Human Meat Loaf Explodes

The only thing that motivates me most days is anger, not love or money or sex or competition, just anger.  I like the feeling that my head is about to pop off.

When life is smooth I’m basically a human meat loaf.

It’s most often people on Facebook who do me the favor of pissing me off, since I am a social misfit who only leaves the house when absolutely necessary.

Today a woman named Lisa is asking how long her husband gets a free pass before she can call him an asshole.  They’re on their way to his mother’s funeral.

Really?

When someone I love dies

(and I’m assuming he loves his mother since I seem to be in the minority regarding this whole “My mom is a c*nt thing”)

do not f*ck with me.  I am just stupid enough to cut a real live beloved person out of my life on the way to a real dead beloved person’s funeral.

I do not dig narcissism even though I’m sure there are times I’m her poster child.  I just hope when I’m behaving in such a manner that someone will be kind enough to tell me, even if it means they need to trip me to get my attention.

* * * * *

Other things that piss me off:

1.) Politics.  No one changes anyone else’s mind.

But if you put it in my face as if your opinion is the only one that counts I will hate you with a vengeance, often silently.  Then I might possibly explode at some unknown time at which point you will realize it’s happened by the flying body parts and bloody screams.

2.) Adorable nicknames for “Mom” and “Grandma,” even though my own son calls me “Ma” and “Mama.”

I’m torn over the hypocrisy.  The only difference is I did not design my own cutesie moniker, he started it in his teens.  Why does it bother me so much, when young mothers deem themselves “Mama” and grown women call themselves “Meme” (a word I do not know how to pronounce) or their husband “Pop-Pop”?

I have not a single clue.  Please help.

3.) I know it’s intoxicating to be a young mom.  However, is it necessary that with every breath taken I must be reminded my ovaries have dried up and my child has moved across the country?  It brings up a bitterness in me that’s embarrassing.  I want to scream,

“Just wait!  You’ll see!”

 4.) At least every other day I begin screeching over a woman who complains constantly that men are looking at her teen daughter, winking at her, lusting over her, being inappropriate.  Next time she posts it’s a picture she has taken of her own child’s ass in tight ripped jeans and a comment about her “beauty.”

For the life of me, I cannot look away from this accident scene.

The most amazing thing is that everyone doesn’t realize we all love our children and believe them to be beautiful.  Some actually think theirs is somehow more special, uniquely superior.  I want to spit on those people and scream, “Every child is gifted, you f*cking moron!  Even you!”

5.) Interminably happy people.  It makes me laugh to say this because I realize how incredibly stupid I sound, how unappreciative.  I am a curmudgeon, there is no question about it.  My pessimism began as a child (for good reason) and it’s not going anywhere.

I’m probably a little or a lot jealous of people who don’t realize the earth could shift at any moment.  I admire those who realize it’s true but just refuse to let it stop them.

Some days I come close.

Twisted Dipshit

Either I do nothing or I do everything at once.

Every once in a while I will wake up and schedule myself and/or my daughter for 12 classes and 7 appointments that reach far into the future.  But most days I do nothing.

So last week I purchased 30 days worth of Isagenix to try and get my eating on track.  I had the option of ordering 11 days worth, but went all the way.  What could I have been thinking?

The lovely & extremely thin woman who is my “counselor” has provided me with all kinds of directions.  Oh my do I dislike being directed.  Tell me I have to eat a certain thing and not to eat other certain things and you will find me at 7-11.

Although I’m mostly harming myself this way, I slip into child mode and hide the fact that I’m cheating.  I find great joy in “getting over” on . . . who?  Me, myself and I.

Nothing really brings me more joy than lying to my husband.  He apologized last night for making chicken & mashed potatoes because he assumed I could not eat the meal.

Oh.my.God did that ever tickle me.  I’d just had a Slurpee, an ice cream bar and a package of donuts.  I thanked him for the chicken as I surreptitiously slipped mashed potatoes and gravy into the bowl.

Today I am following the fasting procedures, now that I’ve made it clear I have choices and options and “You’re not my mother!  You can’t tell me what to do!”

I just read a great book entitled: “You are Not so Smart.”

Clearly, this is true.

Twisted Pattycakes &/Or My Barbie Doll BFF

My insane BFF Pattycakes called again today.

Lately I’ve been letting the phone ring without answering.

Her last voicemail: “WHATAYA DOIN?  GIVEN YUR HUZBAN A BLOWJOB?” followed by raucous throaty laughter.

* * * * *

She had a visitor recently and although the woman seemed absolutely lovely there was just . . . something . . . that didn’t sit right.  So Patricia, with her usual down played intelligence and beyond the norm street smartz, tricked the woman into giving her a last name after the chick called a second and third time asking for help finding employment.

It’s not like Patty has a manufacturing business or owns fruit fields.  She’s unemployed herself, after collapsing a lung pushing a garbage cart through a home for the aged.  Yes, this 98-pounder man-handled an enormous plastic bin to the point where she punctured her own right lung.  The girl has a heart the size of the moon.

Anyway, since this unknown prior woman came to visit with her boyfriend’s pal, a dude who’d just recently been released from government custody, Patty searched her on the state website.  Lo and behold, she was in prison for the attempted murder of her husband, an ex-police officer.  How did she do it?  Poison.

She received a miniscule 5 years for putting anti-freeze in his drinks and cyanide in his food “on a number of occasions.”  She supposedly considered suicide but decided punishing her husband was a better idea.  You know someone is pissed when their preferred method of your demise is watching you writhe on the floor for 30 minutes before your eyes go dark.

My favorite part is the neighbor: “She was a little ditsy but didn’t seem like the type . . . always smiling.”

No shit!  The smile should have been the tip off.  I only trust someone who’s exhibiting annoyance with the world.

Patty got the woman back on the phone and said she’d come close to finding her a job when she called the mayor, but the mayor wanted to know “ARE YOU FUCKING NUTS?  SHE JUST GOT OUT OF PRISON FOR ATTEMPTED MANSLAUGHTER.”

I almost forgot the best part, when she told the woman: “Do me a favor, don’t be fixing me any drinks!”

* * * * *

I kept listening.

She mentioned a woman I met once before, Debbie.

‘That bitch is fucking everybody!  She’s almost 50 years old and still posting Facebook self portraits taken in the bathroom.  Jesus Christ, pay attention.

At least keep the toilet out of the shot!” 

“Can you believe it, she went to Atlantic City and picked up some guy down there, slept with him.  The next morning he gives her money for a cab ride home!”

I told her, “You got fucked twice!”

* * * * *

But what’s really got her going is a certified letter that insists she show up in court or a warrant for her arrest will be filed.  Why?  Because she called 9-1-1 five years ago when she heard a commotion across the street behind her house.  Someone was in the process of being robbed and having his throat slit.

She recalls testifying: “You gotta look at the judge when you curse.”

The attorney asked her what she heard: “Gimme your money you fucking spic.”  Uproarious laughter follows.  Testimony lasted two days.  Worst of all, she couldn’t smoke during the breaks.

“They took me in this little room.  The officer said, “You can’t smoke in here.”  I was like WHAT THE FUCK?!”

Now the accused, a scary looking man with an enormous rap sheet, dread locks and a neck tattoo, is asking for a new trial and she has to testify AGAIN.  She says, “No fucking way will I ever call again unless it’s a loved one.  I don’t give a shit what happens!”

Then she ends the call like she always does, ever since she lost her son:

“Call me!  Let’s do lunch.  I love ya!”

* * * * *

There are people in this world you will spend oodles of time with and yet they add nothing to your life.  But there may be one who catches your attention returning to school with kindergarteners from the circus when she says:

“This was a great trip for these lil’ motherfuckers, wasn’t it?”

Do not pass go.  Do not look straight ahead and pretend you didn’t hear her.

Immediately strike up a conversation and say: “Did I really hear you say you have five kids?”

You will never regret it.

The Twisted Nature of Life &/or A Conversation With Mom

Spring has sprung and in all the excitement I picked up the phone and called my mother.  I know!  What a bizarre way to celebrate.  We’d had no communication since Christmas.  I’d essentially cut all ties with her and my sister due to the most recent stupidity.  When I say “cut all ties” I did it the virtual way, by blocking them from my Facebook page like a passive-aggressive dork.

I’d made a snarky comment about Mom on my page & she’d replied with something like “You must be talking about some other mother I’m unaware of, I don’t give a shit what you do.”  Rest assured, her stories of my childhood would read oh so differently.  Our communication patterns are clearly warped & then fried like a Twinkie at the county fair.

As for my sister, she let her boyfriend (we’ll call him “Sick Fuck”) back into the house after throwing him out due to the altercation relating to his comments about my niece’s breasts.  Somehow I’ve gotten pulled into everything by virtue of the fact that I’m my niece’s #1 supporter.  It’s not that I believe she makes no mistakes, it’s just that I’ve never understood this idea of kicking the underdog.  Especially if she happens to be your daughter or my niece.

Anyway, my sister is incredibly pissed off that I am close with Samantha.  She hurls curses at her and screams things like, “Go ahead, call Pammy!  I know you tell her EVERYTHING!”  She has some how turned everything around, when Sam is her daughter, not mine.  I have become the moral arbiter in my sister’s eyes, not a position I applied for or qualified to fill.

