Finding New Friends Can Be A Mixed Bag of Rotten Fruit, Yet Highly Entertaining

My TV tells me BEYONCE is partnering with HAMBURGER HELPER

to solve hunger in America.

Life just gets better & better as people keep doing stupid shit.

* * * * *

We attempted to make new friends recently.  I belong to a few Yahoo groups for homeschoolers and a woman with a 12-year old put out several messages that she was looking for friends for her daughter, who at varying times was either (1) shy or (2) outgoing or (3) lonely or (4) wonderful beyond belief.  I should have known better, oh it was so clear right from the get go. 

Finally we met, against my daughter’s best judgment.  She’s got plenty of friends and doesn’t care to run humanitarian aid missions at her own expense.  However, I always think there’s something wonderful out there waiting for me, just around the bend.  To make it less painful for Rachel, we went to the Cheesecake Factory.  Her arm can always be bent if enough sugary goodness is heaped upon her.

First of all, the woman had posted pictures of her daughter with various famous people, one of whom I mistakenly thought was who I would be meeting.  I was a little intimidated cause the woman was really, really petite and attractive.  (This mother has connections from working PR in NYC.  The photographed chick was actually a woman who plays in a televised soap opera.)  So instead of a beautifully tiny woman I meet a large chick I would have assumed was a transvestite if her daughter wasn’t calling her “Mommy” every few minutes. 

To be fair, the lady has all kinds of health problems and has recently been taken by ambulance to the hospital no less than 3 times in the last 6 weeks.  This may be why her eyesight misses the make-up line which makes it appear she attaches her head to her body every morning with snap-on tools.

Also, her hair.  I mean there are issues.  But it’s not all her fault, I mean I hate my hair, too.  Yet I find it amazing that she would post on Facebook that she’d used a new hair dye which caused her to be “Staying in bed with my head oozing and bleeding” after an allergic reaction.  My gag reflex was activated by that statement and we didn’t see them for a while.

Juxtapose this information with the fact that she supposedly used to be Jon Bon Jovi’s assistant and was engaged to a dude in a famous band that included Brett Michaels, whom she took to the hospital on more than one occasion because he let his diabetes get out of wack. 

So how could I help myself?  We met a couple more times because, in all honesty, the woman is fascinating.  She tells me every detail, which is really what I love.  Our girls worked out at a gym together while we sat in the waiting area.  During conversation she revealed more than I have ever known about a single human being in my life.  It was ALL interesting in a freakish carnival kind of way.  (Yes, I realize I am a cruel bitch.  I’ve accepted it and moved on.)

(I mean, I am in no way saying that I am normal or beautiful or sane.  When we went to the mall together I talked my daughter into having her eyebrows shaped in the middle of the mall by an Indian woman with a string.  As she cried and turned red I got in her face and said, “COME ON!  YOU CAN DO THIS!  YOUR FATHER SERVED IN VIET NAM, FER HEAVEN’S SAKES!”)

This woman’s husband had a work accident and has been in chronic pain for 10 years.  His depression was getting on her nerves, so she checked him into a psychiatric clinic, where they gave him an overdose of electric shock treatments (10 in 20 days).  He now has no memory and shakes with a kind of palsy.  While we were waiting for the girls, he called.  This is what I hear from her end of the conversation with this man who caters to her every whim and cleans up her puke and dog shit:

“You fell?  Do you think it’s broken?  Can you walk on it?  Do you think you need to go to the hospital?  Do you think you could drive yourself?  You’re bleeding?  DON’T TELL ME LATER THAT YOU WANT TO GO TO THE ER WHEN I NEED TO GET MY SLEEP!  Okay, just go lie down.  I’m sure you’ll feel better soon.”  (She did not choose to go home and check on him, did not call for an update, and then forgot to get him a take-out meal at dinner.  As soon as we did finally arrive, he came out of the garage to show her his bloody hand.)

Her daughter is 12 and growing out of her DD bras.  She is also growing hair on her back.  They’re going for some type of adrenal work-up to see if she might have congenital issues passed down from Mom.  Although she refuses to meet up in groups with other children, so she might make from friends, she was willing to dress up in a hoochie outfit at Hot Topic and stand in the doorway waving at boys.  She was able to stand up in the middle of a restaurant and walk up to the manager, saying “We’ve been here 30 minutes and don’t have our appetizers yet!”

She’s a relatively attractive little girl who makes me laugh because she is so incredibly inappropriate in ways that tickle me.  Like when we went out to eat at this really cool restaurant where people cook the food at the table for you and others sit really close.  She had just learned the word c*cks*cker and kept repeating, louder and louder each time.  She got a spot on her shirt and mom tried to clean it up at the table, proceeding to put a hole in her shirt right over the girl’s n*pple area.  I mean, you can’t make this sh*t up.  They were cackling with laughter and people were staring at us, I’m sure trying to decide why this transvestite was traveling with a 12-year old.

Mom was admitted to the hospital after her sister upset her on Mother’s Day by saying, over and over, “YOU’RE THE BIGGEST MOTHERFUCKER I’VE EVER KNOWN!”  It was so upsetting to my new friend that she passed out on the floor.  Her sister stepped over her to obtain some items she’d left behind in the kitchen, then went home.  My new friend somehow drove 30 minutes home, lay in bed “vomiting profusely everywhere!  Charlie had to clean it up, cause I don’t touch that stuff!”  Then they called an ambulance.

They have 3 tiny dogs they dote over, but neither female cleans up dog poop, only Daddy.  She convinced her mother-in-law to buy her a $3,500 new washer/dryer combo by guilting her over the recent hospitalization.  They just bought a new JAGUAR and the daughter posted pics on Facebook.

Here’s the glitch!  We were going to go to a mall with them today, then NYC to the wax museum on Monday.  I thought it would be a kick.  But then she increased her stalking behavior.  The woman and her daughter call us over and over and over again.  We do not answer.  It seems to entice them to call more.  Then they read our info on Facebook, see that we’re doing other things, and leave crazy messages like “RACHEL, I HAVE TRIED CALLING YOUR MOM BUT GET NO ANSWER!  PLEASE HAVE HER CALL ME!”

I have oppositional defiance disorder, undiagnosed other than by my extremely intelligent friend Roxanne.  It has answered many questions for me about my own behavior.  If you push me to a wall, I will spit on you.  I will climb between your legs to get away, breaking your kneecaps with a hammer in the process.  I do NOT like being told what I have to do.  Five days before the trip to NYC was going to happen she began leaving me messages about how we HAD to order specific tickets ON-LINE, how we HAD to talk about what train we would take from what station.

People, I do not plan ahead.  When I plan ahead I have a quirk in my head that immediately goes, “Oops, changed my mind.  Fuck that.  What was I thinking?  I don’t want to!”  I must trick myself into doing things by not thinking about them before I jump up from my recliner and run to the car, revving the engine and flying down the driveway!  I cannot have a transvestite mom calling me, writing me, messaging me, bossing me around.  I cannot have her crazy freaking daughter — who twice now has gotten us to her home under the pretense of going to see a movie, then upon arrival said, “I don’t really want to see a movie!” in a whiny voice — who has extremely bad chunky highlights — running my life.  I don’t CARE that the girl has met both the Jonas Brothers AND the Cheetah Girls.  She’s not the boss of me!

So do I (A) Leave them hanging and just disappear or (B) Tell them someone died or (C) Mention my exposure to Swine Flu and express concern that their lives will be jeopardized if in my presence?

Cause, you know, doing things in a mature and civilized manner is kind of out of my realm of possible behavior.

I Hate The News Media &/or Michael Jackson Did Not Define My Childhood

I apologize profusely to those fellow bloggers who are grieving over recent deaths in the news.  You may wish to move on to a happier, less evil blog than this one today . . .

(Let me know if I say anything that offends you.  I might want to offend you again later.)

If only I wasn’t a balless wonder and that was really my attitude!

* * * * *

Was Michael Jackson’s life a sad one?  Yes, desperately tragic.  He was a psychotic egomaniac who apologized to carrots before he ate them, then (allegedly) had little boys for dessert.  

He had 50 long years to deal with whatever made him hate himself so intensely that he chose to disfigure his own face and skin.  FIFTY YEARS!  That’s way more than a lot of people get, children with cancer or soldiers on the front line in Viet Nam or Iraq.

The man died with almost 500 million dollars worth of debt, which is utterly sickening, selfish, hideous.  Self-hatred aside, he lived as if he were God, clearly believing he deserved everything created under the sun.  He even believed he could buy people, as evidenced by his adventures in that arena.  He bought his own children.

His voice, his dancing ability, those were GIFTS.  He was not thankful. 

Did he join in with Jimmy Carter & build housing for the homeless?  No, he built Neverland and took rides on ferris wheels and merry-go-rounds with an ape.  Fer Christ’s sake, are ya f*cking kidding me here people?  He no doubt treated his monkey so much better than the abused children of the world.

How is it we as a society have come to adore these morons who drive half-million dollar cars and wear shoes that cost more than a year’s salary in a third-world country?  Even as they scream their Democratic beliefs from the rooftops and insist they are humanitarians!  It’s such bullsh*t!

* * * * *

How many women would choose to have ass cancer if their entire lives they could look like Farrah Fawcett?  A helluva lot of them, I would bet.  I understand wanting to offer a bit of humanity to any other living being, but this woman had a freaking exceptional life.  Heap your pity on the cleaning lady or the garbage man.  Throw out an extra $20 in tips this week.

* * * * *

Do I give a rat flying f*ck about a TV pitch man I never heard of, who made his fortune selling shit in infomercials on television, compared with children making trips to Disney through the Make-A-Wish Foundation, their parents dazed & confused as they try to figure out how to have FUN?! 

Or the children whose fathers will never come back from Iraq?

F*CK NO!

* * * * *

I have become obsessed with Facebook and so I read many, many comments a day, a good deal of them made by people I don’t know, simpletons I would never want to know.  People who say things like “My childhood ended this week.” 

Well, my childhood ended when my father died.  He was 33.  I was 10 years old and in 5th grade.  What I would have given for another 17 years with him!  Neither Farrah Fawcett nor Ed McMahon nor Michael Jackson had even an ounce of impact upon my life then or now.

