The First Time My Mother Lied To Me

It was summer of 1992, and I had just graduated from high school in a small town, Millis, Massachusetts, where I had been living with my mother and stepfather for the previous seven years.

I was flying out to California to go to college. When I got to California, I called my mother to let her know that I was there safe. And she commented that when I went down the airport terminal I never looked back once. And I didn’t.

I had gone to Massachusetts seven years earlier for a visit. I had been happy in Northern California living with my dad, but when I arrived, my mother asked me to stay. They had never had a formal custody agreement, and she felt that I was old enough to decide where I wanted to live.

I had spent most of my life with my dad. My mother wanted her turn, because she thought that would be fair.

As a kid you’re always taught to do what’s fair. My father had recently married again, and he had a new stepson. I thought he had a family, that my mom just wanted a family, and so I would be fair. So I agreed to stay with my mom, and I broke my dad’s heart. I was 11.

Everything was fine for a while. I didn’t know my stepfather very well.

He was from Jamaica, a Rastafarian. He had these long dreadlocks down to his hips that he stuffed into a crocheted hats. It looked like this African onion on the top of his head.

My mother was a one-time model, and the only imperfection I noticed at that time was a chip on her front tooth. When I asked her what had happened, she said that she had fallen down in Jamaica and chipped her tooth. That was the first time my mother lied to me.

The rest of Silas's story continues at 2:06:

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Silas Lindenstein told this story in April 2014 at the Moth Story Slam in Seattle. Silas was a semi-finalist in the 2014 Sacramento Comedy Festival, a finalist in the 2013 Shades of Laughter Comedy Competition and the 2012 Make Jack Laugh Comedy Competition, and performer at the EMP 2013 New Year’s Eve Bash in Seattle. He performs in comedy clubs, theaters and other venues around the Pacific Northwest.

The Seattle Story Project: First-person reflections published at KUOW.org. These are essays, stories told on stage, photos and zines. To submit a story - or note one you've seen that deserves more notice – contact Isolde Raftery at iraftery@kuow.org or 206-616-2035.