So fuck it, I felt like neither Mom or Penny were happy to hear anything other than perhaps I’d (1) been run over by a car or (2) was working in the power plant demolished by the recent tsunami or (3) my husband had finally acknowledged my worthlessness and set me out on the road in ratty underwear to be hit by the aforementioned (1). 

We’re not the kind of family that applauds one another’s successes.  More often it’s the family tradition to jump for joy over a blatant mess.  That’s the only way to get bumped up the ladder of success, climbing over each other’s backs, preferably in work boots or high heels.

* * * * *

By having no contact with the two of them, though, it put my niece in an awkward position.  She found my mother reading my Facebook page on her own computer.  I had skipped contacting Mom on her 70th birthday because of something she said to Sam.  This weird silent split was only making it more difficult for my niece, the last thing I wanted.

So I called mom and she was of course surprised to hear from me.  If my own daughter blew me off the way I do her, I’m not sure I’d be willing to just pick up where we left off.  So although she never admits to any wrong doing whatsoever there must be some vein of guilt or conscience deep within that acknowledges she owns a part in our epic butt fuck of a mother/daughter saga.

We were on the phone for 90 minutes.  It’s not how you would imagine it, as I am one of those nervous laughter types and after I call Mom on anything I cackle in the hope that she will do the same instead of call me names like when I was 10.  It’s a laugh riot. 

I can only hope that some of what I said will ring in her ears during the weeks and months ahead.  It only matters because I need someone to realize Samantha is not the only bad guy, as she’s trying so hard and yet being treated as the devil’s spawn.

This is a girl who was addicted to crack and hasn’t returned to it since being released from prison even though she is consistently told (1) she doesn’t care at all about her kids and (2) she’s a worthless piece of shit.  My mother stated several times, “Oh, she’ll never do that again.” 

Duh, you freaking dumbass.

 This led to a discussion about addiction and the fact that neither she or I can get off sugar or get our food in order, my brother is dead from the same shit, and my sister’s addicted to alcohol, cigarettes & gambling.  Since we can’t rid ourselves of these substances, how is it possible not to deem Sam a huge success?  Instead of being the black sheep she should be the shining star. 

Although I repeated it several times, I’m not sure she could ever take it in.  She’s too selfish to be able to give credit to anyone other than herself.  She is so incredibly egomaniacal, egocentric, childish and warped.

Eventually I told her there was a reason I didn’t call on her birthday and asked if she wanted to know why.  Did she remember saying something to Sam about how many cocks had been in her during a fight over a $300 electric bill? 

“Well, I don’t know, I might have.”

REALLY, Mom?  This is something you could FORGET saying to your beautiful beloved granddaughter?

I replied, “Mom, you’re 70!  At what point do you realize you’re the grown up and these kind of hurtful words are inappropriate when screamed at your granddaughter?  When do we learn a better way?  You know this isn’t something you should be saying to her.”  Mind you, I continue to laugh inappropriately because it is so ABSURD to need to say these words.

Her reply? 

“Well, Pam!  She fucked a black man for crack!” 

She stated this as if she couldn’t imagine anything worse in the world, with such indignation you’d think she’d led her life by Dear Abby’s advice. 

So I said, “Well, Mom, when I was about 11 you brought a black man into our van at the Indy Time Trials, got under a blanket with him and unzipped his pants then proceeded to jerk him off with me right there.  How is that different?”

“Well, I was probably drunk.”  And that part she said as if she were telling me she’d made me an omelet for breakfast and left it on the counter.  Perfectly reasonable, oh well, not a big deal really.

I said, “Are you going to tell me that a lot of women in America don’t fuck a man they don’t particularly want to on any given night?  At least Samantha got something out of it.  We’ve all done our fair share of whoring around.”

Her reply: “Oh God, not like that!”

How the fuck do you argue against such ignorance?

So I asked: “Do you remember taking me with you to put notes in your boyfriend’s cars?”

“Well, yes, but at least I kept you with me!  At least I didn’t leave you with a babysitter!” 

At this point I just snort.

We talked about Sam’s current boyfriend, who is back in jail, probably getting more facial tattoos as I write this.  Mom went on and on about how Sam had the opportunity to date “a nice guy” who wanted to take care of her and the kids but Sam wanted nothing to do with him.

My reply: “Mom, you married a man who has never, ever treated you properly or respected what you’ve done for him or even thanked you.  And you left everything to be with him, gave up everything.”

She said, “Well, you’re probably right about that.”

I said, “Mom, you left my father and immediately married a man who had a drawer full of bills you paid off.  You have never, ever been with a man who took care of you.  It’s always been the other way around.  And my sister, Sam’s mom, your daughter, left her second husband because he “was too nice.”  So how can you expect more of your granddaughter, or for her to behave any differently than every woman in this family?”

“Well . . . “

Then I add, “And what about the babies, Mom?  She had 3 beautiful children and our family tradition has always been to scream and cry and wring hands at the idea of a baby being born, as far back as my grandmother when she found out you were pregnant with me!  Yet you wanted Sam to have an abortion and that baby is the most beloved of all of them since she reminds us of Jim (my deceased brother).”

Her reply: “Oh, I don’t know what I’d do without those kids!”

I tried to throw in some positives, mentioning that she at least never allowed a man to live in our home who would say negative things about us or cut us down at every turn, the way my sister’s boyfriend treats Samantha.  It’s impossible to describe what a huge ordeal it is for me to see a way in which MY MOTHER is superior in any way to MY SISTER.  But my sister has really lost her way.

Still, I felt I had to make the first move to patch that relationship up too because, once again, this situation is not helpful to Sam.  So I sent my sister a Friend Request with a paragraph about knowing she is frustrated and stressed out.  I mentioned that I don’t handle being screamed at very well and I apologize for that because I know she is in need of help.  I told her I loved her and am sorry.  She accepted the following day with a comparable paragraph.

Not that things have changed.  Sam’s youngest one had a seizure day before yesterday and the idiotic boyfriend wanted to go with her in the ambulance.  What the fuck?!  This is a guy who’s still married to his fourth wife and has never taken care of his own children, on federal probation for having back-due child support in so many states.

My sister got pissed at her daughter for looking askance at this jerk-off and telling him she’d go with her own daughter, thank you very much.  This was somehow considered “selfish.”

I have no doubt that this piece of shit is trying to do his best.  His best is just really fucking similar to worthless.

One minute my niece is selfish, the next she doesn’t give a shit about her kids.  The girl can’t win.  I have no idea how she’s lasted this long.

 * * * * *

Clearly what I need to focus on throughout all of this is my own part in it, my own foibles, mistakes and improper behavior.  As angry as I am at my sister when it appears she is putting her boyfriend first, the reality is I have made and continue to make so many mistakes with my own children.  More often than not, I am incredibly selfish and put my own needs in front of theirs . . . just like Mom. 

It’s a balancing act and I will never be a 1950′s housewife type. 

As this crazy aging process continues I’m not even sure if any particular balance is the correct one.  We all have a limited amount of days on the planet and who is to say having children precludes our ability to ever again live life however we want, even if it displeases our kids (or anyone else)?  I don’t know the answer to this.

Certainly in the past five years, since my son became an adult & my brother died, my perspective has changed 180 degrees.  I don’t enjoy seeing the ways in which I am like my mother but I have to acknowledge I’ve done no better when it comes to some of her most outrageous behaviors.  

I just thank God I have the ability to analyze and apologize. 

I Think Bad Thoughts About My Dentist &/or Germy Kitty-Cat Butts

I’ve always had ugly dentists.  

In high school my sister and I used to purposely go to Steak ‘n Shake and eat burgers with onions before check-ups.  Dr. Hauserman’s breath was just awful, so we wanted to re-pay the favor.  (In retrospect, the man put fillings in my mouth that would survive a nuclear attack.)  I still remember his thick glasses and big yellow incisors bearing down upon me.

Who knew I would actually care about messing up the schedule of a tooth specialist if he happened to be great looking, like the new guy that bought the practice of my former dude (who was obese & had a stomach that made it necessary he extend his arms fully to do the job.)

My normal sleep hours are something like 5-11 a.m.  So when I have to be somewhere at 9 or 10 or 11 (or even 1) it can be a problem.  I am late & miss appointments so often it’s embarrassing.

I missed a big appointment last week, a double or maybe triple time slot for 9 a.m.  These people do not play. 

Can you imagine, after calling our house and my cell phone, his receptionist (with a heavy German accent) called my husband at work to track me down?  Did he do the right thing and say I’d been checked into rehab for drug addiction or maybe placed in jail for assault of a child, something that would allow me to maintain a semblance of self-respect? 

No!  He told them I was . . .

HOME IN BED AFTER A LATE NIGHT!  THAT I’M “A HEAVY SLEEPER!”

Yes, I know it’s true, but come on!  I didn’t even hear the phone ring until 12:45.  Help me out here!

This new dentist looks like he should have his own show on VH-1 or Bravo or maybe even MTV.  When he comes at me from above it’s kinda dreamy.  This is potentially the answer for all dental phobics.  The fantasy gets a little fucked up when his assistant appears out of the corner of my eye with a big plastic face mask, what could be a freaky S&M prop.  Other than that . . .