* * * * *

Years ago I wanted to get my master’s degree and become a therapist.  Then on reality TV the other day I observed a woman completely lose it, sobbing in agony, the kind of pain I feel regarding my father.  I wanted to peel my skin off with a dull carrot peeler rather than observe the expression of that kind of agony. 

It was a bonus moment.  I realized I saved about $60,000 since I would never have been able to use the therapist’s license if people dared express that kind of agony in front of me.

And that is why I can’t bear people expressing supposed grief over famous figures who don’t really touch their lives in any way compared to loved ones who die and rip your heart out.  It so totally denigrates the kind of pain a daughter has when she loses her father at the age of 10, the kind of pain everyone has at some point in their lives, the kind that is real. 

It makes my heart hurt, too, just thinking of my blog roll and things people have suffered silently — and still do — with little or no sympathy sent their way.  Just know I’m thinking of you.

There is plenty of agony in life.  Don’t take a share that doesn’t belong to you.

Turning 49 & Fine Tuning My Twisted Religion

Every year on June 16th there is a (SCHIZOPHRENIC) part of me that likes the idea of a sash and crown.  I have an alter ego who wants people to wave & honk at me from their cars, mouthing: “I KNOW YOU!  IT’S YOUR BIRTHDAY!”   This egomaniac wants others to thank me for gracing the planet, to love me with glee in their hearts. 

So it’s really f*cking disappointing when none of that ever happens! 

To change it up a bit, this year I decided to host my own First Annual Birthday Party.   (Hosting people in my home is one of the most stressful things I could ever do to myself).  I went with it anyway because this hideous number of 49, so close to 50, has given me the philosophy that I’ll be dead relatively soon (if I live to anything less than 99 I’m over the freaking hump & on the downhill side!)

so I should do EVERYTHING!  

To keep it interesting,  I brought in a hostess with www.pureromance.com and she demonstrated her wares for entertainment.  I’m way more of a prude & far less experienced in this area than my obnoxious mouth would lead you to believe.  Thus, I now realize that my husband and I have been living like neanderthals, using things like fingers and toes & Kool-Whip instead of C.rings and Pick.le Pleazers and Strawberry Cheesecake flavored whip. 

By the time it was over I was concerned that with some of the more complicated devices my husband & I might get twisted and wrapped up to the point where we’d need to yell for help.  (Some implements were more out of a Star Wars re-make by Larry Flynt, rather than anything romantic!)

I was hoping for silly, idiotic nonsense & laughter.  At that we succeeded.

* * * * *

I knew there would be people who didn’t show up, people who didn’t even acknowledge the invitation.  My quite reasonable solution?  Girlfriends who didn’t appear would be written off like a tax exemption (no excuses, not free trips to Paris nor amputation).  But then Roxanne’s kids got swine flu and I couldn’t hold true to my very simple plans, just like always!  Well, except for Donna and Kathy & Diane, who . . . wait a minute.  Who?  I don’t know anyone by those names.

My ditzy wack job friend Kim replied with this nonsensical diatribe:

“Just realized your party was a fu.kkerware.  Call me old fashioned, uptight, a jerk, but make sure it starts with pro American and add Christian so it sounds even better.” 

Then she adds this little piece:

Call me when you want to go to church!

God bless your hubby!

My reply:

“Regarding church, there was a time you had gotten away from the sanctimonious bullshit . . . Otherwise, I love Jesus:)  But I’d rather deal in dil.dos than fake ass m*therfukers:) 

How’s that for honest?  I’m working on it.

49 is magical!

Love Always,

PAMAJAMA”

As for blessing my husband, what in the world does she think he prays for?  Cause I’m pretty sure you’re getting very close when it comes to cotton candy flavored massage oil that warms when blown on.

* * * * *

Meanwhile, I didn’t start party planning until the day before & we were driving the streets at 10 p.m. looking for an open liquor store so I could find brandy for marinating the sangria.  Our 11-year old was in the backseat yacking on and on about how “I can’t believe I’m driving around with my parents looking for an OPEN LIQUOR STORE!”  She’s never had to go out at 2 a.m. for a pack of Marlboros either, but it’s not like children don’t do that every night of the year here in America.  I’m sure there are roaming children on the streets right now!

The morning of the soiree I had old bowls of cereal still on the counter, books on the floor, garbage overflowing!  (To say nothing of cookies or cake or tiny hot dogs wrapped in bacon.)  In the end I remembered what I should have known from the beginning: women don’t eat!  No need to cook unless you’re inviting men and children.  Throw a vegetable tray on the table and open the wine.

* * * * *

My birthday brought about a level of negativity that made me nervous, a newfound depth of nastiness.  Even my blogging fell to the wayside as I sat in a chair, numb with the realization that my mommy days are ending and I need to get a life, one based on my own thoughts & desires & decisions.  I don’t want to.  I don’t want to succeed or fail based upon my own actions, I so prefer hiding behind my children.  I don’t want to get old, I don’t want to grow up, I don’t want to be mature, I don’t want to behave appropriately. 

I’m railing against an imaginary entity! 

I can do whatever I want! 

 I’ve got no f*cking idea what I want!

Sweet, simple people speaking of their normal non-obscene lives still make me cringe and feel nauseous.  If I hear one more young mother coo over her babies I will surely slam myself to the floor in an attempt to dull the pangs of jealousy, the annoyance at the naivete. 

We were supposed to go to New Mexico for a wedding August 1st and it’s probably a good thing that my husband has called it off.  The perfectly beautiful girl getting married AND her sister both have new infants.  They are psychotically happy, as fortunate in their current lives as any lottery winners.  Their mother (my husband’s sister) oozes with a syrupy sweet, orgasmic, grandmotherly glow that gags me. 

Recently on Facebook she replied to the utterly uncreative commentary between her two daughters with

“You two are hysterical!”

HYSTERICAL?  Jim Norton’s “Monster Rain” on HBO, created by a man who hates himself and everyone else, the blackest humor imaginable, that’s hysterical.  

The scene in “Jackass 2.0″ where a guy puts powder on the crack of his ass and then farts in the face of a sleeping dude, engulfing him in a fine white mist, THAT totally hits the mark for me. 

When I tell my daughter that’s how I’m going to wake her the next time she bitches about getting out of bed and then she punches me in the arm 27 times as we’re driving down the road screaming at each other & laughing maniacally to the point where we can hardly catch our breath upon such a disgusting thought, yep.

I seem to have found a dark place and I’m beginning to grow mold.

My Sister Reminds Me of Mother Teresa, Which Makes Me Anna Nicole Smith

Yesterday I returned from my second trip to Kentucky.  Typically, after purposely avoiding the place for 25 years, I visit twice in less than three months.

Really, I should leave home more often.  This time my husband opened the pool, painted the kitchen AND a bathroom.  It looked so different that I said, “Oh my God, I even love the new light fixture!”  As it turns out, it wasn’t new, I just hadn’t noticed it in the three years we’ve lived here.  The previous wallpaper was so ugly I could see nothing else.

He also dealt with the 11-year old (who suddenly acts 17), the one who grew an inch taller than me in only a week’s time after counting the minutes until my departure.  (”Not to hurt your feelings or anything Mom, you understand!”)

It’s so unusual for me to be completely alone that for a good portion of my initial driving time (after dropping my son off at his university dorm) I continued to catch myself believing my daughter was in the backseat.  I would turn to check on her or begin to say something and then remember she wasn’t there.  After the fifth or sixth time I wondered how long it would take to get the hint, so I could stop feeling really stupid.

* * * * *

After 25 hours in the car, I’m not so good with adjusting to the return home.  My body continues to quiver as if I’m still moving at hyper-speed.  Actually, being on the road was fun.  I love driving 80 mph in the Charger, blowing people away with the hemi, pretending I’m part of a video game.

Of course, there’s the other piece where I’m crossing myself and begging God that I don’t die until my daughter grows up.  The various personalities in my head begin arguing, one suggesting she’d be better off without my influence TODAY, IMMEDIATELY!  Now I’m flying down the road with two bitches slugging it out as to whether my influence on her is positive or negative.  Actually, I’m sure it’s both. 

I am certain of NOTHING after spending a long weekend entirely on my own with a 1, 2 and 3-year old.

When the voices become annoying I put on the radio or a CD.  Sometimes I listen to books on tape, but it’s hard finding something to love & most are disappointing.  For this trip two new music CD’s, Duffy (it’s been years since I’ve fallen in love with someone the way I have with this chick, especially the song Mercy) and Elliot Yamin (my boy).

I do not stay in hotels on the road, preferring to sleep in my car (with embarrassingly dirty hair & a look that screams CRACKHEAD with a secondary donut addiction) rather than deal with bed bugs or filthy phones or invisible jism on the walls (cause you KNOW it’s there).

(Side Note: Does anyone reading this communicate with Red (who convinced me that every coffee pot in every hotel in the USA has been shit in at least once)?  Has anyone heard from her or know she’s okay?  I think of her daily, since she deleted her blog, and miss that crazy chick.)

I did get stopped once.  I’d been on the road since 9 a.m. & after 18 hours a young, slow-talking Tennessee Sheriff’s officer wondered why I was weaving in a confused manner.  I’m sure he expected me to slur my words and stumble, but it was just a case of serious darkness in the middle of nowhere and no clear lines on winding asphalt.  I was tickled pink when he asked, “Ma’am, do you carry a concealed weapon?“  Even the idea gave me a thrill!  I laughed out loud & said, “No one would EVER give me such a thing!”  (My dear friend Roxanne claims I should have said, “Only my rapier-like wit!” but I don’t think nearly that fast.) 

Thankfully, I left with no ticket, possibly because he was pleased I was about to leave his state behind, thus becoming Kentucky’s problem.  He happily provided me with directions.

* * * * *

I went back because I was already making a trip south.  When I came up with this brilliant idea the extra eight hours of driving time sounded utterly reasonable, sort of like making pancakes for breakfast.  So I told my sister, “I’ll watch the kids!  You just make a plan to have fun.”  She’s had her grandchildren for three months now.  The entire situation is truly mind boggling once you are there and realize the difficulties involved.  The magnitude of issues & complications does not translate well onto paper.

Well, when I said, “Make a plan” she took me literally.  I thought

perhaps an afternoon of golf,

she thought

53 hours in the Smoky Mountains, 300 miles and six hours away, with two overnights booked in a hotel. 

