A Cow is a Cow
Ruby
It was ten o’clock on Saturday morning. I proudly wore the dress my mother had just given me for my eighteenth birthday.
The doorbell rang.
Earlier in the week, after I finished a day’s work at Woolworth’s Dime Store, I walked across the street in downtown Pacific Beach, to Dorothea’s Dress Shop. A certain dress had caught my eye. That evening, I mentioned it to my mother. I only told her about it because it was more than I could afford, and I was planning to save for it.
My lovely surprise on that birthday morning was the dress. I still remember how it felt. A perfect fit, with a full skirt, a black belt and three-quarter-length sleeves. The speckled grey was broken with thin streaks of black and red running through the material. I felt so special in this wonderful gift from my mother.
The doorbell rang again. I answered it with a cheerful greeting.
“Good morning,” I said. There stood a woman I did not know, and yet, somehow, I did.
“Are you Ruby?” I asked.
“Well, who am I talkin’ to?” she asked.
“I’m Ann,” I answered.
She looked down, seeming embarrassed.
“Yeah, I’m Ruby.”
I extended my hand. “Well, come on in,” I said warmly.
Ruby was my birth mother.
