Mothergate

So many routes to joy. Most of them, detours.

Allan Gurganus, Local souls

Somewhere between the canned food and the spices I forgot what I was thinking about. My brain short-circuited. One second, I had a thought—something vital, something urgent. The next, it’s gone, hijacked by a stupid tuna salad package that reminded me of an old Italian Rio Mare commercial with Kevin Costner. Thirty seconds of advertising, and my entire train of thought derailed. Completely wiped out. Like when you forget to save some important document you’ve been working on for hours. Now I’m standing a few steps away from the tuna—by the pickle jars, to be precise—feeling utterly helpless. I squeeze my eyes shut, willing my brain to retrieve the lost thought, but anger and disbelief cloud my focus. All I can see is old Kevin’s dumb facial expression. The thing is gone forever. Unless…

Unless I retrace my steps, of course. That’s worked before. All I have to do is walk backward, undo my grocery shopping, and put each item back on the shelves, aisle by aisle. If I reconstruct my thought process in reverse, I might unearth the source—the catalyst—the exact product that triggered the very-important-thing-I-needed-to-remember before the damn tuna snatched it away. It’s a solid plan. I’m committing to it.

My only witness is a freshly retired man reluctantly contemplating overpriced organic pickled onions. He sees me taking a deep breath, smiling absentmindedly before embarking on my crucial mission. ‘Che se sente male, signorina’? Are you feeling ill, miss? He asks. ‘I’m alright’ – erm, ‘tutto ok grazie’. I reply politely. Being called signorina always makes me feel good, I must admit. Does this make me a bad feminist? Not now, please. Focus.

To my defense, grocery shopping in Italy can be an overwhelming experience. Italian supermarkets are the place where all the food fuss begins. A place where words like olive oil, mozzarella and focaccia become plural, as there are dierent types of them. Imagine growing up in a country where a broad selection of prosciuttos is the norm and a McFlurry is the exception, where brand competition is based on who is the most traditional. Yes, the word ‘traditional’ doesn’t imply any negative connotation in Italian. And even though personally I’ve never been that much of a food enthusiast, I’m still told by my non-Italian boyfriend that I’m not open to rule-bending when it comes to Italian cooking. But I’m not

gonna read too much into it, especially when the phone is ringing and it’s my mother calling me.

I decide to ignore it as I walk past coees and teas, sugars and jams, trying to prevent any new thought from getting in the way – now that it happened once it could happen again, my mind seems to be prone to detours at the moment. But I make it safely to the honeys, place my jar back on the shelf, and wait. Nothing. Never mind, this is only the beginning, I tell myself as I go on, don’t give up just yet. Unfortunately, the pasta aisle (yes, there’s an entire aisle just for pasta) holds no revelations either. So many shapes and brands, but no signs of the forgotten thing here. All I can remember is looking at the recommended al dente cooking time on the rigatoni box that I’m now putting back – 11 minuti – and finding myself missing my dad, the only Italian to ever like pasta overcooked.

I move on. Philadelphia cream cheese is next, and I know exactly what that made me think of. Fidelfia, a nun from my primary school—the whitest, skinniest woman I’ve ever met. A name could never have suited someone more. It’s one of those trivial childhood observations that burrows into your brain forever, like bad puns or poop jokes. Unfortunately, that means I’ll always think of her whenever I see Philadelphia cheese. So, no luck here either I’m afraid.

It must have been another product, another aisle. Which one though? I cruise back through the Mulino Bianco cookie wall, the Nutella wall, the baking essentials wall. Here I retrieve my recent observations on the baking powder, a funny one called Paneangeli (‘angels-bread’), with a retro design unchanged in thirty years. It shows two little white angels flying above the red ribbon logo, holding a cake. The blue of the sky on top of the sachet fades into a bright light green background with the words “LIEVITO PANE DEGLI ANGELI”, followed by more words clarifying it’s a baking powder (in case it wasn’t clear enough). On the left, a stack of sachets looking exactly like this sachet indicates that the main sachet contains more sachets inside. As I put it in my cart just a few minutes ago, I remember thinking that this over-indexing, openly catholic meta design choice is the quintessence of Italianness. So dramatic, so wordy, so ancient, and for this reason totally legitimate. Whether it’s a conscious marketing choice or not, this unashamedly ugly brand has been the xerox of baking powders in Italy since I can remember. A madeleine moment catches me o guard as I put it back on the shelf. I’m twelve again, in my ciambellone phase, obsessed with baking and using kitchen utensils because it felt a new and thrillingly adult thing to do, and I cut my index finger with a blender blade. Blood all over the kitchen, a true splatter scene. Damn it, I’m losing the plot again, but I resist the urge to google ‘why is it called paneangeli’ and recommit to the plan. The very-important-thing-I-need-to-remember must resurface.