We never bothered to compare our visualized experiences until I was standing in her living room and her boyfriend was carrying enough clothes to the car for a Mexican honeymoon.

It was about then that the 2-year old little boy plucked a tick off the dog bed and said, “Here, Gramma!”  She told me then that they’d just treated the two huge Boxers for an infestation and went on to say with pride and amazement: “He’s been finding them everywhere!  He’s really got an eye for it!”  (It took me several hours to sit on anything other than a coffee table.  I never did pull the cover down and climb into the bed, choosing instead to stay on top the bedspread fully clothed.)

An hour later they left and I found myself looking at 3 children under 4 years of age, all completely dependent upon me to behave as a mature adult & keep them alive for an entire weekend.

It was quite a learning experience.  If I ever had any fairy tale dreams about (1) how I should have had more children closer in age or (2) how my (fill in the blank) makes me somehow superior to my sister in any way . . .  they’re gone.

A Perspective on Vaginas & American Idol Voters

Rarely is anything or anyone 100% correct, cause it’s all about perspective.  It’s easy to believe in the moment – like that obnoxious bitch Judge Judy — that you are absolutely above it all and RIGHT, RIGHT, RIGHT.

So often you’re wrong.  I’m wrong!  I realize my stupidity when I’ve opened my mouth and suddenly the universe responds: “Why is that idiot crossing the yellow line?”  Within seconds I notice the tire of my own car do the same thing.  “Who in the hell put this drink here, the one I just knocked over?”  A moment later I remember it was me.  It’s always me.

At home or in the privacy of the car my mouth opens far too quickly and I express my thoughts in a manner similar to the movie character Carrie on her rampage, after having been covered by pig’s blood at prom.  

In mixed company I think twice, I keep opinionated statements to myself because I really believe there is some merit to nearly every point of view AND I fear argument, dissension and conflict.  (If I had any sense at all I’d be more worried about the 11 year old hearing my crazy comments.) 

Most of all, I want people to like me: homeless schizophrenics, criminals, friends, enemies, children, total strangers & people I will never, ever see again.  I want them to LOVE me.  So I do a chameleon thing.  I’m not proud of that fact, it’s a character defect, but at least I own it as MY character defect.

This is why I don’t talk about politics & have recently added a new toxic subject area:

American Idol

There are but a few things I’ve had such strong beliefs about that I’m willing to expose myself and stand up for what’s right: real butter over margarine, bras with an underwire for heaving bosoms.  However, life is even chipping away at some of those long held certainties!

There was a time when I believed in natural childbirth.  I bought the bullshit, I refused an epidural.  (Meanwhile, my crackhead niece didn’t even have prenatal care and the kids are perfectly fine!)  Labor lasted 37-1/2 hours.  They pulled and told me to push, which messed me up.  I am convinced you want NO FURTHER DETAIL.  (My shame filter is gone, so I’m doing this only for your benefit cause I’D LOVE TO TELL YOU ALL ABOUT IT!)

Eleven years later, I find out I’m pregnant.  The FIRST thing I tell the doctor, who writes it AT THE TOP of my information sheet: “PATIENT REQUESTS EPIDURAL.”  A change of perspective.

Recently I was speaking with a young woman who is pregnant with her second child.  She is adamant that this birth experience be the ultimate of all time to make up for the fact that the first one didn’t go as planned.  The anxiety she expressed over the possibility of losing control in the birthing room was palpable and pushed my superwoman buttons.  I decided I should tell her a tale from my own life.  What a dumbass I am!  It’s like I thought I was 78 years old for a minute.  This chick did NOT want to hear what I had to say, but I didn’t care.

(I might have gone a little too far, you judge.)

She told us she is diabetic and the doctors are more conservative in treatment than she would like to be.  (Homeschoolers typically are unhappy unless they can give birth squatting over a dirt floor inside a straw hut with no medical assistance for miles or alternatively while bathing in organic dolphin pee.)  She’s concerned a cesarean section will be necessary (to save her life, duh). 

So I stepped in as the voice of reason & said, “Either way, you walk out with a baby!  It’s all good!”  The expression on her face didn’t seem to register my wise counsel, so I had to go further.  I told her I used to adamantly believe women should wait until they go into labor, they should not schedule childbirth the way they would a dog grooming.  She nodded her head in agreement.  I said, “Then I had a 9 pound baby and a 10 lb., 11 oz. baby, both delivered vaginally.”

This is where I may have stepped off the grid.  I added, “Those women who scheduled cesareans?  They now have nice tight vaginas.  I’m thinking they’re not as stupid as I might have initially believed!  I mean, I’m not saying my vagina is a BIG GAPING HOLE or anything, but still!”

* * * * *

Anyway, my point regarding American Idol being . . .

one of them stood head & shoulders above the rest.

If I heard 20 people sing the same song I could not identify Kris Allen’s voice after listening to him sing weekly for several months.

However, if I heard 1,000 people sing the same song I could identify Adam Lambert because his would be the very best rendition, time and time again.

So . . . I’m not saying that the vacuous people who voted for Kris Allen instead of Adam Lambert have big gaping vaginas, but I’m thinking it.

Mothers & Sons ~ As Twisted As It Gets

I’ve done so little in the past week that I had to ask my husband,

“Did I leave the house at all?”

All four movies I watched Saturday were great, providing no incentive to move.

I’m convinced it’s like a bear conserving energy for the days ahead.  Today the girl & I go into NYC to pick up the boy and my life will change for a little while. 

It’s all so bizarre, this adult child thing. Each time he moves I’m suddenly involved in his life again.  On the other hand, the first time he does not ask for my help I will be more devastated than I can even put into print. 

The kid can’t win.

For some unbelievable reason my husband isn’t willing to go into the city at 1:30 in the afternoon and battle traffic when we could have gone in at 7:30 in the evening.  Can you believe he’s so unfeeling about my son’s desire to make it home in time to go to a bar tonight and meet friends? 

Such insensitivity.

For some reason it also bugs the big guy that when we get there (in his truck, the one the boy will use while he’s home) nothing will be packed (before we have to haul it down 11 stories), which will no doubt be the case. 

The boy already verbally agreed that’s how it’ll be.  (He had such an impish grin in his voice and laughing tone.  Really, it was adorable!)

* * * * *

Things I do differently when my oldest child is home:

1.) Bite my tongue way more than usual.  (No harsh voice allowed, no irritation shown, no disagreement.) 

2.) Pretend to make motions toward homemaking activities like cleaning, organizing, laundry, etc.  Sometimes I actually do that stuff. 

(I just spoke to my friend Roxanne today and she was delivering a grilled cheese to the couch for her newly graduated 22-year old.  It’s nearly impossible to compete!  I think there may be private meetings where the guys all get together and say, “Hey, what did you get your mom to do today?” 

“Mine made my bed AND french toast.”

“Mine took money right out of my dad’s wallet for me & spoon-fed me peas!”

“Ah, that’s nothing.  Mine is driving into a city full of several million people with my little sister, in a pick-up truck.  She’ll move all my stuff down 11 stories and pack it up for me while I take my computer apart AND she’ll buy me food on the way home!  All so I can get to the bar on time!”

And then they laugh and laugh!

Young moms shouldn’t feel smug cause they start practicing this shit around age 6 or so.)

3.) I jump to make him special meals with lots of protein, fruits & vegetables.  I will make 100 cups of hot tea in the week to come, filling them with fresh lemon to soothe allergies.  (This does not go over well with husband and daughter, not at all.  It’s like I have a couple of puppies watching me.  Where’s mine?  Mind you, neither of them drink tea or like my cooking.)

4.) Turn my life around to make things convenient for him, break dates with friends & leave all my time free just in case.  (He leaves me hanging, puts everything off to the last second, like I am the “alternative plan,” which no doubt I am.)

5.) Occasionally find my head up my own ass after twisting and maneuvering and accidentally leaving it up there.

6.) Pray every time he gets in the car and drives away.  Worry about where he is and when he’ll be back and whether he’s safe.  (For some reason I am able to let go of this for the most part when he’s living elsewhere.  I am evidently far more afraid of vehicles than guns or muggers or street gangs or swine flu.)

7.) Ask question after question in an attempt to start a conversation, laugh at myself, converse with myself, smile like an idiot preparing to jump from a clown car.  (Those questions do nothing but annoy him, but silence feels even worse, like I’m showing no interest!  I can’t bear the idea that he might think I don’t care.  I’m looking for input from men here — tell me I should just shut up, would you?)

8.) Pick apart every single thing about myself & wonder whether it’s the one tragic piece of my make-up that makes him not like me very much.  (When normal people come to visit I tear the house apart thinking nothing is ever good enough.  When he comes to visit I tear myself apart, thinking nothing is ever good enough.)

Mind you, he says “Love you, Mom” every time we speak.

9.) Try my hardest never to bring up any of the above issues because it only makes it so much worse & removes all question as to whether I’m a complete wack job.

10.) Wonder how it’s possible the above nine items could be true and worry that the 11 year old (whom I have a relatively good relationship with today — just like I did with him) – will be just like him.  (She and I have already agreed that it might be best if we only hug from hereon in, no speaking allowed.  She told me yesterday that she believes “When you turn 50 you die inside and start staring at trees like Daddy.  I turn 49 in one month.)

* * * * *

It sounds so much worse when I put it on paper and I don’t think I’m explaining it all properly.  In person it’s really just a lot of silence on his part and perky paranoia on mine.  I need one other friend who’s had the same experience with an adult son.  Just one! 

Instead, I’m surrounded by people with beautiful babies.  I can’t bear it!  Just today one of my husband’s nieces wrote something about having “me time” and getting her husband to hold the baby while he napped!  How idiotic!  I am going to stop eating sugar & ensure that I do not go blind before I watch her cry that her son is a grown man!  I will love it so!  As she blubbers I will rub it in: “I remember when you wished he was in a crib, sleeping through the night!”  Cause, you know, you can say shit like that when you’re 70 plus!

* * * * *

He will be home for little more than a week, then I will be driving to drop him off at graduate school for a final summer semester.  We will leave early in the morning, really early, because he won’t be willing to go down the night before and stay in a hotel like civilized people, as it adds to the amount of time he must spend with me and cuts back on the time he has with friends. 

