Well, that’s torn it. I’ve officially turned into my mother. I’m writing this with a bowl of freshly stolen picked blackberries at my elbow.

I took a walk on the trail below my house. So far, this is normal for me, but the rest of this sequence is completely unnatural.

1. Noticed AND recognized blackberry bushes.

2. Saw ripe blackberries.

3. Made sure they weren’t a similar looking poisonous berry by eating a few.

4. Spent the rest of my walk figuring out how to take the berries home without a container.

5. Improvised a bowl by picking somebody’s large grape leaves (The owner wouldn’t mind).

6. Rationalized that these berries didn’t belong to anyone, and even if they did, they were going to waste so I deserved them.

7. Picked as many as I could.

8. Made plans to come back in a few days to get more.

9. Listened to the same nonsensical blather about “boundaries” and “honesty” from my daughter that I used to give to my mother, thus completing the circle of life.

During that walk, I tried to adjust my mind to the fact that I was behaving exactly as Mom would have. Don’t get me wrong, Mom was a wonderful lady, even if her values were a bit elastic when it came to berries. But I’m way too young! If I’m stealing … err … picking berries already, am I doomed to adopt four more cats and let them eat off the dinner table? Will I start sending my daughter money for groundhog’s day? Will I buy 20 pounds of funnel cake mix because it’s on sale? Surely, not. I’m my own person.

But, as I trudged along thinking of mom, I remembered her purse. She had everything in her purse — Kleenex, certs, safety pins, a recipe for seven-layer dip paperclipped to Richard Simmon’s Deal a Meal wheel, a flashlight, a sandwich from last week.

“Gross, Mom! Throw that out!”

“It’s perfectly good!”

and so on.

With satisfaction I pictured my own very small purse. But then the disturbing thought intruded, that even though my purse doesn’t have everything in it, my office does. My office is just an extra-large version of the purse! I too have Kleenex, breath mints, recipes, a flashlight, a sewing kit, holiday decorations and an inflatable toupee (don’t ask). The scary thing is that this is exactly the kind of random thing Mom might have had in her purse.

Mom is gone now, but I remembered our conversations.

Mom: “Well now that I think of it, I know how to shrink heads. Would that help?”

Me: “Well, that’s not quite … hold on, human heads?!”

Mom: “Well, certainly not animal heads!”

Me, rolling my eyes: “Of course not, but how?

Mom: “The trick is to get the sand really really hot …

Me: “I mean, why do you know this?”

Mom: “Oh, it’s just one of those things you pick up.”

Would my daughter have similar memories of me? No …. well, I’m sure she’s forgotten that chat about juggling running lawnmowers. I can’t help that I know … never mind. Moving on.

I read once that in my grandmother’s day, mothers would make a paste out of opium to rub on their babies’ gums to soothe them. And I knew the fields of poppies where my mom grew up were ideal for making opium.

“Omi never did that to you and Uncle Helmut did she?” I asked Mom jokingly.

“Oh no,” she said with shifty eyes.

“Wait a minute,” I said. “You never did that to ME, did you?”

“We were living in New York when you were a baby,” she replied.

I noticed that this didn’t exactly answer the question, also I’m pretty sure you can get just about anything in Manhattan.

“I repeat. Did you ever…?”

“Oh, don’t be silly,” she sniffed.

Many years later, I got to visit Breslau, Poland, the area where my mother grew up, and I saw the vast fields of poppies for myself. I hadn’t realized they were so large. Huh. That explained a lot.

Oh well. There are worse fates than turning into my mother. Plus, there are still a lot of berries left. I can’t wait to go back.

Mom would be proud.

Anneli Byrd is an academic adviser in Weber State University’s Student Success Center.

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