(GK: Garrison Keillor; SS: Sue Scott; TR: Tim Russell; TK: Tom Keith; AG: Adam Granger)
AD & GK:
She sits at the stoplight and waits for the green,
She's late for the meeting at eleven fifteen,
Then she'll pick up Tyler, Siobhan, and Marie
Driving around in her big S.U.V.
She has a cellphone attached to her ear,
And she's talking to someone while she tries to steer,
And check her Palm Pilot for Wednesday at three,
Driving around in her big S.U.V.
From soccer to school to the park to the mall,
From Minneapolis back to St. Paul.
A mom, an executive vagabond she
Is driving around in her big S.U.V.
One thing she'd love and that's somebody who
She could pour out her fears and anxieties to:
But there's no time for that, not a minute is free,
Driving around in a big S.U.V.
It wouldn't take much to gladden her heart
Just a trip to Paris would help, for a start.
A week when she'd go for long walks and take naps
And be driven around in French taxicabs. (INTO PIANO BRIDGE)....
GK: It's Mother's Day and of course there's more than one kind of mother: There's the old mom that we remember from long ago:
SS: Don't you worry about me. I'm just fine. I don't want anybody to go to the trouble of getting me a Mother's Day gift ---- I have everything I want. All I want is to have you call or write once in awhile. Whenever you have time. I know how busy you are.
GK: And there's the mom of today.
SS: (MODERN MOM) Jonah? I packed your lunch for school and I put some very nice kiwi yoghurt in there. Please don't trade it for marijuana.
TR:(KID) Aw, Mom...
SS: Promise me you'll respond to your pager when I call you, okay?
TR:(KID) Okay.
SS: And after soccer, the van from the Play Date service will be there to pick you up.
TR (KID): Aw, Mom...
SS: Tonight is your multi-ethnic play date. And when they bring you home, there's microwave veggie-burgers waiting. Give them 60 seconds. And no cheese!
TR (KID): Okay....
SS: I'll be home late from the gym and then I go to my book club. Daddy's in Peru for two months, but he left you a videotaped message in the VCR.
TR (KID): Okay-----
SS: Go to bed before midnight, set your sound machine on ocean waves, and I sent you a goodnight e-mail today.
TR (KID): Aw, Mom...
GK: That's a Minneapolis mom. They're always on the go over there. Cellphones at the ready, laptop in the backpack. They go to soccer games and drink bottled water and do e-mail. Here in Good Old St. Paul, Moms are more like what you remember----
SS: (REGULAR, ST. PAUL) Buddy?
TK:(KID) (STEPS APPROCHING) Yeah, Mom?
SS: 'Yeah, Mom'? What's that? What are you, a beatnik? Are you Jack Kerouac?
TK: Yes, Mother.
SS: Better. Who you going to ask to the junior high spring dance?
TK: Aw, I don't want to ask a girl to go.
SS: Yes, you do. We'll have no alternative lifestyles in this house,
young man.
TK: Yes, mother.
.
SS: Sit down, you need a haircut.
TK: Mom...!
SS: This'll just take a minute. (ELECTRIC CLIPPERS CUTTING HAIR) (MUSIC)
GK: That's your St. Paul mom. That means that, in St. Paul, unlike some other cities, kids leave home before they're thirty. So they can have their hair the way they want it. But they'll come back for Mother's Day. Whereas in Minneapolis, they don't have Mother's Day, they have Mentor's Day, honoring parents, teachers, therapists, everybody. But that's another story. (MUSIC)
In the room with the houseplant, she sits all alone,
She's knitting a scarf as she looks at the phone----
She can't leave the house lest her children should call
Sitting alone in a house in St. Paul.
© Garrison Keillor 2002