If it’s a repeat of last summer he will go out until late, drink more than necessary and want to sleep all the way there.  Then I will help him haul all the stuff out of the car, pack it into the new dorm room, make sure he’s set up and say “I love you!  Be careful!  Maybe you could call once a week, cause ya know I get physically ill when I don’t hear your voice after a while?  Good-bye!”

I will go from there to my sister’s to spend a few more days with the Kentucky peeps.  It seems silly to go again so soon, but I’m already in a southerly direction and it’s only eight hours more.

In a quick two months it will be time to return for graduation and move the boy back to NYC.  The summer will fly by, like it always does.  In eight weeks time I will get four phone calls and an e-mail or two.

This all sounds so incredibly negative & I wish it didn’t.  The boy has no tattoos of grim reapers or Disney characters.  He’s handsome as could be and has a million friends.  I just sent his cousin two letters yesterday addressed to a fucking women’s prison!  Are ya kiddin’ me?

He is perfectly normal and I’m fucked up.

It’s like that Chili’s commercial:

I want my baby back, baby back, baby back.  I want my baby back, baby back, baby back, baby back . . .

Seriously now, I want to hear

What’s your special brand of crazy?

Twisted Prank at the Empire State Building

If I love 10 things in life, pranks are included in the list. 

A few weeks ago I met a prank master who got me so good it was SICK!  It made me want a job like his just so I could f*ck with stupid people and get paid for it, too.

There’s always the option of standing on a street corner near the ocean this summer, like a block away, pointing people in a westerly direction when they stop & ask how to get to the beach.

* * * * *

The story began when my step-sister, Jodi, came to visit.  We haven’t spent time together since her father & my mother married, each bringing three children into the family.  We were the two oldest, the alpha females, forced to share a bed together for 7 years in FarmLand, Illinois.  We fought like cougars.  She moved one summer & disappeared off the face of my earth.

(In this photo she’s seated and I’m standing with my arms crossed, pissed off that she is holding the baby (who is now 35!).)

We got in touch again at my brother’s funeral last August, a bright spot in the nightmare.  A Chief of Police in Indiana, she’s now a freaking grandmother! 

(How f*cking old am I?)

The first day we stayed in our pj’s chatting until 5 p.m.  With her job she doesn’t get a chance to do such silly stuff very often.  She told great stories, like passing the Police Academy at the age of 35 & chasing down a flasher who maintained his erection throughout arrest (which included a freezing cold creek & a gun pointed in his direction). 

You know I love that kind of shit!

The next day we went to a garage sale at closing time & filled our car with free junk like an episode of the Beverly Hillbillies.  Yes, that’s me above.

We visited the 9/11 monument overlooking the bay & Manhattan’s skyline.

I didn’t feed her much.  My hostess skills really suck.

* * * * *

Sunday we went into NYC & did everything I could think of to see it all (minus downtown).  We started at the TKTS booth in Times Square, walked to the most cracked out flea market I’ve ever been to in my entire life, then took a cab to Central Park & rode in a horse carriage driven by a handsome young Irishman. 

It was 82 degrees. When it hits 85 the horses must be taken off the street & returned to their stalls or their owners are breaking the law.

Whenever I’m in Central Park I want to get a picture of myself lying on these rocks like a dead body in a Law & Order episode. 

Failed again.

 

Next, we  took a bicycle to Dylan’s (Lauren) Candy Bar (which is so unbelievably cool, the perfect place for a deliciously slow suicide at age 93).  This photo is what it looks like from the seat on the back of the bike.  Traffic at intersections is mind-bending.  It’s a squirrel’s eye view.

Happy to be alive, we ate hot pizza on the street.  My glasses fell off my face & into the cheese, which pleased Jodi to no end.  Time for dessert at the famed Serendipity 3:

Frrrrrrozen hot chocolate ($8.50) & a

Forbidden Broadway Sundae
chocolate Blackout cake, ice cream, hot fudge topped with whipped cream ($14.50). 

(Jodi, I apologize profusely, but I love the smile!)

Their website states that Madonna’s daughter, Lourdes, was recently there celebrating her father Carlos’ birthday with several friends.  Salma Hayek visited with her daughter Valentina after her recent wedding.  Cameron Diaz popped by, as did the Olsen twins (with their own champagne).

For some reason I did not see PAMAJAMA listed in the mix.

(In this photo we’re supposed to be imitating chipmunks.)

We saw an Off-Broadway show (The Marvelous Wonderettes).  I sat beside an insurance salesman from Louisiana.  He’d won a contest & was staying at The Waldorf on the company dime.   He let me quiz him on his thoughts about the government’s response to Katrina & its’ aftermath.  

Afterwards, we saw Jane Fonda signing autographs (no, I did not scream the word “Traitor!”), went to the Hershey’s store AND the M&M store, Rockefeller Center & then on to the Empire State Building at dusk. 

I was just a little loosey-goosey by this point:

After hoofing it a few miles we reached our destination & a dude at the entryway wanted us to buy expensive special tickets that would allow us to avoid the line, plus see a video.  I didn’t want to spend the extra money, but Jodi would have happily done so.  I totally annoyed the guy with my bad attitude. 

As we were wrapping up our discussion he said,

“Oh, there goes Tom Hanks, the man there with the hat!  He’s been shooting a movie in the area and I guess he’s heading for dinner.  We saw him earlier when he was walking to lunch.”

Classy chick that I am, I said

“F*ck the Empire State Building, let’s follow Tom Hanks!” 

So we did.  After two blocks we caught up with Tom, who was actually

an incredibly dirty homeless man, crazy as any bed bug.

So there you have it, something I’d be willing to get out of bed for, the opportunity to prank a middle aged jackass that thinks it makes sense to run down the street in pursuit of Tom Hanks,

a guy who would never walk alone or have the need to purchase his own meals during a movie shoot.

* * * * *

We did go up in the Empire State building & soon knew exactly what it felt like in the Octo-Mom’s crowded womb.  NYC tourists are often from ANYWHERE other than America & there is a difference in personal space expectations.  I don’t like to be touched.  It’s a problem!  I expected gigantor pink pigs to fly by the Empire State building at any moment.

While climbing lots and lots of stairs — my decision, to save from waiting on an elevator — Jodi reminded me she has a heart condition, which developed after dealing with breast cancer and the meds she had to take for treatment last year.  I immediately visualized her falling over — with me to blame — being carried from the 72nd floor by EMS workers. 

I ordered her to maintain consciousness and stay alive for at least another 30 years, on the off chance someone remembered our errant trip up one of the tallest landmarks in America (at my insistence).  

On the way out we found the creative genius who directed us to Tom Hanks.  We lauded his mastery & success in the prank department.  This is a guy who knows how to entertain himself! 

I can only imagine the joy he experienced, watching my ass scoot on down the sidewalk at hyperspeed, purse flying behind me in pursuit of Forrest Gump. 

Whether he gets another big sale or not

who cares?

as long as he can see another ignorant tourista run down the street in the direction of the homeless Oscar winner.

Twisted Funkadelic

When my friends or relatives are exhibiting bipolar traits I notice almost immediately.  When it’s me doing the same thing, it takes me several days to say,

“Funk Me!

Really, I shouldn’t exaggerate.  I’m not bipolar, but I am a funky motherfucker when I get into a negative kick.  I think I’ve been on the same one, more or less, since I was 10. 

Although there are exceptions, I dislike sunshine, exceptionally happy people and bubbly personalities.  A long devised equation in my head evens things out like a see-saw.  A complete stranger wins the lottery?  I’m fine with that as long as the person has either (1) a hideous facial disfigurement or (2) the kind of personality which insists on continuing to clean other people’s toilets “for fun & a sense of purpose,” or (3) been mistakenly sentenced to death row for a minimum of 12 lost years.

Most things seem pointless to me, even when I’m feeling pretty good, and I’m relatively certain that’s not normal.  I do not have a serious drive to do much of anything at all.

I have no interest in a high paying job that would allow me to hire a contractor to remodel my bathroom.  If the bathroom looks bad enough, I might consider wearing sunglasses inside the house.  It’s just easier to stay home.  I’m in the dark as to why people think it’s imperative that their house be immaculately clean.  Yes, you’ll die with a clean house, but so what?

Bugs do make me move fast.  I do whatever it takes to make them go away and then I sit back down.  Same with unrecognizable smells.  I do have standards.

I can’t comprehend people who don’t watch TV.  What are they doing otherwise?  Learning French?  Decoupaging a plate?  Washing their sheets?  Cleaning behind their washer and dryer and refrigerator? 

I don’t know anyone who speaks French, other than a few Montessori children (and they’ve got snot running down their faces, so I have no interest in communicating with them).  I’d fuck up the plate, no doubt.  You already know how I feel about cleaning.  Such repetition is for dogs or squirrels or monkeys.

I do care about my children’s lives.  It’s why my son insists on maintaining serious boundaries.  He KNOWS me. 

Pretty much the only thing I ever truly & completely believed I was good at, that made me feel successful, was caring for my babies.  I’m not happy about leaving that persona behind, even though those days are freaking over.  I’m not saying that to mean I’m “all giving” or some such bullshit – because I am selfish extraordinaire – it’s that I am hyper-alert regarding my children’s lives and less than concerned about my own.  It’s why the babies are pulling me back toward my family of origin.

Next week I will move my son out of NYC, which will take considerable energy, and I will do it exactly as he chooses (in the most inconvenient way possible).   For him I will battle traffic and do laundry and whittle a wooden stake to face down zombies.

My daughter got thrown off of Club Penguin FOR LIFE because she’s incredibly creative at being bad.  I immediately made it my goal in life to get her back on-line, no matter the offense nor the fact that she withheld the information that she has been previously suspended three other times.  She’s just 11! 

Six e-mails and a phone call later, mission accomplished.  I could not rest until she was happy again.  It’s not like we don’t know who taught the girl her bad habits.  She’s an absolute doll!  Poor little girl shed real tears.

As for me, I tried anti-depressants and didn’t like them, so I stopped.  If I had any stress in my life at all, then I might have no choice, but my husband does stress, not me.  I can’t even handle filling out a job appplication or answering the phone.  I’m talking on a good day.

