My mother believes she has worked extremely hard in life & deserves only the best, while other people’s achievements are luck alone. We’re talking bad luck, because someone else got it and she didn’t. This is why she regularly sighs heavily, sneers & says things like:
“Pam is so lucky, she’s got a husband that takes care of her and pays the bills.” She spits heavily as the words leave her mouth, they’re so difficult to say.
She knows that I was previously involved with 12 criminals, 11 freaks, 10 motherfuckers, 9 scumbags, 8 retards, 7 sick bastards, 6 monsters, 5 psychos, 4 pigs, 3 drug dealers, 2 dudes with crabs & a heroin addict before . . .
. . . suddenly & accidentally finding the Wonka bar with a golden ticket.
The little girl in me still finds it hard to fathom that she’s not pleased I chose a better life for myself than the one I was headed towards.
However, she refuses to consider anything a choice, unless it fits her skewed vision of the world. It’s impossible for her to imagine I’ve brought something equally positive to my husband’s life, since clearly it wasn’t cash. What else is there?
God forbid, we’ve been together 15 years and never separated, cheated or needed to call 911. I’ve never shown up at her house — like my sister — with a bloody face that looked as if I’d been in a car accident. I’ve yet to bleed at my man’s hands, he’s never bailed me out of jail.
She finds it odd, too, that we choose to keep our 11-year old daughter at home, instead of perhaps placing her adrift on a log in the middle of the Delaware River while I troll for nickels in the street. Neither my husband nor I have ever accidentally broken her nose or an arm, haven’t blown pot smoke in her sweet face.
I’m sure both my mom and sister believe she is incredibly spoiled & would love to toughen her up if they got the chance. (They will not.)
In other words, I am a huge disappointment to my mother. I have chosen to want better for myself, better than she would want for me.
Whereas most parents want happiness for their children, my mom would like me to be a hulking mass of 700 or more pounds, whereupon she would deliver fried chicken & tacos to my bed & then call me a lard ass. I could make her ecstatically happy with this single scenario, more than any other.
Unless of course she found me in that same bedroom, the same exact scene, sucking off a crackhead for a Snickers bar.
It’s true, with a little creativity & effort there are ways in which I could please her even more.
9 responses so far ↓
morethananelectrician // October 13, 2008 at 10:25 pm
As much as I could comment on “mom”, I am going to choose the good feeling I get whenever I watch Charlie open his Golden Ticket and when, at the end of the film, when they are flying over the town and the closing music starts…
I think that movie was an escape for me as a child…that good things happen to good people when they make good decisions. Sure it was “luck” that Charlie got his “ticket”, but the decisions he made helped him in the end.
Tara Gettman // October 13, 2008 at 10:56 pm
I think that’s the best revenge–that you have a stable, normal and HAPPY adult life and marriage. Despite her uncontrollable attempt to sabotage your future by screwing up your childhood, she failed. In the end, you get the last laugh. And your sane relatives get it!
Love you.
pamajama // October 13, 2008 at 11:02 pm
MTAE: The last time I watched that movie I let myself get so lost in it that I started to cry — for the 457th time. How is that even possible???
Saturday, on the ferry boat, I swear there was a little girl who made me think: “You remind me of Violet Beauregard!” Pure genius:)
TARA: I am laughing out loud at the fact that you chose this obnoxious post for your first comment! You must have subconsciously realized that it’s actually POST # 300! XO
soapboxdiva // October 14, 2008 at 11:09 am
Awwww, thanks for posting the pic….he looks as wonderful as I thought. Loves his baby girl and she loves him!
You know, I DO totally get that it has been hard to ‘let go’ of all the tremendous, fucked up, inconceivable, crap your mother surrounded you with. Really Pam, you deserve the BIGGEST award, just getting to where you are now. Your mom may take the cake for biggest, fucked up person with a vagina, allowed to procreate in this world!
But we know why….cause it got you here. And those two beings you brought in to the world and made such different choices with them. And that man, who whether your mom gets it or not, wouldn’t choose anything different than what he has. Sex is awesome in this ole world, but there are actually deeper emotions that can drive people, than the pleasure she gets from being stroked. Not sure your mom will ever ‘get’ that.
I’m with MTAE…..let’s focus on what makes us feel good! And I love what he said “that good things happen to good people when they make good decisions.” Only I don’t think it was luck that he got the ticket in the first place…..in the quantum-ness of it all, I think Charlie knew how to be happy and joy-filled from within, NOT based upon the circumstances of his life. And that brought him the eventual reward…..he just had to get the ticket to get there!
Tara’s hit it right on the head…you ARE living the best revenge. On some level, way down deep, your mother probably can’t stand it, that you figured out how to do something she never has…….and her twisted-ness of wanting to sabotage it for you isn’t working! She is having less and less power to mess with your happiness! It must really twist her panties! LOL! I love it! I wish I could type Muahahaha or however it should be spelled!