Even with his intimidating good looks, I say stupid things because I figure

WTF?  It’s a short life!

I told him the only thing more embarrassing than having him in my mouth is having my proctologist in my ass.  Really and truly, though, I’m not sure that’s accurate.  I hate my teeth.  In general I’m pretty grossed out by (1) saliva, (2) bad breath, (3) spitting, and (4) mouth germs.  Really, ALL OF IT!  The whole french kissing thing is over-rated when you put it under a microscope.  It’s the catalyst for a freakish acid trip, combine enough tongue, tartar and gingivitis and I could jump out a fucking window.

On the other hand, I’ve never been up close and personal with my own rectum.  Don’t they all look pretty much alike?  I mean, some chicks have GREAT freaking teeth!  There is no f’ing way their butt holes are somehow spectacular.  I simply refuse to believe it.  Don’t forget, I’ve had a succcessful hemorrhoidectomy.  My ass is quite up to par, thank you very much.

I couldn’t even allow him to give me nitrous oxide when he ripped a 30-year old cap out of my face with a crowbar because I remember being completely inappropriate the single time I had the stuff.  And the oral surgeon wasn’t even attractive!  I had such an urge to reach out and touch. 

If I went with the gas I would really do it this time. 

Pathetic!

* * * * *

Friday I had a regular doctor’s appointment at 2 p.m., one of the least favorite things I ever force myself to do, even though I absolutely adore the negative, unhappy, miserable fat man who told me yesterday he thinks maybe he should start smoking dope to deal with the stupid people surrounding him.  Yes, that’s my doc. 

I’ve stopped going to the gynecologist because I can, there are no prescriptions to fill.  But my general practitioner is a different story.  I tried to stop that too, but someone mentioned if you don’t continue taking thyroid medication you can drop dead. 

Oh bother!

The highlight was peeing in a cup.  Normally I don’t have to do this, but I guess the whole sugar testing/diabetic thing is supposed to be taken seriously.  I couldn’t even figure out the mechanics of what I was to do, so I had to ask for help.  “Where are the bottles?  What do you want me to do?  Where should I put it?”  So embarrassing. 

I managed to pee all over my hand and began laughing out loud behind the closed door.  Here I have my hand in the toilet trying to catch the flow, I can’t bear the idea that my skin might actually touch the porcelain, and so of course it does.  I wash my hands like an OCD wackjob.  Then I notice the pen I’m supposed to use to write my name on the outside of the bottle.  It has a paper flag attached about 5 inches wide, with the word P-E-N scrawled on it.

Seriously, I’m supposed to TOUCH THAT THING?  How many other people peed in cups and chose to use the pen BEFORE washing their hands?  I want to puke! 

How is it that doctor’s offices tend to be such petri dishes, something so clear to me but evidently not to the medical personnel working in them?  It’s like the toys in the waiting room!  When my kids went to touch those things I’d scream with the intensity of a woman watching her toddler stick her finger in the butt-hole of a mangy kitty-cat at the park.

I’d taken a Xanax before the appointment and it gave me the ability to use that pee-wadden pen, then wash my hands once again before I used my sleeve to twist the door handle and escape my nightmare.

* * * * *

So how was your day?

Update On Potato-Head Brother-In-Law &/or Thanks, Mom!

Scott (my step-brother) called yesterday laughing like a hyena and talking like he’s been on  a 100-day meth bender.  This is the norm, although he doesn’t even drink alcohol.  He does, however, spend weeks alone in a truck.  So when he finally speaks it comes out with volcanic force. 

Occasionally he picks up some chick and spends a few hours feeding his need for human contact, but then he kicks her out and goes back to being the most kind-hearted, adorable, funny, anti-social freak I know.

He was calling to say that he told the pseudo brother-in-law Mike (my sister’s boyfriend who is married for the 5th time, yet engaged to sis) a big fat lie about buying his own truck, which in turn got Mike talking to him again.  Talking so much that Mike called 7 times in a matter of 2 hours.

Somewhere in the mix Mike asked Scott, “Kin ah ask yew a question ‘n will ya tell me the Gawd’s honest truth?”

“Sure!” was Scott’s answer, although anyone who would believe him is nuts, since Scott is never completely serious.

Evidently the fact that I’d written on Scott’s Facebook page the words

“Scott Eric“

had come to Mike’s attention.  Since I don’t always have shit to say I just put down anything to simply express the fact that I’m thinking of someone.  After I’d written that, my niece wrote back ”Pamela Jo.”  Amazingly, she gets it.

Cause it’s my name, fer goodness sakes.  Nothing more.

Then I made the mistake of saying something else on my own page about my 50th birthday approaching and how I might just stand naked in the road for the purpose of trying to get truckers to honk their horns.  Utterly stupid bullshit.  You know, the kind of thing Facebook would die without.

Mike’s question to Scott was,

“Are you fuckin’ Pam?”

Scott’s reply:

“Pam who?” 

Then he thought for a second and said,

“YOU MEAN MY SISTER?”

I’m kind of at a loss as to where I can even go with this from here.  I knew Mike was a pervert, I knew his mind worked this way, but the absolute confirmation of same is icky and troubling. 

There really are times I wish I was wrong about people.

I should acknowledge that from a different perspective this should be a compliment.  I am nearing 50 and most of Scott’s chiclets are 35 or less.  I have wings under my arms that resemble an owl, my skin bears the remnants of carrying two big ass babies, and Scott’s ex-wife is a Scandinavian bombshell.

So it might be a compliment if Mike didn’t have the IQ of a pork chop.

* * * * *

Then Scott mentioned that Mom has had pneumonia and went for an MRI recently.  Does this mean I’ll be feeling sympathetic and send her a Mother’s Day card with a nice gift?

Aw, fuck it.  I’ll spend the cash at the psychologist’s on Friday, trying to figure out why I am the most unforgiving person I’ve ever met. 

I mean if Mom wasn’t so fucked up then my sister would think she deserved better than this piece of garbage she’s aligned herself with.  She might be with someone normal, like a tax accountant.  Her children might never have gone to prison or had sex with chicks whose parents were jailed for murder.  This would play havoc with my superiority complex.

My brother, without my mother’s hideous interference, might have played for the NFL and be living the life of riley with a mansion in Miami.  Can you imagine how hot it is down there right now, if I had to make that trip for the holiday, if he wasn’t dead?  My husband could be forced to sit at the pool with hot, young cheerleaders. 

My sister’s tax accountant might have an affair with one of them and she’d be devastated.  My husband might be having a threesome with that motherfucking cheerleader and the wimpy tax accountant this very fucking second!

And since Mike was from Florida and I’d be really pissed off, standing on the side of the road trying to get truckers to honk their horns, that ugly bastard might have picked me up and we’d be together now, with me caressing his flaccid un-muscled skin and bad Harley tats.

So thanks, Mom! 

Happy Mother’s Day!

Twisted Lives Are So Much Better Shared

It’s common knowledge among people who know me in real life that I ask a lot of freaking questions.  We’re not talking friendly chit-chat, it’s more like invasive interrogation lobbed at your head like a racquetball.  The more information you provide, the faster I think of things I want to know, subject areas I want to delve into further.  There is never enough time.

Some people like it, some are offended and hate it.  I’ve been asked if I’m a newspaper reporter or a member of a crime-fighting squad.  Personally, I would love it if someone showed such interest in me.  If memory serves correctly it happened just once and we were at the local Italian American Club during a repast.  The experience brought me to tears at several points, not because I was unhappy about it or the memories too painful to rehash, but because it made me realize how seldom anyone ever has shown such interest in my life. 

This blog entry talks about it a bit: The Twisted State of Conversation.  I think I was actually grateful.

It’s not that people avoid asking questions due to disinterest, they don’t ask because of some reserved belief that other people’s business is not their business.  It’s just not true.  We’re all experiencing similar funky shit cause we’re all living life.  Of course one has the right at any point to refuse to discuss themselves and that’s perfectly fine.  But from my study of human nature (mostly in bowling alleys) it seems that people are desperate to be heard and I like to think I’m providing a service.

Recently it’s come slamming into my awareness that everyone has a story, bar none, and often the story is so much more than you could ever imagine it would be.  My own life has been full of unexpected twists and turns, often hinging upon the mother I grade ‘F’ for “Fucking Failure.”  But in the long run, compared to most, I should receive a ‘W’ for “Whiner.”  It’s a difficult thing to acknowledge, a little embarrassing, but inescapable.

* * * * *

This conclusion has been cemented through my re-connection with several old classmates, due to the wonders of mighty Facebook.  Our farm town held only 3,000 people.  There were about 100 students per class.  We spent 8 hours or more per day in cramped desks, listening to boring teachers, for 10 or more years.  It seemed to me that I was the only person in the entire school who went home to crazyville.  30 years later I come to find out I couldn’t have been more wrong.  Unshared drama surrounded us all.

When I think of our attention focused on some idiotic historical figure or other, instead of sharing experiences and focusing on solutions to problems and comfort in numbers, it makes me want to puke.

From just three conversations I walk away with my mind unhinged.