Really, I was feeling pretty great until something this past week grabbed my balls and decided to twist.  I don’t even know what it was . . . which is fucking annoying.

Alter Ego: (It’s PMS, ya dope!  Lay off the chocolate!  Get off yer ass!)

Fuck you!

Alter ego: (No, fuck you!)

Twisted Mother’s Ass

When my sister called she informed me the first thing Mom said to her this morning was: 

“I didn’t even hear from Pam on Mother’s Day!”

I sent her an e-mail on her birthday March 6th.  Two years ago I did nothing for her birthday but sent flowers on Mother’s Day.  By skipping Mother’s Day this year I keep her on her toes.  It’s a wonderfully arbitrary method.

Granted, I do hold a grudge like a bitch with a bone.  I accept that about myself.

But what I’m really writing about is this:

Little sis told me that over the weekend Mom mentioned something didn’t feel right.  There in the middle of the office, with no advance warning, she pulled her pants down and showed my sister her ass (which I think was incredibly selfish considering the potential for blindness factor).

As it turns out,

SHE WAS SUNBURNED!

Yes, unbelievably, Mom had crawled into the tanning bed and burnt her ass.

As if that wasn’t bad enough,

she then exposed her enormous belly and said,

“But this part isn’t!”

* * * * *

There have long been issues with Mom’s desire to share information we don’t want to hear AND her propensity for poor hygiene.  I did not want to hear about the pain she experienced during treatment for vaginal warts.  Call me insensitive.

I’ve already blocked it, but Lil’ Sis remembers her telling us on the ferry from NYC two years ago, “I’ve always been sexually satisfied with your step-father, every single time!”  I might have been yelling too loud to take it all in, as my psyche shattered, like that famous picture “The Scream.”

Some of you may remember that I was unsettled when she continuously picked her nose and flicked it onto the floor in my car during a hell-a-tiously long day on the Outer Banks 18 months ago. 

I’d forgotten that detail until my sister and her lover mentioned it during the Kentucky trip.  They mentioned it because they had a new story along the same old lines to add.

When we were teenagers we got yelled at for daily bathing & overuse of shampoo.  If Mom bathes once a week now, it’s tantamount to a happy dance.  FDS feminine hygiene spray was created with a woman like her in mind.  She is living proof that all jokes comparing women to fish are based in fact.

My sister was at work with Mom when she saw her reach down and run her fingers across the vaginal area of her pants, then bring her hand to her nose and smell it.  She looked at my sister, laughed and said, “Oh, I think I need a bath, I don’t smell so good!”

* * * * *

If only I was making this up.

When I take note of Cindy Adams column on Mother’s Day in The New York Post I stick out my tongue & turn the page. 

So she had a great mother!  Stop bragging already!

All mothers are NOT created equal, so I hibernate on the one weekend of the year when it’s impossible to avoid the constant inferences to mothers as earth angels.  It’s bad enough that every other day of the year fathers play second banana, and I include Father’s Day in the mix.  Do they ever REALLY get the same kind of accolades or fabulous gifts?

Someone ought to be in very big trouble for naming my mother MARY.

Maybe it’s the false advertising that bothers me the most.  There are just so many possibilities to choose from, plus the fact that my whining is incredibly annoying even to me.

Fuckin’ holidays.

Laughing At Mother’s Day

The problems I have with my husband are not like anything I’ve ever heard from other wives.  It’s part of why my frustration can come on like a tsunami, especially when pre-menstrual. 

He returns home from a long day of work and walks 5 miles at the local reservoir.  (The first couple of times I did the walk with him, but then I went up a few pounds and realized that walking causes me to gain weight.)  I know, it’s really weird.

Anyway, as soon as he walks in the door it’s the neverending saga of “What’s for dinner?” 

Last week I made something two nights in a row, so I’m guessing he might have thought I was going to do THAT again.  (It was very creative, especially the night I made a heart-shaped meatloaf and covered it with ketchup, making it look like a bloody heart.)

Tonight, after considering Pizza Hut take-out — which gets me as excited as most pervy dudes touching themselves while their computer screen displays some naked chick with hidden herpes sores – he instead decided to go to the grocery store. 

Break my heart, will ya?

He claims he’s trying to SAVE MY LIFE, the motherf*cker. 

Could it have been the order of Hershey’s Dippers that put him over the edge?

My sister just called & told me Mom ate a whole order of cinnamon sticks with powdered sugar dipping sauce when they last ate together.  She said Mom guarded them like a Rottweiler, refusing to share.  Mom insists pizza won’t go down because of the lap band procedure she had for weight loss.  Perhaps sugar is needed to grease the skids. 

In the aftermath of that story I see that not going to Pizza Hut may have been the best decision.

HOW F*CKING ANNOYING IS THAT?  HE’S RIGHT AGAIN?  DO YOU SEE WHAT I MEAN?

* * * * *

A trip to the supermarket means I’m forced to make a list of all the other things I want.

(HEAVY SIGH) 

White bread?  Brown  bread? 

Choices are just freaking annoying.

Obviously if you’re really trying to SAVE MY LIFE you’d buy the brown bread! 

If you’re planning to purchase the white bread, why not take in those calories as donuts?

* * * * *

He returns with the supplies for grilled cheese and asks if I want him to make me one. 

HELLO? 

Have I ever refused a grilled cheese in this lifetime?  So I tell him it’s a stupid ass question. 

He just delivered two to my recliner.  It’s hard to enjoy them after he’s made it all so complicated, but I try.

Other issues:

He insists on doing laundry.  He shrinks things.  He turns bras gray.  He overfills the washing machine.  His folding is adequate & he usually carries it all upstairs, but refuses to put it away.  More than once he’s confused my daughter’s clothing with mine. 

I wore one of her bras to bowling the other evening and the underwire jabbed me in the side every time I threw a ball.  It was painful.

He regularly cleans the kitchen, but I wish he wouldn’t.  It allows him to feel comfortable about complaining when I cook eggs and leave them crisping on the stove in a pan while I sit back down.  It sucks to sit here in the recliner, trying to relax after a trying day of talking to friends on the phone and drinking coffee, when he’s making all kinds of noise and moving pots and pans and dishes around. 

Sometimes I wish he’d just sit down and act like a normal person, maybe drink a beer or complain about something.

He never complains.  I hate that! 

It makes me seem like the world’s most negative person.  I can find something wrong with every minor item you could mention.  It’s one of my favorite hobbies!

When he pays for me to go on one trip or another, to a Broadway show or shopping, he stays home and does yard work.  He does ALL the yard work.  Do you know what it’s like to carry guilt around 24/7?  Heinous, I tell you.

So there it is: yardwork, shopping, laundry, cooking, cleaning.  Oh, yeah, he makes the bed, too.  He rarely farts and never curses. 

A couple of years ago I bought a set of lawn furniture that wouldn’t fit in the back of our truck, so I had to call him to drive across the county at 9:30 at night.  He made it fit.  He also paid for it.  He didn’t complain about that, either.

I hear women bitch all the time about husbands who go out with their friends, drink all the time, smoke and spend hours in stripper joints.  These chicks mow their own grass, make all the meals, break their backs doing laundry and know how to work the dishwasher.

While my husband is taking our daughter out for one more meal at Taco Bell, buying her another iTunes card, driving us to another dental appointment, those other chicks are cleaning their kitchens and making their own beds.

They must feel so good about themselves! 

There are times when I run out of good books to read, there are no new messages on Facebook & the DVR is empty of appealing choices.  I hardly know what to do with myself.

And THAT is why for me

Mother’s Day

is the silliest damned holiday of all.

A Twisted Mother’s Day Tale for Shania ~ Dogs, Guns, Fat Chicks & a Jackass

A new reader has asked for more information regarding the time my mother shot her neighbor’s dog, so I’m going to re-tell the tale here.  It’s still hard to believe, but fantastical enough to repeat . . .

By the way, Shania, thanks for asking a question!  I’m thinking you might wish you didn’t, but I hate to disappoint.

Lastly, for those of you who are extra sensitive about animals, think twice!  I DO NOT like to make people cry.

* * * * *

I was 21 when marriage #3 occurred & already long gone from the house. 

THANK GOD! 

Mom has had guns ever since Jackass came into the picture, but maybe before that, too.  Something makes me think there was talk of a hidden firearm when we were growing up (with husband #2).  But if that’s the case and I never saw the gun. . .

This is what happens when I begin daydreaming of the good old days.  Considering Mother’s Day is around the corner, it’s only appropriate.

. . .  how come we so easily found the sexual implements and naked picture of #2’s gigantor erection?  

It completely BLOWS my belief that Mom was just really bad at hiding things!  I understand Christmas gifts and Easter eggs, but multi-colored dildos and hemi-powered vibrators?  (I’d think the inside of a locked safe, behind an anti-microbial glass wall, would have been the proper spot.)

ANYWAY . . .

Jackass is so talented that he once pissed off his own sister so much that she put an 8-inch butcher knife in his back, right up to the handle, just missing his heart.  Thus, he understandably has a fondness for the corner of a room and the protection of a weapon.  It then makes no sense that he lives with the craziest woman I know, but whatever.

The first I heard of actual gunplay was when Mom shot at Jackass in their bedroom while still living at the house in Illinois.  I wouldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t seen the proof myself.  (Well, yeah, I probably would.)

As so many of my family’s stories do, this one includes a holiday twist.  Once, and only once, I took my son home for Christmas.  While sitting around the dining room table with my mother and sister, Mom got as excited as any little girl and insisted her husband open his present early. 

My sister became aggressively vocal and kept saying, “No, Mom, not in front of the kids!”  Considering that this sibling of mine didn’t blink when her husband said c.*c.k.s*cker multiple times per day in front of her children, I wondered if it might be dynamite or a live grenade inside the wrapped paper.

It was a handgun.  To be fair, that wouldn’t necessarily be such a big deal in the Midwest.  They’re relatively common . . . among hunters.  It was true, though, that there were no mooseheads on our walls, pheasant on our table or venison in our freezer.  Plus, aren’t those shot with rifles?  Or bow and arrow?  I have no idea.

When I asked my sister why she was so upset, she took me into the bedroom and pointed at the window, then let me finger the bullet hole for myself.  She told me Mom had shot at Jackass and missed.  (WTF?  The woman should have thrown a bowling ball at his head.  She’s got a great average!)

