(PHONE RINGS, PICKUP)
Garrison Keillor: Hello?
Sue Scott (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): Duane? It's your mother. Remember?
GK: Hi mom.
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): I hope I'm not getting you at a bad time, Duane, but if I am, you just hang up, don't feel you need to explain -- if you're in the middle of a dinner party with your sophisticate friends around and you don't want them catching you talking to your mother, you just hang up like I was a wrong number, Duane, and that's okay, I understand completely, okay?
GK: It's just me, Mom. Got a pizza in the oven, and it's fine.
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): Well, I know you've got a lot on your mind, so if I'm calling at the wrong time, I want you to tell me, promise?
GK: Mom, I am here in my tiny apartment. I don't even have a table. So I couldn't have a dinner party even if I wanted to.
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): What do you eat on, honey?
GK: I eat standing up at the kitchen counter, Mom.
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): We've got a card table in the basement. We could bring it over right now. It's been in the basement for awhile, but it's perfectly good. You're welcome to it. You could slide it behind your couch when you're done with your dinner.
GK: Mother-
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): You just throw a little tablecloth over it and nobody has to know it's a card table at all.
GK: It's ok mother. I'm fine.
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): You put a nice tablecloth over it, it'd be fine. And then you could invite Dad and me over for Sunday dinner sometime.
(A BEAT)
GK: Was that why you called, mother?
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): I just wanted to make sure you're all right and getting enough to eat and I want you to know I don't expect a thing for Mother's Day tomorrow, Duane. Nothing.
GK: Mother--
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): I have everything I could possibly want. Health and a loyal husband and a good son who is going to make a success as a writer someday, no matter what anybody may say, I just know he is going to finish that book he's been working for 16 years.
GK: Thanks for the vote of confidence.
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): That's all I want, Duane. Is for you to be happy and successful so people admire you for the success you are and not feel sorry for you.
GK: I know, mother.
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): And just because I'm the woman who spent 22 hours in agony giving you life doesn't mean I expect to go on playing a part in your life, Duane. No, no, no, no, no. I stepped aside a long time ago. I don't want to be like some of those mothers. Suffocating. That's what they are. Suffocating. Calling every day, pestering, pleading for attention...
GK: Mom, please---
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): Just because you sacrificed your entire life for someone doesn't mean you own them, Duane. No, sir. You've got to let them live their own lives, even if you're worried sick that they're spiraling down into a morass of loneliness and despair.
GK: I was planning to come over for Mother's Day, mom.
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): You were planning-- were--
GK: I am planning.
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): You said "were"-- you said it in the past tense--
GK: I will come over.
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): It's all right if you can't. I understand. In fact, I've made other plans. Dad and I are going to the cemetery, Duane. We're going to pick out a gravesite.
GK: I thought you did that already, Mom.
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): I did but I don't like that spot. There's a big tree there. I don't want to be where some tree roots are going to come sneaking into bed with me.
GK: (SIGH) Okay.
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): So we're going to pick out a place in the sun. --You want to come with?
GK: I don't think so, Mom.
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): Okay. That's all right.
GK: How are you feeling, Mom?
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): I was wondering when you were going to ask, Duane. I'm tired. I don't know when I've ever been this tired.
GK: I'm sorry to hear it. Maybe you should see a doctor.
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): I've seen six doctors, Duane, and they have no idea what's wrong. No idea. They give me sleeping pills. I can't take sleeping pills. What if your father should have a heart attack in the middle of the night? What if you should call me at four in the morning because your throat hurts? I want to be there when you need me.
GK: I'm okay, Mom.
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): Your pizza must be done by now, Duane. You don't want it to catch fire and burn the place down. It happens, you know.
GK: I'm watching it, Mom.
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): Good. Your dad is right here, you want to talk to him?
GK: Okay.
SS (ON PHONE): You don't have to if you don't want to. If you don't want to, just say so and I'll tell him to go away.
GK: Let me talk to Dad.
Tim Russell (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): Hello son.
GK: Hi dad.
TR (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): Everything going ok out there?
GK: Everything's fine, dad. I hear you're going to go look at burial sites tomorrow.
TR (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): Oh. How did you hear that?
GK: Mom told me. We were just talking.
TR (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): Oh. Ok then. Yeah I guess that's what we're going to do.
GK: What are you going to do after that?
TR (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): Oh, I don't know. I haven't been filled in on that yet.
GK: Okay. You keeping busy?
TR (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): Yeah. And you?
GK: Yeah.
TR (ON PHONE): Okay. Talk to you later then.
GK: Bye dad.
TR (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): Bye now.
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): That was your father, Duane.
GK: I know, mom.
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): You may not know it but talking to you is the high point of his day.
GK: Somehow I find that hard to imagine.
SS (ON PHONE): You're so sarcastic. (STIFLES A SOB)
GK: Oh, here we go.
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): All we want is for you to be happy.
GK: I am happy, mother. I'm thrilled with life.
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): No you're not, Duane. And you know what? You're doing it to get back at me. Living in that dump in that horrible neighborhood that nobody would dare drive through with their car doors unlocked. You know what that says to people, Duane? My mother failed me. And that's why I'm living like a bum -
GK: Mother, I live in St. Paul. Just because you live in Minneapolis---
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): We worked and slaved to give you everything we could, and what do you do? You just turn around and stuff it in our faces. Every time we see you it's a big mud pie in the face.
GK: Mother, please-
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): Don't call me on Mother's Day. Just forget I even exist. I know you're going to anyway, so why not get a head start on it. Maybe I'll just go dig myself a big hole in the cemetery and just lie down in it. Why wait? (SOBS)
GK: Mother.
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): What?
GK: I'll be over tomorrow morning and I'll bring blueberry muffins and I'll make coffee and we'll have brunch. Okay?
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): You are?
GK: Yes.
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): Well, if you have time--
GK: I'll find the time mom.
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): But if you don't show up-- if you should forget -- that's okay.
GK: I'll be there.
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): Okay. You just have a nice day then.
GK: I'll see you tomorrow.
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): If you need to talk to me before then, just call, will you? It doesn't matter how late. Three, four o'clock -- I'm up. So call me.
GK: Bye mom.
SS (MIDWESTERN, ON PHONE): Bye Duane. Love you.
(HANGUP)