A Mother's Advice: How to Remain a Virgin
95 years old, she's still using the same gimmick to get her way, or at least make sure you don't get yours
➡️ an unabashed ploy for likes: I’d love it if you’d like me first, just click on my heart ❤️ and tell the world you like me. Done? Okay, proceed, read, enjoy.⬇️
If a boy wants you to do something, and you don’t want to—you know what I mean—just say ‘I don’t want to.’ When he says why not, you say, ‘Because I don’t want to.’ You keep answering ‘Because I don’t want to,’ and he can’t argue with that. There’s nothing to grab on to.
That was Big Edie’s1 advice on keeping my virginity. The advice came a few years too late to guard my virginity, at that time there was rarely anything I didn’t want to do, but it has been surprisingly effective in a multitude of situations, sexual and otherwise.
As the years pass, I realize that was a bit of hard-earned wisdom, that it came to her a little to late as well. But, it’s an instinctive tactic in her dementia. It’s the unspoken sentence that precedes the repetitive, and increasingly adamant “No!” Sometimes around showers, getting in as well as getting out. Or getting up from the toilet. Putting on the apron for meals and taking off the apron. It’s the thought that becomes a foot dropped to the ground to stop the wheelchair being pushed forward.
One cannot argue with No.
Why not, Ma?
No.
She was right.
When there’s nothing to grab on to, there’s no thing to argue against.
Become a solid wall of I don’t want to.
Dig your heels in.
Maybe it’s time to restate the original advice.
If anyone wants you to do anything you don’t want to do, put your foot down and just say No.
If Nancy Reagan and the MeToo Movement had a baby, it woulda been Ma. Unless, she said No.
Thank you to the lovely Katie Settel for the beautiful set of photos from Mom’s 95th birthday. It was the nicest way to spend the day, sharing it with a friend I hadn’t seen in maybe 20 years, sharing what our lives are today. Her babies are grown, my mother has become my child.
I rarely get photos of us together; I was shocked to see I am actually that age it says on my driver’s license.
💥 💥 If this post touched you in any way, would you please consider restacking it and sharing it with your audience?
This spreads the word and keeps me writing…✏️
aka, Mom
What beautiful photographs, Jodi. And a wise sentiment. We could all learn from your mum, but it must drive you nuts when she continues to use ‘No’ so emphatically!
Your mom is a wise woman. And wonderful photos. So glad you got that special opportunity.