Bless her heart, for once Mom was doing the fair thing and giving Jackass a chance to return fire during their next altercation.  I’m sure there’s a Christmas moral there somewhere. 

All I know for sure is that my brother would have been so completely pissed off if any stray bullets had hit his extensive stolen CD collection.

* * * * *

I never heard any more about a gun until one of our demented family vacations.  Somehow the subject of the neighbor’s dog came up.  I’m sure there was laughter involved.

Preface this with the fact that everyone in my family is a big-time dog lover, except for me.  I mean, I like SOME dogs (but no dog poop).  Plus, I’m allergic.  But then so is my mother.  Actually, she might be even more allergic to children.

My brother & sister have always been far more “in the know” regarding family affairs.  I’m always in the dark.  I will NEVER know the best stories.  I’m sure many died with my brother, since my mother & he were like the villain Dastardly and her dog Muttley in this cartoon.  That’s exactly how my brother would laugh at my mother’s stupidity.

I HAD to know, what was the deal with the neighbor’s dog?

Mom is never one to back off from a story when she believes she’s in the right and someone else is in the wrong.  At that time she was living in Kentucky alone with husband #3 (a/k/a Jackass).  (My siblings were still in Illinois.)  They had moved into a beautiful new home set far back off the road, half-mile down a winding tree-lined path.

The only problem in this idyllic picture

(besides (1) they had already separated once & Jackass was presumably sleeping with his 350 pound ex-wife, & (2) Mom was working three menial jobs AND being sued for abandoning & looting the family business, leaving it worthless in her rush to follow this utter loser to Kentucky) 

I repeat, the only problem in this idyllic picture

was the dog that barked and chased their car every single time they went up or down the lane.  The dog was frenetic and crazy enough that it was actually catching their car and biting the bumper, damaging the vehicle.

According to Mom, they were driving the path up to the road one day when the dog once again begain chasing their car.  Mom was in the passenger seat.  If I know her at all, and I do, she was complaining in a loud shrewish voice:

“That God damned dog is biting the bumper of my car again.  Sonofabitch!”

Now, you know my mom loves dogs.  She loves dogs more than people or money or (definitely) cleanliness.  She literally told me, at the time of my brother’s wedding back in 1990, “My dogs have done more for me than my kids ever have.”  Yes, for the grammarians in the audience, she ended the sentence with a preposition.  I’m not making that part of the story up just to make her look bad.

The point is that HER dogs have done a lot for her.  Other people’s dogs . . . not so much.

As Mom tells the story, when she began complaining about the bumper eating dog for probably the 10,000th time, her husband replied (insert hideous marble-mouthed drawl here):

“Well, Mary, ya know, there’s a gun under yore seat.  Shoot it.”

So, like something out of Bonnie & Clyde, Mom pulled out the gun and shot the dog dead with a single bullet.  But that’s not the worst part.

Nope, the worst part is they left it in the lane.  They left it in front of the house.  They left it where the kids would come home from school and find it.

So in true backwoods fashion,

which I must say I do admire,

Mom later found one of her own dogs shot to death.

* * * * *

Jackass also enjoys telling a story about killing people, although he’s never told it to me.  I’ve only heard it third-hand.  No doubt, he’s aware of my desire to make a citizen’s arrest. 

But if I ever disappear . . .

Happy Mother’s Day.

The Twisted State of Conversation

Last night I was — where else — at the

BOWLING ALLEY!

Who knew all the life lessons to be learned in such a filthy place?

A woman there just for entertainment’s sake — her husband & daughter are the bowlers in the family — was yammering on about one interesting subject after another.  I wanted to give her a big smooch & say “I LOVE YOU!” 

Nothing in the whole wide world makes me happier than people who

TALK TO ME!

Really she was speaking with our daughter, who’s been going bowling with my husband on Thursdays without me all year.  I’ve started going since my step-son moved to ALABAMA.  Yes, I’m a bowling SUBSTITUTE, too!

I knew my daughter adored hanging with this group of older people, but couldn’t imagine why.  Now I know.  They don’t only talk to her, they also

LISTEN TO HER!

What a freaking concept.

(She told me to pretend to be someone other than her mother, so I wouldn’t blow her gig.)

* * * * *

I hate my life when left desperate with those who have nothing at all to say.  I’m sure that’s why I married a silent man and have a silent son!  God’s sense of humor is huge.  I love them I do, but the lack of communication is such a freaking drag.

Please don’t get me wrong, I love silence when it’s appropriate, i.e., during television programming, in movie theatres, while reading or busy with something else.

And I’m not suggesting I’m interested in the idiots who preach at me or think they know it all. 

That is NOT conversation.

However, if in the midst of a public gathering with nothing else going on and 3 or 4 people standing around . . . SHARE SOMETHING, ANYTHING!  Keep me from wanting to bang my head against the wall or peel my skin off with my teeth.

I’m talking

CONVERSATION!

A back and forth dialogue with people who look me in the eye while they tell stories that make us both laugh & cry!

INTERPERSONAL COMMUNICATION!

This obviously excludes those who wish to vomit upon me verbally and then look away when I have something to say.  Those are BORES, not conversationalists.  Folks who take over & show no interest in hearing what anyone else has to say?  Oh no, I’m DEFINITELY NOT talking about them.

Follow the rules of basic civility!

Honest to God, I’ve gone a month sometimes without anyone asking me a single question.  It breaks my heart, it really does.

I’ve lived in five states, nearly died twice, raised two children, lived & loved a man who died of AIDS, held at least 27 different jobs, worked in NYC, held elected office, assisted in an appellate death penalty trial, thrown a dime at a man’s head during a production of Rent, had a dude show me his penis in the side mirror of his 18-wheeler, been offered cunnilingus by a non-English speaker in a San Francisco laundromat, driven a nun to Philadelphia and told a woman in line at a popular Florida amusement park to “Go Fuck Yerself!”

I’m fucking interesting!

But if you don’t ask me about it I’ll never force myself upon you.  I’m not unique.  There are millions of us.

* * * * *

My favorite uncle amazed me, even when I was little.  I LOVED going places with him & it didn’t happen near often enough.  I grew up in a house with BORING people who talked about stupid shit. 

But MY UNCLE would walk into a grocery store & begin chatting with the check-out clerk.  He would ask, “So, do you have a boyfriend?”   (If a person was bagging at the end of the aisle he would bring him into the conversation, too, probably asking if he’d ever dated the checker or knew any details of her life.)

She would turn purple and get all embarrassed — then actually ANSWER his question plus 10 or 15 more — and there was a good chance he’d know the boyfriend because he regularly talked to so many people. 

I’d watch her come to life, giggle, stand up straighter & preen from the interest shown.  I’m sure more than once it’s been the highlight of someone’s day.  

For that moment she stopped feeling drab & invisible, standing in the middle of a supermarket talking to old bitches who only wanted to speak of price checks and coupons, people who didn’t care if she looked like she wanted to cry or if it appeared she’d been standing there for 12 hours and not a single soul had acted as if she was

A REAL PERSON.

To this day I make it a point to mention someone’s nail polish or jewelry or tell them I like their hair.  It embarrasses the crap out of my kids, but that’s just too bad!  (I’m not brave enough to ask the kinds of silly questions my uncle does!)

My son’s father would walk up to someone on a street corner and ask if they knew the score of a game that had occurred the previous evening.  I loved that about him.  He had such an easy going way of not caring if someone ignored him.  He would no doubt think that THEY were weird, that it was THEIR PROBLEM, not his.  So, of course, no one ever blew him off.  Everyone adored him.  He EXPECTED it.

The conversational thing doesn’t come as naturally to me.  I’m always wondering if the person is going to

LIKE ME

which is such a fucking annoying trait that the first time I noticed it I really should have just driven a nail through my own foot and said,

“STOP IT!”

Why do I care if a total stranger likes me or not?  Well, I care because I’m a sick fuck with issues and I have the self-esteem of a garter snake, hiding behind rocks and slithering in the dirt.

What I should have been doing ALL MY ENTIRE LIFETIME — instead of worrying about my lackluster hair or my chunky chiclet tooth or my powdered sugar donut belly — was not giving a shit, entertaining myself, talking to the people no one else talks to.  Cause, ya know, quite often the average guy with spinach in his teeth is WAY more interesting than the perfect looking dude who spent half an hour on his hair that morning.

That’s what they should be teaching in high school!

Granted, there are no doubt some simple boring fucks out there who aren’t interested in communicating with other humans.  I hate them.  The times I’ve attempted conversation with someone who has the depth of cardboard & they’ve blown me off, well each of those incidences has stopped me from attempting at least 100 more times with 100 different people who might have been fantastically interesting.  Yes, I agree, that just means

I’m a moronic asshole!

New people, fascinating information, it’s far better than any of the usual substances we seek.  We self-medicate rather than experience the longing for real human contact.  Connecting with someone while our clothes stay on can be far more intimate than sex.  The body actually gets in the way of learning about the soul, which is why on-line or long distance relationships sometimes seem to move so fast.

I am a natural communicator, even astrologically speaking (Gemini with a Cancer Rising and Pisces Moon). I don’t care about things, I don’t own crystal or Hummels or miniature lit Christmas huts. I don’t want silver or china or jewels.

I feel untethered & high as a kite after great conversation, like I need a Quaalude or a Valium to bring me down. 

* * * * * 

My inner yapper often feels silenced by societal norms, unsatisfied with the conversational subjects I feel limited to with most people.

If I discover you’ve recently visited China, I don’t want to know about the temples, I’m interested in the toilets.  “How was your squatting experience?”

Sometimes I want to mention the AIDS thing or the fact that my mom once shot a dog.  It doesn’t necessarily go over well.  Once I mentioned the dog during a work luncheon with other people from the Probation Department and was met with dead silence & blank stares.  Oops, wrong crowd.

Of course, politics can bring the same reaction.

I love my fellow bloggers, who in a single day often share more of themselves than I get from a month of real life.

The MF’ing Never Ending Twisted Food Battles

I’m still treating it like it’s my best friend. 

Shit food, that is. 