* * * * *

First, it was Robbie, who lived two doors down Guthrie Street.  A cute boy in the class ahead of me, I don’t know if he & I ever had much of a conversation as children.  He was quiet, low-key, never one to look for attention from anyone.  (All traits I’m fascinated by since I was pretty much the opposite.)  I remember being told Robbie was adopted & then his mother discovered she was pregnant.   I’ve always loved this story, like something out of a fairy tale proving God is real.  You know, be a loving person and in return your dreams will all come true.  (I mean I know it doesn’t always work out like that, but even I get one positive thought per year.)

When we talked recently he told me he’s tried to find his birthparents, come close, but can’t quite pull together the final details.  He’s even written to one of my favorite TV shows that find people, but was turned away.  He raised 3 kids on his own after his first young wife died suddenly.  The outgoing, funny brother who was my age is long deceased from a car accident.  No one escapes untouched, but some are mauled so much worse.

All that’s enough on its’ own, but for me the ultimate piece of the story is that Robbie . . .

is psychic. 

As in he seriously believes when he walks into a room he can read the thoughts of others & has to block them out or would lose his mind.  (Holy shit.)  I felt like I’d died and gone to heaven, that’s how interesting I found this subject.  Fuck American History, to hell with Geometry, tell me more about what you’re hearing inside your head.

* * * * *

Next was Gary, a tall, blonde, farm boy adonis.  He was in school musicals, a star, the perfectly popular American athlete.  His smile had a fucking sparkle to it, that kind of guy.  We were not part of the same social scene, to say the least.  When he friended me I was confused.  In a million years I wouldn’t have expected to connect with him, but boy was I wrong.  He is one of the sweetest, most loving, emotionally present people I’ve ever met. 

So when he told me he needed intensive psychological treatment for serious depression after his divorce, I couldn’t have been more surprised.  As it turns out, women are not the only people with feelings.  Shazam!  (I knew that.)  Even guys who drive trucks & appear to have the world by the balls.  Fifteen years divorced, he has never re-married.

Several phone calls since our first connection, I wasn’t shocked to hear that Gary is currently in love with a Filipino girl he met on Matchmaker.com.  He’s met her whole family on-line.  They call him “Steven Segal.”  His heart is huge and he’s willing to do whatever it takes to make life easier for this woman and her daughter, even her extended family.  I hope it works out.

* * * * *

Third, I was most blown away by Susie.  She was someone I probably barely looked at in junior high, I seriously doubt if I gave her the time of day because that’s the kind of little bitch I was & still can be.  I believe she moved away in high school, purposely got pregnant at 15 & married to get away from her mother.  (Sometimes it seems like I just have to give away a little of my own shit to find out where the bodies are buried for someone else.)  This woman now looks barely 40, yet she has 2 grown children, several grandchildren, and 2 great-grandchildren.  Susie’s mom beat the crap out of her daily.  But that’s not the crazy part.

It’s bad enough in person, but in an instant message my typing speed completely overwhelms the victim.  I asked Susie, “Did you have any siblings?”  She mentioned her two sisters.  Then she said, “Oh, and I have a full brother who’s six years older than me, who I just met a few years ago.”  So I asked how that was possible. 

“Well, Mom and Dad left him in a bar when he was a baby and some people picked him up and took him home.  He was raised in a nearby town and we never knew he existed till my sister found his birth certificate.  Mom finally came clean cause she knew she was dying.  She called me home from Florida to tell me about him.”  I was stunned. 

As it turns out, the ”adoptive” family never did anything officially, just raised the boy.  When I asked if he was a ward of the state she said, “Oh no, back then they didn’t bother with stuff like that.  He’s still really angry at my mom, even though I keep telling him he was lucky he didn’t grow up with her.”

Then came the clincher: “They did the same thing to me, left me in the bar, but somebody brought me back.”

Here was this person I never spent a single moment being nice to during all the years I knew her. 

* * * * *

It brings tears to my eyes now, just thinking of how different it could have been for all of us.  Knowing you’re not the only one in a fucked up situation is probably the most healing possible scenario.  The secret causes the shame & that’s the most harmful piece of all.

We learn about fables and calculus and insects.  Children have gym class and recess and foreign language.  But so little time is ever put into human interaction and kindness, or how important it is to understand that everyone has a story, each person is deserving of our respect and attention, & the listener is the lucky one.  (Even when it’s the hot chick who makes other women jealous cause they don’t know she’s so miserable she can’t stand it, or the ugly ass man who would entertain you for hours with his humor if only you were willing to even look his way.)

It would make it just that much easier if we were aware right from the start that none of us are alone in this shit.

Finding My Twisted Voice, Did I Lose It In Farmville?

Somehow, somewhere, my written voice has been choked to death.  It was always a problem that I wrote and re-wrote to such a ridiculous extent, but now I don’t even begin. 

There seems to be a connection to Facebook, since I spend hours and hours looking at the page over at that idiotic site, the one where people say dumb shit in 12 words or less (or more commonly nothing at all). 

So what am I doing there?

I play games with fucking YOVILLE and FARMVILLE and MAFIA WARS, activities a person with an IQ of 50 could participate in as they dribble saliva down their chins and wait for the next institutional meal delivery to arrive at bedside.  As I do this stuff there is a constant running commentary in my brain, like an MTV highlight line, that says:

“I need to do something that makes money.  This is retarded. 

What the fuck is wrong with me?”

The answer is that this Facebook stuff is like crack for the masses, non-thinking hypnotic activities manufactured to put your mind in that subconscious zone most desired by advertisers.  Many of my fellow beloved bloggers are on Facebook and that makes it even easier to remain there, although I no longer read their blogs since I’m instead staring at an empty page appropriate for a monkey.  (Don’t get me wrong, I love monkeys.)

I miss reading blogs, at least some of them.  More than likely I need to weed my list down and then I wouldn’t be so overwhelmed by trying to keep up with too many.  We’re all a bunch of wordy motherfuckers and wading through 20 entries a day can overwhelm me to the point where I’m completely done in.  You’d think I’d dug 20 ditches instead of read 20,000 lines. 

How did people survive when they had to wash laundry by hand (often for families of 10 or so), hang it on lines (all that upper arm strength) and beat the evening’s meat with a hammer before coating it with some kind of crap meal and cooking it in a pan that later had to be scrubbed with a wire brush?

The worst part about Facebook is that everyone is so NICE and BORING there and not many people ever say anything politically incorrect or add much detail.  There are pages I visit where no one says anything at all.  What the fuck is that about?  Seriously, how is it possible that no one has something to say?  I ALWAYS HAVE SOMETHING TO SAY!  Does that mean I’m the fucked up one?  When I start commenting on someone’s page it often seems I’ve taken it over completely (SO NOT COOL!). 

Most inane posts lack even a hint of creativity and contain either (1) game scores or (2) stuffed animals more appropriate for a nursery than a grown human being or (3) virtual beating hearts or (4) terroristic threats of the sort like this one:

“If you love your daughter like I love my daughter and you’re willing to say it (WHICH MOST PEOPLE WON’T BE WILLING TO BECAUSE THEY ARE NOT TRUE LOVING MOTHERS LIKE ME) then post this to your wall for 45 minutes.”

I want to gut the people who post that shit, one of whom is my sister-in-law.  Her daughter does it, too.  The worst are the religious posts.  Honest to God, she put this on her page last week:

“WITHOUT GOD… our week would be: Sinday, Mournday, Tearsday, Wasteday, Thirstday, Fightday, Shatterday, Seven days without God – Makes one Weak! (If you are not ashamed of God, post this to your status.)”

Seriously, I need a divorce just so I’m not related to anyone who could have posted such nonsensical drivel.

But I can’t escape it, even my niece recently wrote: 

“For all of you that aren’t too proud to say thank you to your moms for helping you be the great person you are today… please copy and paste to your profile!  I expect to see this many times on my page! Some people no longer have their Moms here to appreciate! (But we can still say THANKS for their love and support!!!  If you love your mother and are willing to acknowledge that she made you into the wonderful person you are today post this.  Most people will not have the nerve or heart to post such a thing.” 

Now, mind you, this is the girl who grew up to have 3 children before she turned 23, who began using crack at age 15, who went to prison and had her children all taken into foster care.  Ahem. 

Let’s get real, her mom made a few mistakes along the way, just sayin’.

Did she really think I would post such utter shit to MY FUCKING WALL?!  I pushed the limit by leaving a message saying I’d be checking my sister’s status line to see if she was thanking our mother yet for turning us into babbling nincompoops.  (I acknowledge the lack of personal responsibility in that statement because my psychologist insists I have to.  Yes, that would be the psychologist who has not fixed me yet.)

So today there is a viral thing going around that asks you to post a picture of a famous person you think you look like as your profile pic.  A woman I know peripherally has posted a very attractive blonde woman, who I do not recognize, as her photo.  SHE LOOKS NOTHING LIKE THIS CHICK!  Every time I see the photo I want to ask (1) Who is that? and (2) Are you fucking serious, that’s what you see when you look in the mirror? and (3)  Are you fucking kidding me?

How wacked out is it that I can’t stand myself for not writing what I want to write?  How do I find that fine line where I am honest but not so honest that no one will ever speak to me again? 

There are two voices in my head (the loudest ones).  One is saying, “Who died and made you God?”  The other is saying, “Just fucking do it you big fat pussy.” 

