Monday, December 8, 2008

My Mother, the Cyborg

"Listen, and understand.  My mother is out there.  She can't be bargained with.  She can't be reasoned with.  She might feel pity, or remorse, but not fatigue . . . and she absolutely will not stop, ever, until you are fed."  

After years of nagging, I and the rest of my family finally convinced my mother to have knee replacement surgery. 

It had been a long time coming - well over ten years, I think - ever since mom hurt her knees after falling on the steps of the Catholic school where she teaches.  In all that time, as the knee pain grew gradually worse, mom steadfastly avoided the surgery option until all other avenues - drugs, injections, etc. - had been exhausted and the agony finally became too much to bear.  In July of this year she finally took the plunge and now she has a pair of shiny, new titanium knees that are likely to outlast my next two or three cars.  Especially if I buy American. 

I was proud of mom for overcoming her extreme fear of the surgery . . . that is, until quite recently, when things really started to click into place.  Oh yes, I can put two and two together as well as the next guy.  Mom, you had us all fooled . . . but I've figured you out at last. 

You are a cyborg.

How did I pierce through your nearly-perfect camouflage and superior programming?  Maybe it was the way you always just pick at your food when the family comes together for holiday dinners.  "I'm just not very hungry right now," you'd say, as you pushed a small pile of mashed potatoes around your plate.  Or, "I filled up on snacks before dinner.  Shouldn't have done that. But make sure you eat.  How about another piece of pie?"  Had I looked more closely at your plate, I'll bet that the small amounts of "food" you did ingest were in fact cunningly-disguised mineral compounds that serve as fuel for your internal reactor core or raw materials for the microscopic  nanites busily at work to keep you running.

Oh, I know one shouldn't build a castle of suspicions on a single pillar of evidence alone. There's also your inexplicable "sleep" habits.  When I was still living at home, I'd grown accustomed to your pattern after returning from school at the end of the day.  You'd fall asleep within minutes of sitting down in the living room, only to wake up again later in the evening and grade papers late into the night.  We thought it was just fatigue that made you do that.  But that really wasn't the case, was it?  No, you persisted in that bizarre and - to a normal human - unhealthy lifestyle because it allowed you to connect to the house's electrical system or open the data ports in the back of your skull to download "lesson plans" for the next day.  And since everybody else in the house was asleep by then, no one was ever the wiser.

Very clever, mom.

Sure, I could go on citing evidence.  Your steadfast refusal to retire from teaching when most "human beings"of your years would have already dropped from sheer exhaustion.  Your inability to alter your own programming that drives you to relentlessly feed and coddle your sons whenever they come home to visit, no matter how much they protest that they can fix their own lunch or do their own laundry.  

And the episode with the knees . . . it wasn't fear that held you back, was it?  It was the danger that the surgery would expose the gears, joints and complex positronic circuit network that lies hidden under that plump, lovable exterior.  Is it simple intimidation that is keeping the surgeons (or should I say engineers?) who worked on you quiet, or is it all part of a larger government conspiracy?

Well, whatever mission you're on, I won't expose you.  I'll go along with the charade.  It's just a pleasure to see you up and about again.  At the very least, your grandchildren will be able to enjoy many trips to see Grandma, during which you will no doubt amuse them to no end by ricocheting bullets off of your titanium kneecaps.

1 comment:

Dolly said...

This was hilarious !