“I’m tickled pink,” my mother said, a big smile on her face, when I told her I’d been accepted to college.
“You see, sweetheart,” she said, using her most charming tone, “you used to get so angry at me when I pushed you to do your homework and to study, study, study, but I know now that my persistence was a big factor in your success.”
“Nice spin, Mom.”
“So where did you get accepted?” she asked.
“University of Wyoming in Laramie.”
“Wyoming? That’s the wilderness,” she lamented. “I’ll never see you!”
(exactly 92 words)
Written for Sammi Cox’s Weekend Writing Prompt, where we are challenged to write a poem or piece of prose using the word “spin” in exactly 92 words. Also for these daily prompts: Ragtag Daily Prompt (pink), The Daily Spur (mother), Weekly Prompts (smile), Word of the Day Challenge (charming), Fandango’s One-Word Challenge (factor), and Your Daily Word Prompt (wilderness).
This, That, and the Other 
You mean — there’s a University there? Just kidding. My brother went to the University of Idaho, in Moscow (pronounced “mos coh”) and it’s on top of a mountain.
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Back off, Marilyn. That’s where I went to college! ;o)
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Good One! I think I have a grandson who might do something similar! 🙂
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I went to the University of Wyoming! Did you or did you just pick it as an obscure locale?
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No, I just picked it because, to a coast dweller, Wyoming sounded remote. And from what I remember about driving through Wyoming, it seems like a vast wilderness. I’m sure it’s a good school.
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It was a vast wilderness. Especially around Laramie, although it is surrounded by mountains as well and almost any route you take into it, you need to go through or pass by some of them. I’ve never thought about whether it was a good school or not because I’ve never had a basis for comparison. It was just fun that you picked it to make use of in your story. I went there because it was out of state and I didn’t know anyone there. Also, my sister had gone there so I was a bit acquainted with it. I just wanted so badly to get out into life and to be a stranger! Ha.
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Oy… moms. I am one… still just a mom (not a grandmother… which is okay). I’m dealing with sort of the opposite right at this very state in time. I very recently found out that my oldest son has held a resentment for fifteen years for the fact I told him he needed to move out (I don’t remember for sure if he was eighteen or nineteen*). He was annoyed with the younger sons and had developed a level of anger involving throwing things around (the biggest thing was a floor lamp) while yelling at me about my other children. (Of course, it was ironic.)
He was already fully employed at the time, while attending college as well (and I continued helping him with that for another year or so). He was never homeless or in dire straights. He completed college. He married a young woman with whom he is supposedly happy (and who is successful in her work life although she doesn’t work in her field any more as she trained to be a teacher). He has a great career underway. I don’t know why someone would be harboring perceived slights from relatively long ago if one’s life has gone on swimmingly.
* (… or nineteen or twenty… he started dating his now-wife at twenty-one)
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😂 She just can’t let her child go.
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Many moms (and dads) have trouble letting go.😏
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I had the same experience with my mom
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Ha! A well spun tale of a child finding their way with and in spite of mom’s help.
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Good one.
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Thanks, Neel.
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