As I’ve already told you, I’m not a fan of religious messages.

The Great Adventure

As mentioned in tonight’s prior post, we went to see Raven Symone in concert at Great Adventure with the “new friends” I’ve named “Control Freak and DD.”  Well, sometimes it’s so much more ridiculous than you even expect. 

The mother seemed entirely sane this evening, in comparison with her daughter.  The first thing her girl said to mine upon arrival was, “I didn’t think your house would be this big.”  The mother noticed the Christmas tree, still up in July, and didn’t blink an eye.  The woman impresses me in unusual ways.

Then I made the fatal error and got in her car to drive to Great Adventure.  It didn’t seem like a big deal at the time, and when she pulled out her handicapped placard in the crowded parking lot my face broke into a grin.

We went inside.  They rode the Teacups.  The other girl begged and wheedled to do the log flume.  (We have season passes and they do not.)  Her life was going to be over if she didn’t do the log flume.  The sign at the back of the line said “120 MINUTES FROM HERE.”  My daughter and I acquiesced because I am a jackass.  I find myself regularly doing things for other people’s children in situations where I would laugh at my own.  Her mother sat comfortably on a bench talking with another woman, a stranger, while we stood in line with 500 other people waiting to spend 90 seconds in a plastic log.  The girl had the nerve to ask me several times, “Can’t we cut the line?”  I told her we would either be thrown out of the park or punched in the face and she finally shut up.

I hadn’t been in a crowd like this in a while.  It’s an art to avoid such large groups of people and I’ve become a master.  People are dirty, nasty, disgusting.  They sneeze, they cough, they sweat.  Their arms display gang tattoos.  But none of those individuals even came close to being as disgusting as the woman in front of us.  She didn’t expose her piggy side until we were about halfway through the 75 minutes.  Then she proceeded to hold her 4-year old daughter between her legs & finger her way through the braids at scalp level.  There is only ONE REASON I am aware of that causes a human woman to pick at her child’s scalp like a monkey.  When she began picking things OUT of the hair and flicking them to the floor my meltdown was in full swing.

I began testing the wind velocity and direction.  Ten feet became the minimum I could bear between my group and these disgusting menaces to society.  We had another 30 minutes to go.  As other patrons stood shoulder to shoulder, the lepers stood out.  Suddenly it didn’t matter that another child was with us, as the words “PIG” and “SCUMBAG” and “I HATE PEOPLE SO, SO MUCH” began flying out of my mouth.  It’s really not great for my daughter when I get that crazy look in my eyes.  She might believe that I can shoot people with my finger or electrocute them with my steely eyed stare, that’s how tense she gets while waiting for me to take one more step toward insanity.  The other girl LOVED it.  Really, it was the happiest I think she was all evening.  And I must say that when she’s happy she’s delightful!

We survived but not before the little buggy girl also SPIT ON THE FLOOR.  Seriously, what in the hell is the world coming to?  I was truly shocked at the level of hatred I could work up for a pre-schooler.

Finally someone showed up with a Fast Pass and cut the line.  The bug people were no longer directly in front of us.  Those folks aside, if I get any kind of disease in the next 72-hours I know where it came from.

The girls enjoyed the ride, they screamed, they got wet, they said it was worth it.  Whatever!  We headed for the concert.  The 12-year old we were with is a very unhappy child.  I didn’t notice it so much previously, but tonight she was a monster.  Nothing made her happy.  She pouted and complained for hours.  Her mother is either a saint or a monster-maker, perhaps both. 

We bought 3 VIP tags for $10 each and headed for the front of the stadium.  It was great until she wanted to use my daughter’s camera, then my phone to take photos.  When the answer was “No,” the girl ended up sitting back with her mother in the stands as my daughter and I had a blast.  At one point she said, “I want to go now.”   I told them “Go ahead!  My husband will come and get us!”  I guess they didn’t think we had any other options and suddenly the girl was trapped in her own web.  So she proceeded to sulk for the next 90 minutes. 

Fortunately the VIP tags came with bags of Starburst, which they ate while we danced.  They both have metabolic problems that are the reason for their weight gain, unrelated to Starbursts in any way, also unrelated to the french fries purchased on the way into the concert.

Did I mention that my daughter told me this girl asked her, “Why don’t you straighten your hair?”  Did I mention that?  Because nothing could piss me off more than someone trying to convince my kid to make her beautiful curls disappear.  No doubt it was out of jealousy, but I don’t care.  This lanky-haired little bitch was trying to mess with my kids head in more ways than one.

The worst was after the concert ended.  First it seemed okay, the girls rode three different rides, one rollercoaster twice.  They were laughing and running and getting red-faced with excitement as I sat talking with the other mother on a bench.  As you may remember, she recently had a TIA, which has now been upgraded to a full-blown stroke (no surprise there).  She cannot ride rides and her doctor actually has recommended she should use a scooter.  She does not because her daughter told her it would be “too embarrassing.”  I don’t know what to believe.

The aunt who died last week?  She was 91!  She was the daughter’s great-great aunt!  This is worthy of histrionics on Facebook in an effort to obtain sympathy?  It came up that she also cried about something entirely different during the funeral event, actually I believe she said, “I just sobbed.”  I was looking at her, trying to imagine her face melting, trying to imagine my discomfort if she should ever do such a thing in my presence.  I might run.

The highlight of our conversation was mind-boggling.  I asked how her daughter’s appointment with the endocrinologist went.  She told me she hated the doctor.  The reason she hated the doctor is because she “had no personality” and at one point in their time together the doctor began “squeezing her n*pples.”  As she said that statement I felt a buzz of electrical shock flood me, no different than if I tried to pet a horse across an electrified fence.  I remember thinking, “Oh my.”  I said, “What?” with a dumbfounded spacy sounding voice.

She said, “Oh, she was trying to see if she was lactating!  She was trying to see if she could express milk, to find out if they were making milk!  Endocrine problems can typically make such things happen!  But she just began twisting her n*pples with no warning!  I was like, ‘Don’t you think you could have told her in advance you were going to do that?’”  She doesn’t plan on returning to that doctor again.  It was at that point she mentioned for the 7th or 8th time that her feet were now “covered in blisters.”  We had barely walked the length of the park.

But that’s not the bad part.  The bad part was that at 10:00 at night this girl became insistent that we go to THE CHEESECAKE FACTORY, three words she repeated a minimum of 27 times as her mother nearly drove off the road in frustration while yelling at her daughter to stop saying “THE CHEESECAKE FACTORY!”  This is after I had heard about her desire for MEXICAN FOOD over and over throughout the evening, across the park, in every venue we visited.

When the Mexican food was mentioned at 10:00 at night I said, “I suppose Taco Bell is not your idea of Mexican food?”  She went on a tirade regarding fast food restaurants.  She, this 12-year old girl, said, “I just want to sit down at a table AND HAVE A NICE MEAL!  I HAVEN’T EATEN ALL DAY!”  It was as if she were channeling a 60-year old woman.  The girl would not stop.

This is where I don’t understand my own behavior.  I should have just said, “Take us home.”  But there is a part of me who never wants to disappoint.  I want people to be happy.  This girl had been happy for maybe 30 minutes of the 6 hours we’d been together.  We finally found a Ruby Tuesdays open until 11 p.m.  She was not satisfied with TGIF, absolutely threw a shit fit, she would not eat there.  She would not consider Sonic, which both she and her mother thought would somehow damage their car!  I mean I’m making suggestions and the girl is acting like I’m an assistant to the devil.  She’s acting as if her palate and taste buds are worthy off an exquisite French vineyard.

So we go into the restaurant and her mother refuses to purchase her first choice, A SIRLOIN at 10:00 on a Thursday night.  So what do you think she orders?  What does her mother proceed to tell me she orders everywhere they go?  You guessed it.  MOTHERF*CKING CHICKEN FINGERS. 

For the 437th time in 6 hours the girl spoke to me and I said, “WHAT?”  She is a mutterer.  She talks fast AND she mutters with braces on.  I can’t understand a word she says.  The other mother asked MY daughter if she was ”in a bad mood.”  I think I may have heard her swallow the words, “No, your daughter is just an obnoxious idiot and my mom won’t let me speak!”

At that point I began texting my husband, “Please come pick us up.”  I had a horrible fear that when they drove us home they would somehow come into our house and never leave.  They would sleep over and the girl would ask me to cook up some quail eggs and escargot for breakfast.  She would cut my daughter’s hair off in her sleep, then suggest she’d done her a favor. 

My husband tried to call but I wouldn’t answer the phone as it would blow my covert operation.  He texted, “Call me.”  I text, “NO!  PLEASE!  I’M BEGGING!”

So my husband, who paid for this magical trip to Great Adventure, took off his slippers and pajama pants.  He threw on a pair of sweats and made his way to the car.  He did not complain, he did not get angry.

As we sat at the table the waiter asked ”Is that your car out there with the lights on?”  We both said, “No.”  Meanwhile, I was thinking “Superman has arrived & I’m f*cking Lois Lane.”  I didn’t tell her until we were out the door, “Oh, that’s my husband over there!  This will be so much more convenient for you.”  She couldn’t believe I would do such a thing.

