favors, but no party

"i need you to do me a huge favour." it was my mother on the other end of the phone, and without so much as even a "hello" she asked me for a favour.

"what now? this isn't going to be another bra-buying fiasco is it?" i asked in return, having a sudden flashabck to a darker time in my life.

i always try to maintain my status as the 'good son' by doing things for my mom, but sometimes she steps over the line. the last time she asked me for a 'huge favour' was nearly fifteen years ago. she asked me to go to sears, to the plus-sizes, and get her a dozen 'ahh' bras. i am not fucking kidding, either.

she had apparently found the last remaining 'ahh' bras in the nation in her big-booby size, and that location just so happened to be at sears in overland park, kansas. overland park kansas happened to be a mere ten miles from my home in midtown kansas city, missouri. i didn't have the heart to reason with her that no matter how you look at it, buying bras at sears is definitely 'old lady' and one baby step away from an aarp card.

"and what in christ's name is an 'ahh' bra?" i asked.

"it has an underwire and they are very comfortable," she stated matter-of-factly.

"mom, come on, this is not right. i am twenty-three, gay, single, and NOT a drag queen. please don't ask me go buy your bras for you."

"well what should i do, hop in the car and drive the eight hours just to buy twelve bras? how ungrateful. what if i told you that i don't have any bras to wear because my last one broke today? you want me going all saggy-tits all over town?" guilt was always one of my mother's specialties, unlike cooking.

"fine! but you owe me, woman! you owe me big time!" i hopped in the car and off i went to sears.

i found my way to the granny panty section but for the life of me could not spot a rack of any bras called the 'ahh' bra. finally a matronly looking woman appraoched me and asked if she could help me.

"um, well, can you tell me if you have any of the 'ahh' bras in a forty-two-d?"

she looked me up and down then rolled her sagging eyes and said, "i do not want to know why a man is buying 'ahh' bras." she took me to the hidden rack of the mysterious bras and began searching for mom's size.

"i need a dozen of them if you have them."

again, the rolling eyes and a sigh as she kept searching. after i stood there for what seemed like eons, i was handed a dozen bras and then she had the nerve to ask if there was anything else i needed help with. as if buying your mom's braziers weren't bad enough.

"i am never, ever going to date in this town again," i thought to myself, dying inside at the same time.

"i need you to go to jo-ann fabrics and get me a twenty-eight-inch separating zipper," my mother woke me up from the flashback of bra-buying.

"here we go again. i might as well reserve the u-haul now. buying your bras drove me out of kansas city, and now hunting down a sasquatch-sized zipper in the notions department of a fabric store will run me out of dallas. why do you hate me?"

"stop being so damn dramatic and go get me a zipper! it's for your jacket. that you asked me to repair after you let that stupid dog chew it up."

ouch. just like the bra buying fiasco, it's not often i can say no to my mother. so, i went to buy the zipper. and i am still the 'good son."

in the background::mother's talk:tears for fears