Not Becoming My Mother
Ruth Reichl has been dining out on stories about her mother for years. The hilarious opening chapter of her first memoir, 鈥淭ender at the Bone鈥� (1998), recounted how her mother, 鈥淭he Queen of Mold,鈥� accidentally poisoned two dozen people at a party. Young Reichl became a self-appointed watchdog, warning guests off her mother鈥檚 more dangerous concoctions.
With Not Becoming My Mother, Reichl, editor-in-chief of Gourmet magazine and former restaurant critic for The New York Times, attempts to atone for having disloyally mined the mother-lode for entertaining material. The book is essentially a posthumous, left-handed Mother鈥檚 Day card to Miriam 鈥淢im鈥� Brudno Reichl.
In it, her only daughter thanks her for providing such a strong negative example 鈥渙f everything I didn鈥檛 want to be.鈥�
Reichl isn鈥檛 just referring to her mother鈥檚 lamentable culinary skills. The lesson Mim imparted went far deeper: Not working causes misery all around. What Reichl took away from her mother鈥檚 unhappy life is that the key to fulfillment is meaningful employment.
Reichl comments that 鈥渢o this day I wake up every morning grateful that I鈥檓 not her. Grateful, in fact, not to be any of the women of her generation ...鈥�
This sounds harsher than it actually is, for the remarkable thing about Reichl鈥檚 slim book, which grew out of a talk she gave honoring the hundredth anniversary of her mother鈥檚 birth, is her determination to see things from her mother鈥檚 point of view. She does this by excavating her mother鈥檚 personal papers and letters.
What she finds is a woman who was 鈥渕ore thoughtful, more self-aware, and much more generous鈥� than the comic character featured in her Mim Tales.
Reichl boils down her mother鈥檚 difficulties to her acquiescence to societal and familial pressures not to pursue a career. Mim later rued her eagerness to please her parents, who considered marriage the end-all and be-all for women.
Reichl comments: 鈥淕ood women didn鈥檛 work if they didn鈥檛 have to; it would only humiliate their husbands ...鈥� The result, she said, was a whole generation of smart, educated, bored, miserable women, 鈥渁 terrible waste of talent and energy.鈥�
Her mother was bright but no beauty, not a winning combination in the marital meat market.
Reichl was taken aback to find a cruel letter from her grandfather dissuading her mother from following him into medicine: 鈥� 鈥榊ou are a dear girl,鈥� my grandfather had written, 鈥榓nd you have a fine mind. But you will have to resign yourself to the fact that you are homely. Finding a husband will not be easy.鈥� 鈥�
With encouragement like that, Reichl says, is it any wonder that her mother held such a low opinion of herself and plunged into a predictably disastrous first marriage?
Among the things Reichl thanks her mother for is giving her the freedom to disobey her. The implication is that if Reichl had received such a letter, she probably would have ripped it to shreds 鈥� or used it as literary fodder.
In fact, when her mother 鈥� as a test 鈥� addressed a letter to her recently married daughter as Mrs. Douglas Hollis, Reichl sent it back, unopened, as she鈥檇 said she would. Finding that, too, among her mother鈥檚 papers, she discovers that her mother had expected her to return it and had written the letter to herself, a pep talk listing her mistakes and urging herself to stop looking back and start moving forward.
With the rose-tinged clarity of hindsight, Reichl concludes that 鈥渕y mother deliberately sabotaged my respect and emphasized her failings. She loved me enough to make me love her less. She wanted to make sure that I would not follow her footsteps.鈥�
This is, no doubt, a consoling interpretation of her mother鈥檚 woeful behavior, and it sure beats bitterness. But was her bipolar, willfully eccentric, over-medicated mother, a 鈥渢sunami of pain,鈥� really in control enough to 鈥渨illingly鈥� make this 鈥渆normous sacrifice?鈥�
Readers of Reichl鈥檚 columns and previous books about her culinary and personal adventures, including 鈥淐omfort Me With Apples鈥� and 鈥淕arlic and Sapphires,鈥� know that she is an irresistibly engaging, natural storyteller.
鈥淣ot Becoming My Mother鈥� is more didactic, pitched at inspirational fervor over entertainment. On a mission to convey the unequivocal lessons she gleaned from her mother 鈥� 鈥渢hose who are not useful can never be satisfied,鈥� and 鈥渋n the end you are the only one who can make yourself happy鈥� 鈥� Reichl reduces her story to a clear broth that is simple enough to spoon into children, yet bracing enough to fortify everyone.
Heller McAlpin, a freelance critic in New York, is a regular Monitor contributor.