I left actually feeling bad for the woman.  We’re supposed to see them again in 76 hours.  I’m flabbergasted by that fact.  Clearly, part of me feels good when I’m in a situation where I appear all together in comparison.  There’s gotta be a better way.

Once again I would like to thank my mother for pummeling my self-esteem into something that resembles a kernel of corn, a dull jelly bean that’s spent some time on the floor.

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.

Twisted Kentucky

We returned last Wednesday and nearly a week later I’m still twisted over what to say about the trip.

The drive is crazy.  80 mph in the 70 mph zones means a driving intensity I’m entertained by for the first hour or two, then I start losing it.  800 plus miles.  Left at 6:10 a.m. and arrived around 10 p.m. after a few stops. 

It rained for hours and hours.  We drove into a hail storm & a tornado.  I felt it was a clear acknowledgement of the fact that I was entering Kentucky after 22 years of avoiding my mother’s home. 

Even the atmospheric conditions were on alert.

* * * * *

We stayed at my sister’s.  The house is far neater than my own, as she is completely anti-clutter.  Toys come out and they get put away.  Amazing.  Since I knew it was a big deal to them that the house remain neat, I never stopped moving and picking up and straightening during my time there. 

Probably the reason I didn’t gain weight, even though I ate almost an entire sheet cake.

The two Boxers are like having a couple of NFL players living with you, guys who occasionally wrestle in the living room.  They eat more crumbs than ever need to be cleaned off the floor.  The kids have learned to get out of the way for the most part. 

However, they were perhaps my 11-year old’s least favorite part of the trip.  I think she summed it up nice & clear when she said, “I would kill myself if I had to live in Kentucky.”  By the last day she had tears in her eyes when she begged to get on the road.

I fell wildly in love with the babies and ran out the door in tears for an entirely different reason. 

Each child is brighter than the next.  So much for all that nonsense about pre-natal care and staying away from crack while you’re pregnant.  They are all adorable, loving & needy of every bit of attention they can get.  They sop it up like pancakes.  I was Aunt Jemima & I liked the role.

Here is the 3-year old, the one I relate to as the oldest.  It’s hard to be a baby girl when there are two younger children making it seem you should be ready to enter college any day now.  She is far too smart for her own good.

I’m planning to go back at the end of May.

My sister is doing a great job, considering she’s still working five days a week at my mother’s insistence.  She never stops moving and spinning like a top.  I think I would be a mad woman in her situation.

Most nights no one comes home through the door because her boyfriend is an over the road truck driver, so she’s completely alone with the children after a very long day.  When she’s not changing diapers or cooking or cleaning, she’s doing laundry and feeding dogs and giving baths.

Her voice, for the most part, remains sweet and kind.  She is especially taken with the baby, who looks so much like her daughter.  Honestly, who wouldn’t be?

There are things I wish were different.  However, my sympathy for her is huge.

My mother is a different story.

Screaming at Random Twisted Sh*t

I scream at random: television, newspaper articles, traffic &/or stupidity.  Partly, it’s because my husband is silent.  I feel the need to express enough emotion for both of us. 

Here are a few things I’ve screamed about in the last 72 hours:

 1.) “The Biggest Loser” when Helen got kept in the house over Sione.  Helen is an obnoxious c*nt who sent her own daughter home so she could stay in the house and continue losing weight.  The level of selfishness needed to send your little girl home when you’re the one who taught her to eat like shit in the first place . . . well, I can’t even wrap my head around it.  I hate selfish parents.

2.) Our local newspaper highlighted a story about a teenager who watched a 62-year old woman fall in a parking lot and then ran to her aid, placing her sweatshirt underneath the woman’s bleeding head & calling 9-1-1.  Two NJ assembly people showed up for the ceremony congratulating this 17-year old for her INCREDIBLE ACT OF ASSISTANCE IN POSSIBLY SAVING THE WOMAN’S LIFE! 

Are you f*cking kidding me?  We’ve come so low that it’s a big deal when you don’t leave someone alone & lying on the ground?  This is what our politicians are spending their time on during this worldwide financal crisis?  The girl actually said something to the effect of, “I didn’t realize I was so capable until this happened.” 

You didn’t know you could dial your phone or comfort another person?  An 18-month old or a dog calls 9-1-1 and I get excited, but this? 

It’s not like she inserted a straw between the woman’s chest cavity with a pen knife and blew into her lungs until help arrived 72 hours later.  She got blood on her sweatshirt.  I’m surprised they didn’t mention the brand (possibly Billabong) and its’ cost ($72) plus dry cleaning expenses.  The woman only needed 4 staples, not 47. 

If anyone ever wants to honor a member of my family for acting like a decent person I’m going to tell them to go f*ck themselves for thinking we’re such low lifes.  This girl’s parents should be ashamed of themselves for being involved in such ridiculousness.  It’s sickening.  However, I fully expect it from politicians during an election year.  JACKASSES!

 3.)  The guy on Dr. Phil right now.  He throws away his kids’ toys, his wife’s personal things (like her exercise ball) & even important mail.  He’s a control freak — like me — and I would kill him if he touched anything of mine.  Just watching him, I hate him.  I know it’s over the top, but I don’t care.  I like being messy  and it sucks that I’ve been made to feel ashamed of that fact for 40 years now.  When I try to keep my house looking perfect the personal relationships inside the home fall apart.  It’s not worth it! 

4.) Religious tag lines.  Oh. My. God.  I hope He does not let these people into heaven.  Currently my least favorite says: “Live your life in such a way that those who know you, but don’t know God, will come to know God because they know you.”  The first time I read it I was merely annoyed by how it’s written & the fact that unless you wrap your brain into a pretzel you can’t grasp what in the hell the person is trying to say.  The second through 1,208th I wished for the author’s head to burst into flame.

The audacity it takes for someone to believe they are so superior to others, so much more in tune with God than the average heathen on the street, is superhuman. Each time I read it I strive to avoid the rage. For me it’s more about the superiority thing than the religious issue.

I can barely write a post like this & say what I honestly think about debatable issues.  I question everything so much that when someone else is utterly sure of themselves I’m jealous & hateful. I want to be like them, it seems so much easier.  I’d like to love myself like that, to believe in my own opinions so completely that I don’t care what anyone else thinks.  Even though it’s incredibly stupid.

I’ll just keep screaming.

Pamajama Questions: Twisted Investigator At Your Service

For most of last week I was designing questions instead of blogging, after posting Twisted Red Questions.  I made the offer to interview other bloggers without a thought, not realizing my psychosis would take this mission as seriously as any currently underway at NASA.  

I didn’t feel comfortable asking questions if I hadn’t read the ENTIRE BLOG, so I did, six times.  Starting at the beginning is the best way to “get it.”  Just as I can’t imagine becoming a fan of ”The Office” in season four, it makes a difference in blogland, too.  I wish I could always start with post #1; however, the time involved is insane.

If you’d like to check out my victims, here’s the list:

1.) Birdpress  (A newlywed who currently lives in Kentucky, I especially love her insights on life & addiction issues.  Can you imagine how much more evolved the world would be if we all went to rehab just once?  She’s a smart cookie who’s both thoughtful and so understated.  Fabulous photos on her site, often of a dog grooming “before and after.”  Answers posted.)

2.) SassyMamaSays  (Sassy Mama is a perfectionist at heart.  I imagine her clipping the yard with a pair of scissors, looking absolutely beautiful while she does it, two gorgeous dogs standing guard.  Reading all her entries highlighted my belief that — although Jimmy Kimmel and Brad Pitt look quite different – we’re all the same at the inner core.  However, Sassy Mama’s baby pictures are unequaled.  Answers are posted.)

3.) Craving Silence  (I had never read this blog, other than a post here and there, so I really was at a loss.  Once I dug into it, holy crap.  These questions were the most over the top & totally inappropriate, kind of like walking up to a stranger on the street who you’ve been tailing for months & mentioning the most intimate of details.  Answers pending)

4.) FontanaJourney  (I know Aimee in real life.  She’s at home with three beautiful kids, tearing her hair out, sewing felt vests & baking beautiful cakes.  Usually she’s out-numbered with an additional 3 or 7 children on hand, just for fun.  In fact, she’s in the process of adopting a teenage daughter from Haiti.  She’s supposed to be posting her answers here, cause she’s not anonymous and plans to REALLY answer them.  I can’t wait.)

5.) BaconIsMyLover  (My girl, Heather, is where I go when I want to laugh like a wack job.  She has become an addiction, I can’t miss an episode detailing her f*cked up neighbors or crazy friends or screaming nephews.  She has a heart of gold & her family totally rivals my own, maybe even wins.  She’s just so much nicer about it all.  Her use of the English language is kick ass & extaordinary.  Answers posted.)

6.) TheGirlFromTheGhetto  (Most of you probably have visited this blog, she’s recently surpassed 1,000,000 hits!  She’s honest and often skips the PC bullshit, which is what I love.  Her life has been more than amazing, from growing up in “a mouse house” to marrying the man of her dreams after a 24-hour engagement.  Reality show fans will love her reviews.  Answers posted.)

