My mother carried her purse like a soldier carrying his weapon. Close to her side, she’d stand guard as if some inconspicuous body was waiting beyond the corner of her eye, on the verge of breaking her arms free from their sold grip. She called it her pocketbook. The short vinyl straps always remained secure around her right shoulder. Every outing, both big and small, called for a retrieval of the oversized accessory. My keeping an eye on the purse while my mother scurried up the aisle for Communion was not to be trusted. Even in church, my mother remained guarded. “Just because a person’s Catholic doesn’t mean he’s not a thief.” She had an answer to all my questions. With bag held securely under her arm, my mother walked comfortably toward the altar, alongside the roaming eyes of Catholics whose loyalty to certain commandments she questioned.

As a child, I was certain that mother’s pocketbook contained treasures that would soon be mine to keep, treasures I longed for. These items defined the beauty of my mother, making her, as my father would often say, “soft on the eyes.” This beauty, this self-definition, I was eager to discover for myself and make my own. The shiny gold cylinder that twisted cleverly, revealing the brightest of reds would be applied to my mother’s pale lips. The sweet smell that always followed her was kept tightly sealed in the frosted blue bottle with lilacs on one side. Unfastening the purse’s silver snap would release an immediacy of aroma, causing me to imagine that the lilacs from our once prosperous garden had been collected inside this bag and locked away for my mother to secretly adorn.

In my small hands, mother’s pocketbook was like a load of bricks to my underdeveloped arms. Struggling, I’d often heave the large bag upon my lap in search of a piece of candy or stick of gum. Each quest was my own rediscovery of the woman I called my mother. Beyond the lipsticks and liquid rouge were the rosary beads of my grandmother from a century and country of old. Letters bound with a pink rubber band were addressed solely to my mother, from a sister who lived far away. Curiously, I’d gather words in my head that might have been written in those private letters, but I knew they were words that she alone should cherish.