(PHONE RING THREE TIMES) (PICK UP)
SS: Duane, it's your Mother.
GK: Hi, Mom.
SS: How are you doing?
GK: I'm at the Fair.
SS: I know that. I mean, how are you doing with Celine?
GK: Her name is Serena, Mom.
SS: Okay, how are you doing?
GK: Fine. She just went over to the Education Building.
SS: Where are you?
GK: Fine Arts. Looking at art.
SS: You're not having a fight, are you?
GK: No, Mom. She just went over to the State College booth to see a friend.
SS: Sometimes a girl will say that when she wants to ditch somebody.
GK: Mom, please.
SS: Well, it's your first date with her, so I'm curious. What are you doing tonight?
GK: We're going over to the Grandstand, Mom.
SS: What in the world for, Duane?
GK: Going to the show.
SS: Honey, it's that public radio show ---- it's all public radio people over there. Old people who get excited about recycling. Honey, Celine is young, she doesn't want to sit and listen to people play guitars and sing about climate change.
GK: Mom, it's okay, we're having fun.
SS: Take her up to the Midway. Take her on a ride where you hear young women screaming. One of those rides where you get tossed around and there's a lot of body contact. Give her a chance to grab onto you.
GK: Mom, I don't care for wild rides.
SS: Well, now is the time to care. It's called dating. You hang out, you go out to dinner, you go to the movies, you have babies. It's just nature.
GK: Mom, please.
SS: I wish you weren't wearing that seersucker jacket, Duane. Honey, nothing says "sad middle-aged man" like seersucker. It's what math teachers wear.
GK: Mom----
SS: There she is in the short shorts and the tank top and you look like her sad old uncle. She's out for a good time, Duane. She's not a public radio person.
GK: Mom, she is. She's 34, she's an insurance adjustor.
SS: Well, she doesn't look it.
GK: Mom, are you following us?
SS: I don't know what you're talking about.
GK: You're following us, aren't you.
SS: Your dad and I came over to the Fair and we happened to see you go on the Swiss Sky Ride.
GK: You're following me. I can't believe it.
SS: You were holding her hand, it looked very nice.
GK: I can't believe this. My parents are trailing me.
SS: Well, forgive me for caring, Duane. Forgive me for wanting you to be happy. I guess I should just get out of your life. Maybe I should get on the Sky Ride and jump out. Maybe I should go gorge myself on Tom Thumb donuts and swallow them whole and maybe I'd choke to death. Maybe I should go to the horse show and jump into the ring when the Budweiser Clydesdales go by and be crushed by a beer wagon. How about that? (SHE WEEPS)
GK: Mom, I just wish you'd treat me like an adult. I'm 47 years old.
SS: You're a writer, Duane. Writers are sociopaths. They know nothing about personal relationships.
GK: Mom, please.
SS: Okay, now I've made you angry and you'll punish me with your silence. Here. Talk to your dad. I'm going to go take an Atavan. (OFF) Here, Hank. Take the phone. Oh look, you dropped in the sawdust. What's your problem? For mercy sake.
TR: Yeah?
GK: Dad?
TR: Yeah?
GK: Can you hear me?
TR: Yeah.
GK: What's up?
TR: Oh, not much. Up here looking at snow blowers.
GK: What's Mom doing?
TR: She's got the binoculars on. Big binocular marks around her eyes. She looks like a raccoon.
GK: You been to the animal barns yet?
TR: Nope. Kinda saving that for last. She's gonna drag me up to see the butter sculptures and then we'll spend an hour looking at jams and jellies and----- boy, I sure miss the stock car races.
GK: Yeah.
TR: She keeps telling me, "Don't wander off now." Like I was a child.
GK: Yeah, I suppose.
TR: I might just do it though.
GK: Wander off?
TR: Go stand behind a root beer stand just to see what she does.
GK: Okay. Well, be careful.
TR: Okay then.
SS (OFF): Give me the phone back. (THEY ARGUE) Duane? You still there?
GK: I'm here, Mom.
SS: I get the feeling I'm in your way, Duane. The problem is that I care too much. After you left this afternoon, I went over to your house and cleaned, just in case you bring Serena home with you. I changed the sheets on the bed and everything. But maybe I should just disappear. How about I put a hijab and burka on and a big backpack and walk over to the poultry barn and tell them I'm going to blow it up and act like an old-lady terrorist and they'll take me downtown and send me off to Guantanamo Bay and you'll never see me. I'll go off and you'll be rid of me. Forever. (SHE WEEPS)
GK: Mom, you already cried once. You don't need to cry again. Okay? What do you want, Mom? Tell me what you want?
SS: I want you to be happy.
GK: I am happy, Mom. What do you want me to do right now?
SS: I want you to go find Serena and make her happy.
GK: Okay. I'll take her on some rides then.
SS: So often a woman judges a man by how he treats his mother. Did you know that? I read that somewhere. That shows her how he'll treat her when she marries him.
GK: I didn't know that.
SS: So after the rides, maybe you could meet us over at the Olivet Lutheran lunchroom and we'll have some strawberry shortcake and you can be nice to me. But only if you want to. Don't do it for me, Duane.
GK: Okay. I'll do it.
SS: Go on the Tilt-A-Whirl and the Human Slingshot so she screams and grabs onto you and then come meet us at the lunchroom. But only if you want to.
GK: Okay. I want to. I gotta go. Bye.
SS: Bye now. Talk to you later. Love you.
GK: Love you, Mom.