Just received another request, this time from the beautiful, funny, intelligent & insightful Pammy Girl.  She’s a combination of modern day Mary Tyler Moore & Lucille Ball antics.  Amazingly she’s single and – although I usually am a tremendous defender of the male species – this is the one fact of the universe that convinces me all those wacky e-mail forwards from bitter women must be  right, men are really stupid.

* * * * *

In person I’ve been asked if I’m an investigator or a reporter.  Limited to five questions, this exercise made me nuts.

My inner yapper is oh so frustrated by societal norms, unsatisfied with the conversational subjects I’m 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?”

I think we’ve reached a place where loneliness is common, even in a crowd.  I hate that.

So I’d like to say THANKS to those of you who joined in on this escapade.  I love you for it.

Twisted Joyful Springtime Snowflakes

There is only an hour and nine minutes of winter left as I begin to write this entry.  I have a heinous secret to confess, similar in degree to the heavy-set blonde woman marrying a death row inmate (who perhaps killed a bunch of big blondes), the dude she met as a prison pen pal.

(Deep breath) . . .

I am one of the few freaks who likes winter.  I wish it would snow more, a lot more.  In Illinois the flat land allowed wind to blow the snow into huge, beautiful drifts on my grandparent’s farm. 

I’ve been driven home from O’Hare Airport through a snow tunnel, my step-father driving on ice with his beer cooler between the seats, scaring the utter shit out of me.  I don’t miss that jackass, but I miss the snow.

It’s one more annoying way in which I don’t fit in. Do you have any idea how much people bitch about cold, how often they complain about snow?  This winter it was unending.  I smiled.  I am FAR more likely to throw a flip-flop at the TV when a toothy grin says, “It’s so beautiful!  It looks like we could hit 90 degrees today!”  Just the thought makes me want to puke. 

I love sweatshirts & blankets.  I like layers & scarves & crawling under the covers in a freezing room at night.  We rarely put the heat higher than 65.  It’s fantastical natural air conditioning, what we pay for all summer.  When my son came home for a visit he looked at me with wild eyes & I ran for the thermostat.  Even at 23, I can’t let my little boy freeze.  Our daughter is never cold, like her mother & grandmothers before her, all relatively big women.  She wears flip-flops all year round.

It used to be that spring was my favorite, then I changed to fall (the pink & orange leaves won me over).  This winter I enjoyed myself so much in-doors that its’ taken over as #1.  I love the low expectations!  Staying home is what’s expected!

I am happy with my books, my computer, my big screen, vegetating like a sprouting potato.  A simple vacation throws me so out of wack it takes a month to recover.  I have finally come to the realization that this is just me: I am happy at home with my little family.

As other people imagine moving south I dream of north or west, where the heat never rises above 75.  I’m not a fan of sweat.  Although I like a little color, I do not worship the sun.  I do not want more wrinkles.  My son had a basal cell carcinoma at 14.  It changes how you think.

Not to be a whiny bitch, but even the fluorescent lights of a mall or department store often necessitate that I wear shades.  The bright sunlight of summer highlights my eye problems & depresses me enough that I want to live like a vampire.

More than anything, though, I think it’s the disgusting happiness that summer brings to other individuals that bugs me.  I am forced to listen to enthusiasts go on and on about “the great weather,” “the beautiful weekend,” or how they biked 50 miles on a Saturday and took their kids to the park 12 times last week. 

For years I’ve dealt with the perky bullshit as I wore long sleeves & pants, my thighs chafing with each sweaty step.  It’s nauseating.  Although I weigh less now, I can’t imagine it will be all that different.  I just hate the heat.  So does my daughter.  Her face turns beet red, her freckles begin to pop.  Before you know it, she’s bursting into tears of abject misery.  Really, it makes us both such nasty bitches.

So what I want to know is where is MY weather forecaster, the one who says, “Good God, when will this f*cking heat disappear?“  They act as if two inches of snow is quite possibly the end of the earth as we know it, but broiling like a slab of bacon is utter joy.  F*ck Me!

Summer days are like holidays, filled with ridiculous expectation.  Ninety degrees out & I’m faced with the overly enthusiastic ”Aren’t you loving this weather?”  God forbid I say “Just shut the f*ck up already.  You smell like twat!  Take another hike in the sun with the 3-month old & leave me be.”

Perhaps because we live at the shore it’s worse.  When others run to grab surfboards I’m thinking of the riptide that nearly killed me two years ago.  I’d prefer my kids never enter the ocean again.  It’s beautiful to look at, but a bitch at heart.

* * * * *

Although I totally freaking hate death anniversaries, my father died 39 years ago today & it no doubt filters my view of this day.  I remember thinking how he would never experience spring again. 

It fascinates me how those early years are set in stone.  No matter the twists and turns chosen later in life, the original caste remains.  In one way or another, each and every day, I am the the end result of what began at the hands of my parents, neither of whom I’ve spent any real time with during my entire adult life.  Regardless, my father has lived a very full life inside my head & heart all this time.

Quite surprisingly last week it even occurred to me that there was one single thing I appreciated about my mother.  I know, it’s quite shocking.

If she hadn’t been crazy then I’d likely be normal, which is so hideously boring, a fate far worse than death.

* * * * *

7:44 A.M. and it is now officially spring . . . 

Suddenly it begins to snow. 

Twisted Freak Says: “Screw Valentine’s Day”

Yesterday I learned that I’m not the only woman I know who will be spending Valentine’s Day with no valentine.  It does not make me any happier, not at all, but it did make me laugh with glee. 

Roxanne of Owl Moon Studio woke her children up screaming, “You Rat F*cking Bastard” into the phone when her husband called to say he’s a last minute team replacement for a week long job in HAWAII and will be flying out as soon as they can get him on a flight.  Seriously, she’s a lovely girl & his new nickname will only be said with a smile, not more than 1,000 times.

* * * * *

My husband came home from work yesterday ready to do the monkey, since I might have said something on the phone that could have made him think we’d be dancing. 

Really, he was hoping to make up for the lost time he’ll be spending in a rental truck full of things no one would buy at the lowliest of garage sales, towing a piece of sh*t van, sitting next to his 275-pound, 6’1″ son, instead of comfy on our pillow-top mattress (where he belongs) next to me.

So my psychological chess move was to completely ignore him as I sat at the computer playing a word game.  I had to do that, just to put him in his place.  I’ve accepted that I won’t see him on this utterly stupid holiday, but I can’t let him have clear advantage.  He has to know this can never, ever, ever happen again.

Still, it’s uncomfortable having a puppy at your feet & eventually you give in to the adorable mutt and play ball.

Meanwhile, I’ve been tossing sh*t food in my mouth like a big ass baby, feeling sorry for myself, and so I forgot the green peanut M&M’s in the pocket of my sweatshirt.  This is how a pile of them ended up in the bed, looking like a leprechaun laid eggs.

Unbeknownst to me, the M&M’s were falling out of my pocket & hitting my husband on the head in the dark.  Really, it couldn’t have worked out better.  Boink, boink, boink.

It fascinates me that he could be kerplunked on the noggin, over and over again, yet say nothing about it.  Something hits me in the head in the dark, I gotta know RIGHT NOW what the hell is going on.  I mean, the weight of a peanut M&M could potentially knock out a front tooth.

* * * * *

So this morning he called me a freak. 

I couldn’t be happier with an Academy Award or a Nobel Peace Prize, coming up on our 13th anniversary.

I don’t have a paid job, I am really a terrible housekeeper & my cooking skills are practically non-existent. 

But as long as my beloved thinks I’m a freak, clearly I’m a major f*cking success.

The perfect tattoo: Freaky Pamajama

Should I do it?

* * * * *

Deep breath. God forbid I don’t stockpile enough meds & end up in a nursing home.  Attendants would bring family & friends in to laugh and point. 

They’d take pictures for e-mail forwards & there I would be, gumming an ear of corn with the words “Freaky Pamajama” barely readable next to a big purple bruise. 

Yeah, I don’t think so.

Twisted Babbling: Family, Facebook, F*ck

Recently I started playing around with Facebook.  I love that it has Scrabble and Tetris, but hate that most of the items on there have no detail. 

Blogging is better.

Throwing a shoe at someone in the virtual world doesn’t cut it.  If I could throw an actual f*cking shoe, then count me in.

I’m not interested in the fact that a woman I barely know made a batch of gluten-free bread this morning.  Frankly, I’d rather she described the condition of her shit when she eats gluten, the agonizing stomach cramps.  Now that I could find interesting.

I’m quickly losing direction . . .

Worst of all, I was “friended” by my daughter-in-law and she sent me a hug.  I need more than a f*cking hug, considering she’s taking my husband away on Valentine’s Day. 

Honestly, I don’t give a shit about holidays until you steal my man.  Then I hate everything about you and suddenly it’s the most important day of the frigging year.

She’s moving to a far away southern state on the Gulf of Mexico, the whole family is moving to what I like to call “The Butthole of America.”

Actually, the whole family is not moving.  She’s leaving her 12-year old twins here to live with their father.  I guess you can do without a couple when you’ve got five?  Hard for me to imagine, but then she doesn’t want to be like me, either.  As evidence, this statement:  “I want to have all my children before I’m old, like you.”

