“I made you a little hot chocolate.”
“Thanks, Mom.”
She hands me a cute mug that features a graphic of Michigan as a winter mitten, and I take a sip.
I nearly do a spit take. My eyes grow wide as saucers.
“What the hell is in this, Mother?”
“A little something ‘extra,’” she says, using her fingers around the word “extra,” before doing it again. “A little ‘warmth.’”
“Would you stop with the quote marks,” I say.
My mom laughs and then winks a perfectly mascaraed eye on her perfectly made-up face. “You’re going ice fishing this morning. Believe me, you need a little something-something in your coffee. Or else.”
“Or else what?”
“You might not make it back here with all your wits. Much less all your fingers and toes.”
I stare at her and then take another drink.
“Is it really that bad?” I ask. “I’ve forgotten. I just remember dad going and loving it.”
“Let me just say this. Your father used to always have a cup of my hot chocolate before he went ice fishing.” She stops. “Or two.” She stops again. “And he’d take a thermos.”
I take an even bigger sip.
“Do you like it?” she asks.
“It tastes like white lightning. Are you running some sort of bootleg moonshine operation up here with the northern Golden Girls?”
She laughs again, harder.
“You’ve gone soft. Sun-kissed highlights and tanned skin in January? Rosé by the pool? Your skin should be pasty right now, and you should be wearing big sweaters and thermal underwear.”
“Then explain how you look so good?”
“I’m three-quarters of a century old, sweetheart. You do your hair and put on a little lipstick and the whole world thinks you’re Jane Fonda because you’ve made an effort.” She pauses. “You know better than anyone. What you endured in your job is worthy of a lawsuit. Men continue to treat women like objects. And women continue to play the game.” My mom pours herself a cup of coffee and continues. “Do you know your father never saw me without makeup?”
“I never saw you without makeup.”
“My mother taught me it was what women did. ‘Wait for your husband to fall asleep before you remove your makeup. Put it on before he wakes.’ Did you know I did that for decades? I’d wait until your father fell asleep, and then I’d sneak to the bathroom and take off my makeup. I trained myself to wake up at 4:30 in the morning so I could slink out of bed and put on my face.”
She opens the refrigerator and pours a few drops of cream into her cup before continuing.
“When your father was ill, he couldn’t sleep. I was so exhausted and depressed, and yet I was still sneaking away to put on my face. He was awake one morning, watching me. He said, ‘I never knew you did that.’ I said, ‘I did it for you.’ Do you know what he said?” My mom stops and shuts her eyes, remembering. “He said, ‘Do you know when I fell in love with you? When I saw you at the lake, and you’d just emerged from the water. You didn’t have a stitch of makeup on, but you were the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen. It was like there was a glow around you, as if you were in a spotlight, meant for me to notice.’” My mom opens her eyes and looks at me. “Society places such unjust expectations on women to attain perfection.”
“You’ve always looked beautiful, Mom.”
“And so have you,” she says. “I don’t know how you do your job. It must be tough to know you’re good at your job and yet be expected to look a certain way.”
“It is,” I nod. “It’s like a facade.”
“Same for me,” she says. “When will society learn it’s not our looks that make women such powerful creatures, it’s our minds, hearts and souls?”
“Never?” I offer.
My mom shakes her head and leans against the counter. Though my mother is in scrubs, her body is lean and tight, her forearms muscled. I’m amazed, even shocked, at the incredible shape in which she remains.
“I got in good shape for your father,” she says, noticing me staring. “A good caretaker must be strong, not only physically, but also mentally and spiritually to care for those who need their strength. More often than not, caretakers get sick or injured. I vowed that wouldn’t happen. And now my patients rely on that strength. It keeps me balanced.”
“I rely on your strength, too, Mom.”
She blows me a kiss. “Drink up, sweetie.”
I take another sip from my mug.
“I think I’m already buzzed.”