The reason why I’m here today is that I’m visiting my newly widowed mother who lives in a small town near Rome, once the opulent summer residence of Emperors, now an unremarkable sprawl of supermarkets, parking lots and pharmacies. Being someone’s (only) child in Italy comes with a set of obligations, most of them implied, like you have to fulfill your parents expectations, don’t live too far away, check in on a daily basis and take care of them when the time comes in return for what they’ve done for you. As if you asked to be born in the first place. Now, I know all these things are not just an Italian prerogative. But in Italy we MEAN IT. And people fall for it. Like they think it’s normal. Like they think their main task in life is to keep their parents happy. Unfortunately, I’ve failed on all counts. I live in another country, I don’t call every day and I have no intention to marry and have kids. So not only am I a huge disappointment, but over the years I’ve been blamed for pretty much everything that didn’t go as planned. I deprived my mother of Sunday lunches, nativity school plays, the chance of turning up at my house uninvited and many opportunities to feel needed. I deprived her of the beautiful and rich life she had planned on living vicariously through me, by virtue of proximity. Truth is parents’ love is rarely unconditional, in fact it’s rather selfish. At least my mother’s. She often refers to me as independent, and not in a good way. Seduced by the big city, transformed into a soulless woman who abandoned a potentially meaningful career to work in advertising, in her eyes I’m someone who chose money over happiness. Surely, I must feel lost and unfulfilled. Basically the ideal setup for a Hallmark movie, except I’m perfectly fine with where I’m at in life and I definitely have no intention of moving back to my hometown and rekindling things with my high school boyfriend. But I know my mum would love that.

A strange thought crosses my mind at this point. Does the TV commercial that started this whole nightmare have some sort of subconscious meaning? Is it a metaphor for my career in advertising distracting me from what matters in life? ‘And now, after a 15 year long ad break, she’s back to where she was always meant to be…’ Oh god, what am I doing? I don’t need another subplot right now. Instead, let’s focus on the mission at hand: retrieving my elusive thought.

It’s gotta be the yoghurts. Yoghurt is my favorite food in the world. I push my cart toward the fridge, where a cherubic four-year-old studies me with an intensity that suggests she’s unlocking the secrets of my soul. I stare back. I know what you’re doing, little lady. You’re hoping to distract me from my stupid cerebral quest and awaken my maternal instinct with those big eyes, that ridiculously creative outfit, that perfect pink-cheeked innocence. Nice try. Also, congratulations. Not everyone has the luxury of being four years old and carefree these days. I stick my tongue out at her—subtly, not creepily. She grins. I turn the corner to get away from this unbearably adorable view and from the huge stash of yoghurts that I just put back on the shelf, where I found absolutely no sign of the lost thought.

Back to the comfort of my manic stream of consciousness, I become aware of the music playing in my ears. I don’t even know what I’m listening to. Last I remember, I typed

Fluorescent Adolescent into Spotify, pressed play, and let the algorithm take over. Thirty minutes of music went on completely unnoticed. So maybe it wasn’t the products. Maybe it was the music that initiated the train of thought I’m so desperately trying to recover. Forget the grocery—I’m going to replay the same sequence, start from Fluorescent Adolescent again, and work my way backwards (forward?). After all, nobody knows us better than our algorithms. As I stand in front of the parmigianos, fumbling to retrace my Spotify queue, I have a revelation (but no, not THAT revelation): supermarkets have no chairs. Isn’t that insane? Not a single place to sit. Maybe there’s a business idea here—an ergonomic grocery store with seating. A place to rest between aisles. Shopping is overwhelming, after all. A modern-day hunt for sustenance. Why shouldn’t there be designated recovery zones? Alright, fuck this music thing. I can’t figure out how to restore the same playlist. I can only replay Fluorescent Adolescent, which reminds me over and over again that the best you ever had is just a memory – as if I didn’t know! – and yes, in case you’re wondering, I do identify with the middle aged woman from a song written by a 16 years old guy in the mid ’00s. The problem is every time I play it, it generates an entirely new impromptu mix. Dierent branch of the algorithm? Who knows. What I do know is that I’ve just wasted forty-five minutes of my life chasing a thought that lasted a fraction of a second.