The stuff that has so conveniently & easily caused me all desired angst & misery.  I’m not saying it hasn’t been useful!  It’s helped me push people away, it’s provided a battering ram between myself & the rest of the world.  It’s kept me feeling inferior, which is comfortable, an easy excuse when there is no other.

I’ve never looked upon a salad with googly eyes, nor a head of broccoli.  I don’t eat tomatoes or cucumbers or celery.  I detest cantaloupe & watermelon & eggplant.  Don’t bother offering me spinach nor escarole or squash.

Even vegetables I like are in danger in this house.  It’s not unusual to find furry green beans or wilted lettuce or demented carrots in my fridge.  I’m better with fruit, but just barely.  I like apples but so rarely eat them, minus the coma inducing qualities of hot apple pie a’ la mode.  Grapefruit is fantastic, but lacks the panache of a soft, warm chocolate chip cookie.

Of course, none of the natural items contain the kind of addictive ingredients that are put into the processed products that make us crazy.  When my body is free of sugars & nasty fats my brain stops racing & screaming “More, more, more!  Now, now, now!”  (At least until I see cinnamon rolls in the very last aisle of the grocery store, practically being given away as a day old bakery item!)

After losing more than 50 pounds it’s easy to pretend that I’m thin when I’m not.  Although I’ve gone down four sizes, I could lose four more & just barely come close to my friend Donna’s proportions.  A picture taken recently shows us side by side and she looks like a tiny bunny I could turn into a stew.  Compared to what I was previously, sure, I’m in much better shape.  But compared to skinny chicks I’m a walrus or a plump old lazy dog. 

I’m tired of being the gigantor chunk of the crew, the tyrannosaurus rex, the lineman.  I’d like to be NORMAL.  I want to be thinner than my sister or JUST ONE of my sisters-in-law.  Those bitches have felt superior to me FOREVER.

Of course, I know the problem is really me.  I would no doubt find something else to feel inferior over.  Hell, I’d tend to pick a dude with a pot belly before I’d ever go for a skinny guy.  But as long as the weight exists it will always be my excuse, I can never dig deeper, I can’ t deal with the real issues.

I’m 49 in a month!  I used to think this was the kind of stupidity you grow out of; I know now that it’s just not true.  I don’t want to have to be sick or dying to find thin.  (”Damn, Pam looked hot in that casket!)   This is NOT an exaggeration.  My grandmother was overweight all her life and died of a diabetic-related heart attack at age 57.  My brother died after weight loss surgery & his third heart attack at 44.  He was started on diet pills at age 14, which he took during summer football practices when the temperature outside was near 100 degrees. 

We had actual screaming matches in my childhood home when one child or another would find Mom’s stash of butter pecan ice cream or chocolate bars.  Mom accepted shock treatments in a mental hospital, rather than tell doctors she was so addicted to diet pills that they were making her insane. 

CAN YOU IMAGINE THE DEDICATION?

Losing weight makes sense for so many reasons: (1)  Summer is coming and I’m a miserable motherfucker in the heat, (2) The fatter I am, the more I look like my mother, which is beyond hideous, (3) I have more energy when my body is not in the process of digesting food 24/7, (4) I wouldn’t have weight as my reason to feel “less than” all the time, (5) I could lose the diabetes diagnosis & all the things that entails, and (6) 127 other things.

I tend to give up if I can’t be perfect.  Rationally, I don’t think of tiny as perfect.  I like the look of a girl who is 5′7 or taller, who weighs 140 or more.  Women should not look like boys.  Yet it’s all mushed together in my psyche.  I lose focus in the time it takes to turn my head.

In the mean time I’m going to make a list here of things that ARE NOT MY FRIENDS and hope that I remember that fact:

1) Hostess Powdered Sugar Donuts (Why commit suicide any other way?)

2) Brownies (Especially when covered with ice cream, fudge & Godiva chocolate at The Cheesecake Factory or Serendipity III)

3) Any food that’s in the house for my husband or daughter (My husband has to keep his frosted mini wheats in the garage.  I ate my daughter’s frozen chocolate brownie yogurt, but left just enough . . .)

4) Crackers, Toast, White Flour Products (entire sleeves of Ritz product can’t go down fast enough)

5) Cake (all ooey-gooey warm cake, especially with vanilla frosting, but chocolate will do, including on birthdays)

6) Soda (It’s such shit!  And POT is illegal?)

7) Black And White Cookies (The perfect combination for indecisive fools)

Ice Cream (including sugar-free, which does absolutely disgusting things, take my word for it)

9) French Fries (Why not drink Mazola Oil from the bottle or eat Crisco by the spoonful?)

10) Anything that comes from a fast food restaurant, anything at all

11) Candy (Valentine Candy, Easter Candy, Christmas Candy, Halloween Candy — FUCKING HOLIDAYS)

12) Potato Chips (Everyone needs at least one video of themselves eating these damned things)

13) Cheese, cheese and more cheese  (It’s from COWS)

14) Tubs of Kool Whip Free (when eaten at a single sitting)

15) 40 slices of bacon at a clip (No matter how fast you eat it, the calories remain the same!)

16) Cinnamon rolls (Even when still ooey-goody & on the day old/discount rack – they’re way too expensive in ways that have nothing to do with money)

17) Hot dogs, corn dogs & sausage (All tacky, disgusting, phallic-shaped objects that are oh so unnecessary & don’t even taste any better than your average old carnival meat)

There are such better options.  Focus, girl, focus!

My Mother & The Kentucky Trip ~ (Part III)

We believed Mom would take these 3 great grandchildren into her non-existant heart & alleviate a little of the grief over my brother’s death. 

WHAT THE F*CK WERE WE THINKING?!

My brother:

My great-niece:

THE WOMAN NEEDS TO BE HIT ON THE HEAD WITH AN ANVIL!

She’s been given a chance here to start fresh.  She’s only 68 years old and could easily live another 30 years.  She’s solid as any mule.  This is so clearly a repeat of the first time around. 

She doesn’t get it.

I was born when she was 19.  Within four years she had two more children, another girl and then a boy.  ALMOST FIFTY YEARS LATER SHE’S BEEN GIVEN THIS GIFT: TWO GIRLS & A BOY TO DOTE ON, TO LOVE HER. 

Life is so fucking cyclical!  She’s got a chance to fix it!

* * * * *

Getting to Mom’s house is an adventure.  It’s a half-mile off the main road down a tree covered path that reminded me of the story of Hansel & Gretel.  It’s just beautiful, even in the dark.  The ice storm this past winter did a lot of damage & she’s still upset about it.  There used to be another house on the trail, the home that held the dog she shot when it continually bit at the bumper of her car, but it’s gone now.

The whole scene was a little eery, particularly when the firearm came to mind.  I have not been an extremely kind daughter & she’s nuts, a bad combination.  At one point we stepped into an over-stuffed walk-in closet and I said, “You could bury me in here and no one would ever find the body.”

Entering her garage, she pointed out to me that she has the refrigerator from my grandparent’s farm sitting there. 

The woman hauled a forty year old fridge from Illinois to Kentucky!

We’re greeted at the door by her pack of dogs, which are much older and calmer than my sister’s brood.  Mom has four and her husband has two.  Even their dogs are separated into “yours” and “mine.”  Some are from the same batch of puppies as my sister’s.

Walking through Mom’s house is like entering a time machine.  There are photos on every wall, the same ones that hung on the walls of our home in Illinois growing up.  It would appear that she treasures family above all, but in reality she could probably tell you more about the cost of the picture frames, where she bought them & when.  She’d be happy to do that for you.

It’s all decorated nicely, much better than my own, in kind of a Martha Stewart meets country vein.  It’s a similar open style with an upstairs balcony overlooking the living room. 

At the very bottom of the photo, those are dog beds.  The floor in that area was wet with dog pee.  She did not bother to clean it up while we were there.

Unfortunately, we were hit with the smell of stench as soon as we entered through the garage door into the kitchen.  I have no idea why, but I did not want to offend my mother and ignored it.  My daughter immediately put her hand to her face and began making gagging sounds.  I kept telling her to cut it out, but she didn’t seem able.

The office is a glass room, which we entered from outside after going up a staircase.  We reached the stairs only after following a beautiful wooden path built around the entire circumference of the house.  It even winds through the grass to a swing.  She had the path built so she could walk around the house without ever touching the grass or accidentally stepping barefoot on pine needles.  Sadly, it was too dark for photos.

We also passed the screened in porch with both bar and hot tub, a beautiful room.  We went through the library and past the slot machine:

I DIDN’T EVEN ASK!

I was a little jealous of the real arcade Ms. Pac-Man sitting in the hallway.  She said it came from our home in Illinois, but that must have been after I’d already left.

Her bathroom has special tiles that are “self-warming,” as well as a huge reproduction of a photo I took of a sunrise on the Outer Banks.  I was pretty surprised by that. 

Hanging above the stairs is the lamp that hung over my desk when I was a teenager, circa 1976.  The plastic flowers, ceramic ducks & reindeer nearby added a bit of acid trip feel to the scene.  This picture makes me sad.  I didn’t notice the dust so much when I was actually there in the situation, nor the dirty sheen of the couch the dogs obviously lie on.

Before my sister moved down the road, just six months ago, they had family get togethers here on holidays when they did not travel to Illinois.  I can’t imagine how it was possible to sit and eat.  I do know she’s had a house cleaner come in regularly, but don’t know if that’s still the case.  Mom has asthma and she wheezes from the dogs.

The look on her face is not so evil here:

God damn it, why does that fucking make me cry?

To get to the spot where I could take this photo we had to step over a good-sized pile of dog poop.  She picked that up with a tissue, but missed a turd which I pointed out.  She shrugged and left it sit.  We walked on.  (If it had been baby shit she’d have been enraged!)

I really have no desire to mock the situation, it brings me little joy or humor at this point.  It’s just the reality.

* * * * *

I videotaped her talking about her great-grandson and the way she feels about him, but I’m afraid to post it.

Once it became clear to her that I found him adorable, she felt the need to set me straight.  She held up a pop-up book I’d brought down and showed me a page that had been torn.  She said, “This is O!” with venom dripping from her voice.  I’d dug the book out from my basement and it did not concern me in the least that it had been torn.  That’s what children do to pop-up books.  I told her so.  (We later decided we thought the 3-year old girl was the actual culprit after she ripped pages out of several more books of the non-pop-up variety!)