“Ha,” my mom says, her laughter echoing in the kitchen. “You’re a West Coast transplant who doesn’t wear shoes all winter. You’re going to be miserable ice fishing if you’re not at least warm inside. And ice fishing is boring. You gotta pass the time. Hooch helps.”
She continues. “You know, I used to go with your father and his friends before I knew better. It ain’t a day by the pool, my dear. You’ve forgotten all about Michigan winter traditions. We don’t play bridge and go to the club in Michigan. We play euchre, we drink and we ice fish.”
I laugh. “I feel like my life is a little bit like a winter version of Survivor right now. Cardboard sledding, now Lisa wants me to ice fish. What’s next?”
“Why is the station having you do all this?”
“Ratings.” I sigh. “They’re doing a whole winter-long segment called Sonny in the Winter to introduce me to viewers. It’s sort of like Candid Camera. Get me in the wild and hope that I’ll say or do something that will make news. Maybe even have another meltdown.”
“Well, that’s just cruel!” my mom exclaims.
“Welcome to television, Mom.” I stop. “I kind of think Lisa actually wants me to have another meltdown. We have a very strange relationship. Sort of like frenemies.”
“Why?”
“We just never clicked in college,” I say. “I think part of it was me and part of it was her.”
“Are you sure it wasn’t more one-sided?” my mother asks. “Your side?”
“Thank you, Mother,” I say. “Yes, actually, I’m starting to realize I wasn’t a very nice person to her.”
“Go on,” my mother prompts.
“I know she’s trying to resurrect the station, and I know she’s trying to resurrect my career, but I kind of feel like she’s getting a really big kick out of all this winter torture.”
“Revenge is a dish best served cold.”
“You’re a regular Philip Marlowe, Mother.”
“Thank you.”
“She knows I need this job, and I know she needs me. It’s a very unhealthy relationship.”
“Perfect for you then,” my mom says.
“Ha-ha.”
“I think she always believed in you,” my mom says. “I think she saw a great talent in you as well as a soft side you refused to show to the world. Give her the benefit of the doubt this time.”
I nod.
“I miss this,” my mom continues. “Mornings with you. Our banter. You’ve always been the one to make me laugh, the one to debate with me, the one to get me into a little bit of trouble.”
She looks at me for the longest time. “It’s nice. My daughter back home.”
“I’m fifty, Mom. It’s a little weird.”
“I like weird,” my mom says.
“Me, too.” I reach out, take her hand and give it a mighty squeeze. “Well, I best get going. Icicle is taking me to meet Mason and some ice fishing locals at Bear Lake.”
My mother laughs. “That is a sentence I never thought I would hear you say in my entire life. But that’s not why I’m laughing. Um, what are you wearing?”
“This.”
“Take another drink, sweetheart.” She eyes my outfit. I’m wearing dark slacks and a turtleneck. “That will not keep you alive.”
“I want to look good taping my segments. I don’t want to go overboard like I did when I went sledding, but I also don’t want to wear Lisa’s hand-me-downs. I thought this was a perfect balance.” I look at my outfit. “I’m planning to take a coat, too.”
“Oh, that’ll do it,” she says in a sarcastic tone. My mother walks around the counter and makes me stand. “Think about it. You’re going to be sitting in shanty with a fishing pole stuck into a hole in the ice. It’s not just I’m-gonna-grab-a-Starbucks-to-warm-up cold out there, it’s bone-aching, heart-stopping, can’t-feel-my-hands cold. You don’t need to look nice. You need to look like a local.”
“But I’m on TV. I’m new. I’m Sonny Dunes. It’s my thing.”
“Well, your next TV gig will be playing a corpse on CSI if you wear that.” She looks at me. “What were we just talking about? Wear some camouflage. Maybe show your viewers that you understand what you’re doing so it doesn’t come off like a joke. Embrace the culture. Don’t embarrass it. Or yourself.”
“Ouch.”