Wait, is this another metaphor? ‘…and then she realised she was wasting her life chasing a chimera…’ I’m starting to question my entire thought process and I’m this close to giving up. But my cart is almost empty, I’m approaching the end of my shopping-undoing journey so I might as well get to the bottom of it. Everything is back on the shelves by now, except for vegetables and fruit. I can’t really put them back, can I? Not hygienic, and besides, who wants to touch someone else’s apples? So I go around in circles for a bit, analyzing oranges, pears, red peppers, melons, cherry tomatoes, bananas, in search of an answer. Desperately trying to find my lost thought among the avocados, begging courgettes and aubergines to give me a sign. Anything. I can’t let this go. I must remember. Was it a genius idea? Did I crack the meaning of life for one second before losing it forever? What was I thinking? Literally, what was I thinking. Maybe it was an old thought I lost years ago that suddenly came back to me. Could be. Like something I wrongfully dismissed in the past that subconsciously resurfaced. Something from when I was 27, single, on top of my game, and ready to kick ass. Basically the exact opposite of how I feel now. That’d be too good to be true. Please, thought, please come back to me. Please.

My mother is calling again. Shit. This is really not the right time, mamma. I feel like I’m almost there, I’m very close to remembering the thing I forgot. There is something about the ‘buy one, get one free’ deals, I don’t know what it is yet, but I’m feeling it. When the phone finally stops ringing I feel guilty for not answering, and I know that it won’t go away unless I call her back. Amen.

– Ma? You rang?

– What took you so long? I bet you are on silent mode, aren’t you? Why do you have a phone if you keep it silent?

– Do you need anything?

– Where are you?

– At the supermercato.

– Which one?

– The one on the main road.

– But I told you to go to the other one!

– They sell the same stu, mum.

– No they don’t. The one on the main road sucks, I never go there. They don’t have the whole grain-palm-oil-free biscuits, they don’t have the lactose-free bio milk… – I’m sure they have similar products, mum.

– No they don’t!

– Ok, whatever. So did you need anything?

– Well I thought you were at the other supermarket so I called you to remind you to buy water.

And just like that, she gave me the answer. Can you believe it? I don’t know how she did it but somehow, she must have known. The answer I was looking for, the vital, urgent thing I couldn’t retrieve, was simply WATER. Acqua. It’s all coming back to me. I simply thought ‘I must not forget to buy water’, knowing that I would forget because I normally don’t buy it. And somehow I must have felt it was vital because, well, water is. But then of course I lost it when I walked past the giant aisle of plastic bottles and went o on a tangent (no shit) – when did we start buying something essential to life—wrapped in plastic, no less? Did this come before or after someone coined ‘cost of living’? And why do people in Italy, of all places, drink ONLY bottled water? It must be the biggest scam ever. I’m pretty sure the tap water in Italy is perfectly fine.

– I’m pretty sure the tap water is perfectly fine, ma.

– You know damn well it’s not. ey told us.

– Who told you?

– Oh, it was ages ago. Anyway, make sure you get the right one. With the blue label, not the green one.

– I’m sure they have it here as well. It’s water.

– No they don’t have it because it’s from the other supermarket’s own premium brand. – Ok then I’ll buy the premium brand from this supermarket.

– It’s not the same. Never mind.

– Ma, come on. It’s water. Why do you have to buy it in the first place? – Because that’s the only one I can drink. I can’t digest the other waters. – Are you being serious right now?

– I just don’t understand why you couldn’t go to the supermarket I told you to go to, the one at the roundabout!

– Alright you know what? I’ll just put everything back on the shelves and go there instead.

Yes, I actually said that. Part of me is laughing at the irony of it all. If only mamma knew that I’ve already put everything back on the shelves – but again maybe she actually does know?

– Ok, if you don’t mind. Make sure you buy the right one, with the blue label, not the green one. That one’s got more sodium, it’s heavy on the stomach.

At this point, it’s hard not to acknowledge that all these serendipitous coincidences are clearly pointing towards me going to the other supermarket. After all, I’ve already undone the shopping, and for a minute this all makes sense: maybe I’ve been in the wrong place all along. Again, maybe the world is really trying to tell me something, and the other store is where I am supposed to be. Or maybe it was my subconscious telling me that the one vital thing I was looking for was not in this store. This must not be the place. Does my mother read my mind? Or maybe I’m just being punished (by myself? By my mum? Is there a dierence?) for not listening to her in the first place. I hop back into the car and head towards the supermarket at the roundabout.

This time, I go straight to the water aisle. And just as I turn the corner, desperately looking for the one with the blue label – you’re not gonna believe this – I bump into none other than my boyfriend from high school. You gotta be kidding me. Of course, he just got divorced and he’s now sharing custody of two adorable kids. We talk briefly and part ways. One minute later, he friends me on Facebook (yes, it’s still relevant in small town Italy).

Is this fate? Will we end up back together at the end? Will I just move back to my hometown and be the step-mum no one asked for so we can all live happily ever after? At this point it becomes clear that the Hallmark movie subplot I’ve been trying to ignore is desperately attempting to become the main storyline. Shall I just give in? Do I actually have a choice? I’m at the checkout now, placing items on the conveyor belt, and as I take a sip of the water with the blue label (not the green one), all I can think about is that a mother’s control has no limits.