This story is part of the Healthyish Guide to Being Alone, a series of tips, recipes, and stories about how to be alone when we’re together and together when we’re alone.
Just a few weeks (which feel like months) ago, CNN’s Chris Cuomo invited his brother, the governor of New York Andrew Cuomo, onto his show to update the nation about the state’s response to an increasingly dire pandemic. Chris ended the segment by saying, “No matter how hard you’re working, there’s always time to call Mom.”
“I called mom,” the governor responded. “By the way, she said I was her favorite. Good news is, she said you were her second-favorite son.” The tit-for-tat became a rare moment of levity for a very stressed out country—a much-needed, warm-hearted distraction.
If you are from an Italian family—or have at least joined one of us for a home-cooked meal—you’d know that the mother is often the anchor of our households, the foil to tough-as-nails fathers, the reason we put aside our differences and begrudgingly agree to sit peacefully for a meal. Mom is the nurturer and provider, the one who’s always asking if you’re hungry before prying into the details of your personal life. The Cuomos’ “call mom” shtick is a classic move by us Italian children who are always vying for her attention, affection, or (let’s be honest) culinary talents. It’s our way of saying, “I talked to mom and you didn’t, you ungrateful bastard.”
Unfortunately, this guilt trip rarely worked on me. I was the only one of Mom's five children to fly the coop, landing hundreds of miles from Boston in New York City. Mom always wants to speak to me, and usually comes prepared with detailed questions about what’s happening in my life, prompted by tweets she’s read or scenes she’s observed on my Instagram Story. For much of the last 10 years, we’ve endured an unfortunate routine every time I finally answered the phone: When are you coming home next? And then, when I do agree to come home, the frantic back-and-forth: Why are you staying for so short a time? What can I cook for you before you get here? Who should we see while you’re home? Is your fiancé coming? (If no: Why not? Does he have to work? Is everything okay? If yes: What does he like to eat? Should we make reservations? Your father will pick a place. What does his mother cook for him? I can make that.) I frequently dodged the phone calls, only to inevitably get a text from my sister: “Please call mom, she’s driving me nuts.”
Once Governor Cuomo officially sanctioned shelter-in-place orders in New York City, my mom (like most mothers, I’m sure) panicked. The FaceTime calls started coming daily, lasting for as long as it took for me to calm her anxiety. She was prepared to drive down to my apartment in Brooklyn to come get me and bring me home—regardless of the potential risk I could expose her to. I had to explain that social distancing was designed to protect people in her age group, and that she was the most at risk of anyone in our family, not me. Resolved to her confinement, Mom responded by printing her own shipping labels and mailing me boxes filled with “essentials,” including bleach, Lysol wipes, and...freshly-baked loaves of banana bread.
Trapped in my own apartment, I (like many millennials) have enjoyed using this time to try recipes I could never have imagined myself cooking before. With my fiancé working 12-hour shifts at the hospital, I find myself alone more than I’d like in this particular moment, which often allows my curiosity to get the best of me. Whenever I panic or second guess myself—which is often, especially when making anything that involves multiple pans—I call mom.
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