“Better to say that now than when you get frostbite and lose a toe in those shoes. Come with me. Let me help you get dressed.
“Oh, but take another drink first. Ice fishing is like watching paint dry. In Antarctica. Naked.”
“Can’t wait,” I say.
My mother takes my hand. She actually skips as we make our way upstairs.
I remember Bear Lake in the summer. When the beaches at Lake Michigan were too packed, or the water too choppy, my parents would often take Joncee and me inland to Bear Lake where we could float all day long without a worry.
Bear Lake is an On Golden Pond-y type lake—serene, filled with reeds, white swans and mournful loons—a perfect complement to Lake Michigan, which sits not too far away. In the summer, the lake is filled with kayaks and Jet Skis, the edges lined with fishermen, quaint cottages tucked into the tree-covered shoreline.
Icicle parks, and I step out of the van.
This is not summer.
In the winter, the summer charm of the lake has been replaced with more of a Game of Thrones vibe.
The wind slaps me, hard, and I shiver. The windchill is roughly the equivalent of a toddler’s age. My eyes water, and the inside of my nostrils freeze. I stare across the icy water, the lake indistinguishable from the land and the horizon. Big, thick flakes of snow fall.
Icicle and I begin to make our way across the lake. I am leery, but he assures me it’s safe even though I have already checked the depth of ice on the lake.
“Frozen over solid,” he says. “Trust me.”
My mind floats back to Lisa and Northwestern.
Ice-fishing shanties and pop-ups dot the ice. It’s like a bottle brush village come to life on the frozen lake.
“Where are we going?” I ask. “Everything looks the same.”
No one is out. It looks desolate, save for the shanties, some of which have puffs of smoke emerging from them.
“Ice fishing has probably changed a lot since you were young,” Icicle says. “Like everything else.”
He realizes what he’s just said, and catches himself, albeit too late. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that you were old or anything. But you didn’t have cell phones or anything like that, right?”
I nod. “We had rotary phones. I used to write directions down. Google was known as a dictionary.”
He laughs. “I just meant even the shanties have changed.” Icicle points at one as we pass. “See?”
He’s right. Many resemble tiny homes, complete with fireplaces. I can see lights flicker inside some.
“TV?” I blurt.
“Yep.”
My heart lifts. Maybe my day won’t be so awful, Mother, I think.
“Over here!”
I turn, squinting to see where Mason’s voice is coming from.
My heart drops.
Tiny home, this ain’t.
Mason’s shanty is more of a lean-to, that actually leans in the stiff northerly breeze, much like I am doing.
“Well, aren’t you a sight to see,” Mason says with a hearty laugh, which echoes across the barren lake.
“I’m surprised you can even see me,” I say. “I’m camouflaged.”
He laughs again, a laugh that is like sunshine. I feel immediately warmed to see this man I barely know.
“Looks like somebody got the memo about what to wear.” He stops and looks me over. “Well, almost.”
My mother dressed me in a full-on Apocalypse Now thermal snowsuit.
“Doesn’t it come in another pattern besides camo?” I had asked my mom.
“Yeah, honey,” she’d replied. “Plaid.”
I opted for camouflage because it was easier to accessorize.
“I added this scarf for a pop,” I say. “It looks like Burberry, but it’s fake. Got it at the outlet mall,” I say in a stage whisper. “And I thought the fur-lined Russian cap would set off my earrings. See? They’re fish.”
“Well, you’re ready for… I don’t know what, but you’re ready for something,” Mason says. “This way, ma’am.”
Mason laughs again. “That is, if you can move.”
My mother has dressed me in so many layers—moisture-wicking thermal underwear, and waterproof, insulated socks and boots—that I move like Violet in Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory when she turns into a blueberry.
“Shut up,” I say.
I waddle into the shanty, which is only slightly warmer than being outside.
“What do you think?” Mason asks.
“It’s like The Shining, but less cheery,” I say.
“Amberrose?”
I jump.