Cleopatra Chrysanthemum

Cleopatra Chrysanthemum. That's the name I'd choose if I could change mine. No, not from "Susan Kawa." From "Mom." You see, it's much harder for toddlers to say.

"Cleopatra Chrysanthemum!" I guarantee you they wouldn't be calling it out ten million times every hour. And I wouldn't be whipping my head around everywhere I go, hearing generic high-pitched voices shriek my name in public.

The name itself bespeaks a woman of style and leisure. Who can sip a cup of tea out of a china teacup with a properly positioned saucer, and not have it knocked out of her hand by a wayward football. She sits on a damask settee, whereas "Mom" has never actually SEEN a settee, except in glossy mail order catalogs.

She wears "Dry Clean Only" clothes, and sports a trendy hairstyle. The kind that takes upwards of 3 hours to get "just right." She buys her cosmetics at department stores, not at the supermarket. She carries a pert little purse with an impossibly dainty spaghetti strap and a precisely matching wallet. They appear unused. Her dollars are tucked neatly, not floating around in wads, like packing popcorn. She has no teeth marks in her lipstick, and she's never pried gum off of, well, *anything.

Cleopatra Chrysanthemum drives a yellow convertible, and wears a wide brimmed hat that ties neatly under the chin with an attached scarf. Her car keys occupy one of those snap-shut cases. Yellow, to match the car. Her sunglasses cost more than $1.50, and have absolutely NO cartoon characters on them. The convertible smells of new leather, with not a hint of french fries, or vomit (or both.) Cute bag boys never unload groceries into the trunk, mentioning offhand that "My Mom has a car just like this one!"
She's a woman of class.
Sometimes she wears white gloves. And she always has a fresh manicure (with all nails the same color!) Cleopatra Chrysanthemum "does lunch" and usually orders a big salad with cherry tomatoes and exotic cheeses, and NOTHING that starts with "Mc."

She NEVER gets thrown out of the beauty salon. Or restaurants. Or shoe stores. Because the gentlemen and ladies with whom she associates do not have the constitution of super balls. They know how a fanny and a chair are supposed to interact. And they don't demand balloons.

Cleopatra Chrysanthemum lives in an airy bungalow with plank flooring and rag rugs. There are no Cheerios corpses in the corners. No jelly stains on the bottom third of the refrigerator door. Her décor includes WHITE. Not a lot, but SOME. And the white stuff is still white, and will stay white for indefinite periods, to be measured in months and years, not in seconds or minutes.

She never buys laundry detergent in Volkswagen-sized boxes. She is aware of, and actually USES the "delicate" cycle.  She's perhaps the first person to follow the manufacturer's suggestions on loading, so that after "fluff dry," she produces doves and white rabbits. Not wrinkled reptilian wads of angry denim.

Her silverware matches. She calls it "flatware."

Yes, Cleopatra Chrysanthemum is just the name for me. People remember her. She's a breath of fresh air not a "behind the scenes" kind of woman. She's light-hearted, not burdened by responsibility or worry or fear.

Or love.

Shoot.

Okay, well can I at least be "ChrysantheMom?"