Happy 300th Post! I have loved so many of them! I look forward to the evolving Pam! Oh, and by the way, I think your baby picture looks a lot like your aunt! Keep it coming girl! P.S. Sure this is one of my rambling ones too…..just excuse me, like one of your eccentric SANE relatives! LOL!
You know, it’s so funny, he said more than once, “I really like that picture of me.” I was like, “Of the back of your flat head?” He’s a funny, funny man.
Thank you for acknowledging #300. Very exciting! Now I need to change all my categories so it’s possible to find something on here. Augh.
P.S. I’m not sensing the ramble. Where is your true inner self? LOL
heather // October 14, 2008 at 11:30 am
I think that the men you’ve had to deal with in your life are part of why you are who you are, good or bad. I’ve never had any drug addicts, but I’ve had a few less-than-choice-cuts of man meat, and my current husband is so different. We live our lives with no drama, content to be with each other, and feeling lucky that we found each other. I got tired of the losers, and finally realized I deserved better. Just because my entire family revels in seeking out that one person who can make their lives the most miserable, and continuing to trade “up” for more and more misery – I do not.
I would say your mother is jealous of you, because I find that most people who say negative things about you are motivated by it. However, I know my own family, and honestly, that’s just the way they are. White trash begets white trash in most cases. You are smart, and lucky you got out of that sickening circle of self degradation. I don’t think she has any motive other than she thrives in that kind of environment, and thinks you think you’re better than her because you aren’t satisfied with it. She’ll never be happy and she wants everyone else around her to be in misery as well. (Also, I am sure you suspect just plain ole mental illness, because I certainly do.)
And dang, if you’re gonna blow a guy for a candy bar, at least hide it from your mother. She’d eat it and then you’d have nothing to show for it.
Oh man, if you only knew how often my brother found her candy bars and stole them. She would return, the cupboard was bare, and it was a scary situation.
But, see, the 700-pound girl wouldn’t be able to get away!
The “white trash begets white trash” is so true. It’s been a fast downward spiral in my family, which I think is part of what had made me feel like I needed to pull them back from the brink. My family today is so completely different than the people who came to our house for holiday dinners when I was a kid. It’s pretty mind-blowing that a single generation could fuck up so badly.
“Less than choice cuts of man meat.” LOL
nathaliewithanh // October 14, 2008 at 2:17 pm
I wonder what keeps you coming back for more. There is such repugnance and dislike for her in your posts that I ask myself why you have not written her off yet.
There has to be love somewhere in your heart for her otherwise why bother?
Nope, no love at all. I think it’s a combination of PTSD and addiction, feeling very alone in the world once I moved away. I didn’t really have proper social skills to meet new people and make a new family. Part of what I love in your pictures is what a huge circle of friends you have across the world.
Now that my brother is gone it’s all changed. Because it’s only been just a little over a month there was kind of a whirlpool effect where I got drug back into it all. I think I wanted to be close to him & this was the only way. But he’s gone & I need to wash my mother completely away. Because she controls all the other members of the family through employment, housing, etc., it’s hard to erase her from the picture.
The other issue, though, is my niece who just began a prison term . . . her three children and the fact that they’ll be going to my sister’s soon. Do I step away from everyone? Or do I have some obligation to try and make sure those kids are at least safe? My niece’s criminal involvement started in 2006, just after having the first two. It was what really initiated my re-involvement with any of them.
This is becoming a blog entry . . .
nathaliewithanh // October 15, 2008 at 10:57 am
I’m stumped. You got me there. What a family!
Could you perhaps propose to take the kids a week-end a month? You go get them and bring them back. You are in control and you make sure they know you are only one phone call away.
It seems that you could work this out and still remain in control.
Except for that drive each weekend to Kentucky from New Jersey and back – lol.
Red // October 17, 2008 at 2:37 am
Mmmm .. Snickers.
hehehee
THE BEST FUCKING COMMENT EVER!!! You get me, you really get me – lol.
amandalinn // October 18, 2008 at 2:53 pm
Why is your daughter hugging Ed Asner’s flat head?
Snickers… now I’m all hungry
LOL — the Ed Asner comment — hysterical:) Once we were in the shower and her hair was flat and it was noticeable that her head is shaped exactly like her father’s. She began screaming “No, it’s not!” and crying.
I never really noticed the size and shape of his head until I realized I was pregnant and terrified. Evidently I have an amazing vaginatopia – lol – because she weighed 10′11″ and when her heart rate dropped during labor I pushed her out like a frigging train.
Larry David’s “Curb Your Enthusiasm” just had a show on last week where a woman claimed his best friend had a small penis — this began an argument wherein they claim it’s actually women with l-a-r-g-e vaginas who cause men to be crippled by fears of small peni. I think they might be onto something.
I’m so disgusting, I even gross myself out.