Actually my boat is relatively small, even though I was told as a child that I should not be afraid of anything because my mother was afraid of everything. I felt like an adult from the day I was born. I honestly believed that some of us are born full grown. We are the special ones, we know to keep our napkins in our laps, to use big words and how to shadow all the grown ups in our lives to be really helpful. ‘Mother’s little helper’ was the grandest of praise! Me along side my mother baking eight kinds of Christmas cookies—all to perfection—until my mother’s ‘back’ gave out and sent her to bed, never to recover. Instead, she would die eighteen months later. I never made the connection between her death and her perfectionism until now. How driven she was to always ‘look’ so good to the outside world, many times at my expense. My father and I got used to staying clear of her right before a dinner party when she was entertaining. A tantrum would ensue with slamming doors and fits of hysteria at one or the other of us. Her little helper was watching, and learning.
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