Photo courtesy: Karolina Kolodziejczak via Unsplash

The other morning,

we had to go to UCLA medical center for uh-muh-ni’s check-up. With an early morning departure time, uh-muh-ni had woken only fifteen minutes beforehand. She was scampering around in the kitchen in staccato movements: fixing her coffee, packing fried man-doo, and grabbing a bag of tangerines for the road. 

“We have to leave soon,” I told her.
 
“Huh?” She whipped her head towards me. 

“We have to leave soon!” I shouted. 

She frowned and nodded. 

“Bring a plastic bag for trash,” I reminded her, thinking about tangerine peels. 

“What?” Uh-muh-ni asked. 

“Bring a plastic bag for trash!” I repeated. I was getting annoyed. 

In the car, I slid into the passenger seat. Uh-muh-ni fiddled with the phone charger, plugging in her iPhone. 

“It isn’t charging,” she said. 

“Make sure it’s plugged in all the way,” I said. 

Uh-muh-ni swung her head around, her pasty face inches from mine, “Huh?” Only then did I notice that she had stuffed a wad of cotton in her ear. 

“TAKE THE COTTON OUT OF YOUR EAR!” I shouted.
 
She yanked it out. “I put in ear drops. Itchy,” uh-muh-ni explained. Then she looked down at herself and realized, “I put my shirt on inside-out.”

*   *   *

“Smily” is a nickname my mother gave herself. These are a collection of stories and poems written for her.