I asked Mom, “Do you not think your own son would have done such a thing at age two?” 

Her reply: “No!” 

It was comical and laughable and idiotic. 

She forgets that I was there when her 2-year old boy climbed up onto a chair to reach her ceramic chickens on top of the fridge just so he could slam them to the floor below.  She cried and cried and cried over those damned chickens!

She is nuts over the fact that ‘O’ is openly defiant and says “No!” (like all 2-year olds.)  She blames it on his “Latin-ness.”  I asked her what that meant and she said something about how “they think all women should jump for them!” and “It’s in their blood!” 

She has always been bothered by the fact that she thinks he “looks most Mexican.”  This is the little guy she wanted to call “Opie” instead of the name she believes is too ethnic.  It happens to be the same name as that of her brother-in-law’s father, a farmer from Illinois!  It’s too stupid to believe!

She does not even like the way ‘O’ eats, preferring the baby who seems to never stop wanting more.  She’s considered “a good eater!”  ‘O’ is “too picky!”  She never puts it together that her son died of overeating just six months ago.  She wants the gluttony trait to continue in this family forever more!  She bristles when ‘O’ refuses one food or another, then practically bursts into applause as the baby shovels in fist fulls.

She thinks nothing of telling my sister that she would “hurt him” if she was ever left to care for ‘O’.  I made her promise she would never leave him with Mom & she was already in that mind-frame, thank God.

The most insane piece of all was when she began complaining that ‘O’ “likes girl toys too much” and has a taste for pink.  The money quote of the trip was, “It’s not bad enough, a Mexican in the family, a Mexican homo!”  That’s the piece I got her to repeat on video.  She laughed while saying it.  She knew I was mocking her and didn’t care, believing I’m an idiot and just don’t get it.

I can be heard in the background of the video laughing at the absurdity of it all.  It sounds like I’m laughing along with her.  I really hate that.  It’s not the first time I’ve had that reaction to my own behavior.  For 48 years I’ve done whatever necessary to stay out of my mother’s way, to just get along, not push buttons, not set her off.  Although it’s understandable, it still makes me sick. 

The reality, though, is there is no benefit that comes from screaming or fighting or swearing at the deranged & psychotic person who signs my sister’s paychecks, who paid for the home they’re all living in, who employs my step-brother and sister’s lover, too!  My sister hates her as I do, but is taking what she can from the deal.  She knows now that she made a mistake in moving there and working for Mom, but she’s in too deep.

* * * * *

Clearly Mom does not plan to embrace this child, even though she lost her own little boy so recently.  It’s obvious to me that he’s a freaking gift from God, bestowed upon her undeserving ass, but she can’t see it.  I used to think she was smarter than I am, but now I know she’s not intelligent in any way, shape or form.

My feelings about this woman are as twisted as could be.  Her ignorance saddens me.  She’s my mother, I have no other.  The dream of a loving mommy dies hard, even though my grandmother really took that role and gave me all her best.  It was more than enough for me.  I am so-o-o-o-o-o lucky.

* * * * *

When I return in May I’m going to bring up this issue of prejudice and homosexuality.  I will make sure I mention that I was f*cking the black chick I moved to San Francisco with years ago.  (As well as my very dark-skinned beautiful black boss (a man)). 

I will say, “Oh come on, Mom!  It tastes just like tacos.”

This should be great! 

(My husband says I’m going to get shot this trip.)

* * * * *

I so love this little boy.  How could you not?

Although it’s true that Grandma always said this little girl’s collar bone was broken when her mother threw her from a high chair:

We look pretty similar, don’t you think? 

* * * * *

Writing this entry, more than any other, leaves me feeling like a scared little kid telling family secrets to a social worker. 

Twisted Mom & The Trip to Kentucky ~ (Part II)

Let’s recount for those who are a little lost on background:

My sister received custody of her 3 grandchildren just two months ago.  They have been in foster care for more than a year. 

Their ages are (quite amazingly) 3, 2 and 1.  The two oldest are just 11 months apart.  The youngest was a total surprise: “Mom, I’m in labor.” 

“You’re pregnant?!”

My niece, their mother, is in prison at least until August.  Their father got 12 years.  It all started when they received a “recliner-sized” package of pot through the U.S. Mail.  (It’s a long story, documented throughout this blog.)

Once I was able to sit and talk with my sister, I was really quite shocked to discover she is still leaving the kids five days a week to work for my mother.  The office is in Mom’s home & the house is not child friendly, to say the least.  Mom plays video games while Sis does payroll & taxes.

It’s hard to believe, but true, that Mom is such a c*nt she can still surprise me.  She should have her own circus act or Broadway show.

A babysitter is paid $200 per week to watch the children five hours a day.  The sitter smokes (in the house) while they nap (also when they don’t nap).  I met her once, just as we were leaving. 

She came in the door & my sister asked, “So, how you doin’?”  Her reply: “Sick as a dog.  I’m sick as a dog!”  She seemed kind of happy about it. 

Those of you who know my aversion to germs and idiots will not be surprised to hear it took all the strength I could muster not to say, “Then get the fuck out!”  Just looking at her made me queasy.  I adore those babies & it made me sick to leave them.  Add this chick to the mix and I wanted to set something on fire, perhaps her (no doubt)  nasty panties as they lay against her milky white tobacco flavored skin.

* * * * *

Although Mom made tremendous promises about the kind of help she would provide once her great grandchildren arrived, she’s followed through with not a single one.  She has not changed a diaper in two months time.  She does not baby sit.  (This is no doubt a good thing.) 

She still complains constantly to my sister about how much & how hard she works, as my sister tries not to fall over from exhaustion or accidentally stick a car key in her ass, mistaking it for the ignition, as she twists like a spinning top.

Mom held the dogs on her lap several times while I was there, but I don’t remember her ever picking up one of the kids except during photo opportunities.  She silently stared at the TV a lot.

 

To be fair, I really did come to like these dogs more than most.  They’re funny & lovable, although I still think they’re dangerous.  The kids are rough with the dogs.  The dogs play like two grown men under the influence of hallucinogens or steroids, as the 14-month old totters around with no fear.  It’s an accident waiting to happen.

All that aside, given the choice of loving & nuzzling a little chick and a puppy, I’ll pick the poultry every single time.

What this great-grandmother I call “Mom” has put all her efforts into is creating a fictional fairytale world wherein these children are spoiled little miscreants, particularly the 2-year old boy.

I don’t believe it’s even possible to “spoil” a baby.  To use such terms to describe a child just out of foster care  . . . well, it’s like science fiction.  Yet she believes it to be true & voices the thought every chance she gets.  She wants the children in full-time daycare & her daughter back at her beck and call.

Mom is jealous of her own great-grandchildren.  She is jealous that my sister is home making their meals and giving them baths instead of doing it for her.

At one point I picked up the 3-year old girl, who reminds me of my own childhood as the oldest of three little ones.  I can practically read her mind as she keeps track of who gets the love, the hugs & the kisses.  I watched her count how many photos I was taking of each child, to see if she was getting short-changed. 

When I think of the attention my children received at her age, it’s nearly unfathomable that any two humans born into the same family could enter into such different situations.

She became upset over something or other, so I picked her up & said: “You’re still a baby, too, aren’t you?  You like to be babied just like the other two, don’t you?“ 

Before she could nod her head “Yes” and smile, Mom jumped in with: “I’m 68 and I’d like to be babied, too, but nobody’s babying me!”  My mouth hung open that such words could be spoken out loud.

* * * * *

This is my mother at age 3, with her brother Butchie:  I have never seen her smile with that kind of sweetness.  I think it may have disappeared when Butchie drowned on his own 3rd birthday, after following his puppy down to a creek on the farm property where they lived.

There are always reasons for everything, but it is our responsibility to try and fix ourselves before damaging our own children similarly.  Mom does not seem to have the ability to do so.  She has no insight whatsoever.

She has harmed her own children, she harmed my sister’s children & now she’s passing the poison on to a third generation.  (I cannot ignore that, even though I moved far away & protected my kids from personal contact with her, they received Mom’s shit directly from me.  I wish it wasn’t so, but it is.)

I let my daughter go out alone with her once, to pick up a prescription and get an Icee.  It was nerve-wracking.  (Later, my sister informed me that Mom’s driving has become dangerous.  FUCK ME!  When I try to be less than neurotic I discover NEUROTIC IS GOOD.)

We went out together later that evening, after my sister had a meltdown.  She’d been golfing all day, while I watched the kids.  I didn’t think about feeding them dinner or giving them baths, we just played.  She came home tired and sunburned.  It was a recipe for disaster, especially when her daughter called from prison and wanted to chat.

Imagine this scene: My sister juggling swords in the kitchen as she holds a phone under her chin.  I hear the tension in her voice as she begins frying food for dinner, telling her daughter the kids aren’t going to eat until 7 p.m., no baths until 8 and Easter prep still to do for the next day.  She’s saying, “IT’S ALL FUCKED UP!” 

I’m running for the door.  We’re going to go to Wal-Mart for Easter supplies, then to Mom’s house to pick up other stuff.  I’m trying to take some of the pressure off.

But Mom won’t leave.  She’s too excited by the clams frying in the deep fat fryer.  “Oh, clams!  MMMM!“  We have to stay and wait while my obese mother crams clams & other french-fried delicacies down her throat.  We stand around the kitchen jacking off while my sister melts.

While I could not dream of eating in such a tense situation, Mom doesn’t even notice it’s happening.  Either that or she likes it.

When we finally get in the car, I discover Mom does not wear a seat belt.  She also has not done anything to disable the seat belt warning system.  We drive miles and miles while the car dings five times every thirty seconds.  She ignores that it’s happening.  DING, DING, DING, DING, DING.

I refuse to say anything at all.

We arrive at Wal-Mart and Mom pulls out her stolen handicapped placard, a Christmas gift from some employee (now outdated by more than a year).  We park with her car practically inside the store, closer than the woman beside us using a wheelchair lift. 

I feel comfortable photographing this absurdity, it’s so bizarre I can’t control myself.  You’ll notice we’re actually in a spot intended for a VAN.

Since she’s fine with such jack-assian behavior, I took a shot of that, too:

(TO BE CONTINUED)