Zen room with cucumber-scented water in hand.
And it was a big ask. It had to be. There was no other reason for her to fixate on smoothing her robe and avoid my expectant gaze.
"What's that, Diana Leonore?"
She dragged the robe's belt between her fingers, repeatedly straightening it and rolling it into a cinnamon roll spiral. Still avoiding me. Then, "I've been thinking about my New Year's resolutions. Have you given any consideration into your resolutions?"
It was a good thing she was obsessed with her robe because I couldn't have repressed my eyeroll for anything.
I loved my mother. I did. If I didn't have a fond, affectionate, accepting spot in my soul for my mother and all her quirks, I wouldn't put up with her criticism of exposed bra straps and post-sunset dog walking. I'd skip all the girls' days spent at spas, nail salons, and Boston-area malls too. But I loved my mother and I accepted these gestures as her unique way of returning that love.
However.
I didn't love my mother's lifelong self-improvement quest. Perhaps it wasn't lifelong to her but she'd openly expressed dissatisfaction with her body all of my life. To twist and tangle matters even more, my mother and I had the same bodies. Exact same, right down to the one eyebrow forever intent on colonizing the hairless gulf between brows.
Five foot six inches, dark chestnut hair with wonky, inconsistent waves, honey-hazel eyes, bodies straight out of a Botticelli painting. No amount of Pilates, low-carb dieting, or celery juice could banish our soft, round bellies or thick hips. They were part of us just like our button noses and plump, pale lips, and we couldn't hate them away.
We were generous.
We were handfuls.
We were full-figured.
And I was all right with that. It took me years—years—to realize it, but my body was strong and capable. This body was the only one I had to see me through this life and it was the right one for me.
My mother wasn't there yet. In all fairness, she'd also brought three babies into the world—at the same time. She'd carried me and my brothers all the way to thirty-six weeks and then we'd weighed in between four-and-a-half and six pounds each. That was no small feat and for that, I indulged her assortment of health kicks. I went along with her, if for no other reason than to remind her she was so much stronger and more capable than she gave herself credit for. Even if I rolled my eyes about it sometimes.
"I haven't thought about resolutions, no," I replied. "I take it you have some ideas."
"One or two," she murmured. "Nothing too wild."
I reached for the glass of water seated on the table beside me. "Since we're chatting," I started, pausing for a sip, "why don't you share them with me?"
She shifted in her chair, tucked the robe between her knees. Modesty, very important to my mother. It made no sense that she loved massages where she laid on a table, fully nude, while a stranger rubbed out her knots. But no one ever said mothers had to make sense.
"Please listen to what I have to say before you get defensive."
Okay. So, this is a really big ask.
I made a cross over my heart. "I will try my best."
My mother drew in a breath, held it a moment, and took my hand in hers. "It's been months since things ended with Peter and—"
"Oh my god," I murmured.
"—and years since the unpleasantness with that other boy. I won't say his name because my blood pressure can't handle it but—"
"Oh my god."
"—it's time for you to make yourself a priority, Mag."