Plantation (Continued)
What I found on arrival was exactly what I expected. Mother was playing cards with her girlfriends and talking about men. Millie, Mother's estate manager and friend of a zillion years, was still up to her same old voodoo. Trip was drunk as usual, Frances Mae was pregnant as usual and still turning over the silver looking for hallmarks with her green eyes. And, their girls were still full of all the antics of every devil in hell. Everything seemed normal. It was.
I thought it was my mission to open Mother's eyes to Trip's intentions. To make her see that she needed to take it down a notch or two. Surprise, suprise. I was the one, not Mother, who was about to have her eyes opened. It was my complete sense of who I thought I was that would be wrung out to dry. Most importantly, I was to discover who we all truly were.
Over the years, as much as I would vehemently deny my passions for ACE Basin of South Carolina, its pull on me was an all powerful force. The ACE was Eden. It's where the Ashepoo, Combahee and Edisto Rivers joined at St. Helena's Sound. The ACE was home to more species of birds, fish, flowers and shrubs than you could name. Every inch of it wiggled in song; its beauty was stupefying.
No, once the ACE had you under its spell, you were hers for life. You could turn me around, blindfolded in the handbag department of Bergdorf Goodman on Fifth Avenue and I could point my finger to the Edisto River the same way a compass needle always points north. I was nothing more than an extension of her waters. A displaced tributary.
And, tonight we were all here in the Bagnal Funeral Home in Walterboro with Mother's body. There must have been three hundred people to come and go over the hours that I sat with Trip, Frances Mae, Millie and Mother's closest friends.
People told stories of Mother's crazy theme parties which celebrated Cleopatra's birthday or some little know Aztec holiday. There was the time she dressed herself as a goddess and floated down the Edisto on our pontoon - decorated with billowing white bunting - to celebrate the Birth of Venus. Trip and I were youngsters at the time and humiliated beyond words. I hated her then.
After Daddy died, Trip and I were parceled off to boarding schools, then came the parade of lovers. She was quiet about her relationships at first, but once she was comfortable with her new way of living, the tempo quickened and the fireworks began. It was then Mother discovered Rod McKeun poetry and found her G-Spot in an article in Cosmopolitan Magazine. There was no stopping her. Back then I despised her flamboyance with every part of me.
Lately, I had completely changed my mind. If Mother was shockingly indiscreet, so what? Everyone adored her. You had to admit that she enjoyed her liberation. She was Miss Lavinia, The ACE Basin version of Auntie Mame. What a gal!
Click here to find this book at your nearest independent bookstore.