I don’t speak much in her presence.  When you’re with someone who knows all about everything, it’s better to just listen.  If she was as smart as she thinks she is, then she’d be able to read my mind and this is what she’d intuit:

After seeing the movie Deliverance and paying just a little bit of attention to how views of the world can be different in other regions of the country, I’m not sure ‘Bama is where I’d be headed if I was wearing a 12-inch pentagram tattooed to my left calf.

I think this makes me the hideous mother-in-law/step-mother.  Could there be a worse combination?  Don’t give me any more of these fantastic roles, cause I seriously can’t handle all the love coming my way.

So my husband will be driving in a rental truck, traveling 20 hours southwest of here.  He will then get on a plane and return the day after Valentine’s Day.  Our 13th wedding anniversary is February 17th.  Perhaps I will be talking to him again by then, presuming he makes it home alive.

When my crazy controlling self kicks into high gear the fear becomes huge, too.  I can’t distinguish between the two.  Did the fear come first or the crazy?  The fear easily twists into rage, which I enjoy so much more. 

Basically, I see the world as a place full of trap-doors, none of them containing prizes.

My father died when I was 10, my grandmother when I was 18, three months later it was my step-father, then at 26 my pseudo-husband.   My grandfather died in a car crash five years ago.  My brother dropped dead in a parking lot at age 44 & his first heavenly birthday is Valentine’s Day.

The unfairness of it all blows my mind.  Then I remind myself I don’t believe in “fair.”  I rationalize that my husband is so wonderful he makes up for everything bad that’s ever happened in my life.  It’s absolutely true.

So don’t send me a f*cking hug on Facebook to make up for putting the best thing that’s ever happened to me in a rental truck headed for B*tt F*ck, a 20-hour trip on winter roads.

However, that’s not the only voice working in my head.  The other one is saying, “You’re being irrational.  This is your husband’s kid.  He’s done so much for your own son, you’re not being reasonable!”

“It doesn’t matter that they got into financial trouble by having monogrammed cigars & a personal humidor, gallon jugs of liquor and parties for 100 friends.  The fact that they didn’t pay their mortgage for three months when the daughter-in-law needed hair extensions & clear resin heels, plus four tuxedos, to participate in their best friend’s gay wedding is beside the point.  You love gays!”

“The multiple expensive tattoos are expressions of their artistic natures!  It’s only reasonable that your husband took out a loan at the bank to help them out, this is your family!  You always wanted to be a grandmother, so act like one!  Granted, the check she gave your son for Christmas bounced last year, but those things happen.  Telling you about her renunciation of Jesus Christ at the Christmas party was such an honest move on her part!”

I’ll be spending the weekend crossing myself multiple times and saying prayers for my husband’s safe return.

In addition, I’ll be going to see a production of the musical Rent with my daughter, tickets purchased via credit card just yesterday, which will cost more than his plane trip home. 

Normally I don’t even want flowers, since they cost too damned much.  Surprising how the one time we’re not together could end up being our most expensive Valentine’s Day ever.

Twisted Holiday Condensed

Occasionally you come across something so fantastic you must share it with your friends.  “Fantastic” plus ”dysfunctional” equals “Pamajama’s Favorite Things.”

Two posts in particular, holiday hang-overs, meet that definition.  To find them please visit NathalieWithAnH (whose sister has gone so completely over the edge of creative insanity that it very nearly took my breath away) and Keltic Kaos (a description of Christmas antics that had me choking with delight & in tears from laughter).  If you bother reading anything at all this year, these two clicks are my recommendation.

As I’ve shared my own crazy stories, more people have shared their own experiences with me.  It’s been a gift to realize it’s a rare family that escapes qualifying for an event in the Dysfunctional Family Olympics.

Like everything else, I’m usually more than happy to stick with my own medal arena.  Just in the last few months I’ve come to realize that so often the people who had it the worst speak about it the least.  When they do tell their stories I wonder (1.) how they survived and (2.) why I’m such a whiner.

* * * * *

I have just a smidgen to report regarding my own family’s hijinx. 

My niece is still in prison & her children have not yet been released from foster care to my sister.  I would attach the picture we received of the three kids visiting her, but honestly it’s so pathetic I can’t stoop quite that low.  I believe the scrawled handwriting at the bottom of the instamatic photo is what completely did me in.  (I know, it’s hard to imagine a low place I’m unwilling to go & I wonder what in the hell is happening to me.) 

As for Christmas day itself, my mother took her favorite dog to my sister’s house Christmas Day and it of course peed on the new carpet.  (I’d rather spend the day alone in a movie theater with just a single other patron, a guy with his hands in his pants.)

Mom also sent us two enormous boxes of gifts that I did not return.

Evidently I can be bought for a price and (previously unbeknownst to me) that dollar amount equals: 12 books, his & hers XL green sweatshirts, a hideous polyester pull-over with attachable tacky necklace & matching jacket, a purple pillow that says “Princess,” three horror flicks, a John Deere t-shirt, cash for the kids and a check with my name on it.

Also included was a bag of soaps & air fresheners from Pier One Imports, enough perfumed product to suggest my family expels noxious fumes at the same rate as any airport or toxic waste dump.  (I’ve been told the air fresheners are so popular in Illinois that more than once they were stolen right off the toilet tank by dirt bag pals.)

In total, said items bought her a Christmas card, photo montage & two e-mails.

I’d planned on sending any checks I received to my brother’s girlfriend, but as it turns out she’s already dating someone new.  So like I’m cool with that, but I’m not utterly stupid.

As would be expected, my sister’s son received $1,000 and mine got $250 for Christmas and birthday combined.  The fact that my son has grown up without this particular grandmother’s influence  is worth so much more than a $750 annual fee.

* * * * *

On New Year’s Eve the favored grandson got drunk,  punched a female bar patron in the face & went directly to jail without passing “Go.”  We’ll find out what else comes of it in court on February 10th.  The boy is an absolute monster when he drinks.

In other words, please butter my butt and call me a biscuit if I ever lose sight of how lucky I’ve been in this lifetime.

If Only ~ Words For a Twisted Little Girl

There’s never a time when Aunt Becky over at Mommy Wants Vodka doesn’t have something funny and interesting to say, plus a question. She’s like a machine, pumping out entertaining blog entries beyond my abilities or imagination, even as she parents two young boys and prepares for the arrival of the first girl (yippee!).

Today her question was so intriguing I just had to turn it into a blog entry.

What do you wish you could tell your younger self?

This subject could easily be a bottomless pit, considering the number of things I’ve done wrong over the years, so I’m holding myself to a total of ten random pieces of advice for Baby Pamajama.  Here goes:

1. Do not pee in small bottles for other people.  First, it’s illegal.  Second, you should already be running, fast and far.  Although it may be confusing at first, drug addicts are not better partners than alcoholics.  Accept neither as appropriate for a single wasted minute of your life. 

2.  There is at least one extraordinarily kind man out there who will adore you appropriately.  Life can be both wonderful & simple, no raised voices, no arguing, no name-calling.  Hard to imagine, huh?

He’ll have to make a detour through Vietnam but will eventually find you.

3. Pay your bills on time.  Bad credit & bill collectors are more humiliation than anyone needs.  Do not loan money, never, ever, not even the first time.  Be a hard-assed selfish bitch & enjoy the role.  If you have enough to lend, put it in savings instead.  Better yet, spend less & just give it away.

4. Be an easy-going mom.  It doesn’t matter if they flunk out of school in 4th grade or plug up the toilet with your jewelry, as long as they’re still alive.  Never raise your voice to children.  It doesn’t work.  Silence is more frightening.  Screaming women look like idiots.  It’s a horrible way to live.

By the way, don’t worry, your relationship with your daughter will be NOTHING like yours with your mother. 

The more babies, the better.

5. Never allow yourself to get really fat, like belly rolls & sh*t.  It’s totally heinous.  The best way to accomplish that is by not comparing yourself to other girls, especially girls who are barely five feet tall, girls whose bones are the size of fork tines, whose heads are the size of thimbles.

Trim your bangs!

 

Wear high heels & eat your vegetables.  Strut your stuff with attitude.  Ignore Mom’s attempts to make you buy men’s clothing & cut off your hair, she is psycho.  When she tells you that your personality is not fit to make a good beautician, stab her.  By the way, it’s not true, make-up does not make you look like a slut.  Refuse any & all diet products, find a sport instead.

6. You are beautiful, funny & worthy of the best in life, no matter what anyone says.  She’s just jealous.  The only opinion of you that matters is your own and it’s contagious.  Do not share yourself as easily as smokers do a Bic lighter or a pack of Marlboros.  Stray body fluids kill. 

7. Stay in school until you find the thing you love.  Do not take the easy way out & skip statistics, do not smoke pot before every geometry class.

 After childbirth you will need every extra brain cell, there are none to spare.

8. Remember birthdays, spoil your friends, stay in touch.  Girlfriends can last 50 years but almost all boyfriends eventually marry someone else who will get both child support AND alimony if he keeps calling.  Your own marriage will be in jeopardy if you attempt to help him through it.

9. Do not allow fear to rule your life.  Death is just a thing, you will eventually see them again.  I’m sure of it.  Most of all, tell Grandma how much you love her, right now, today.  Tell her she’s wonderful & beautiful & let her know her love made all the difference.

10. Last but not least, don’t wait 40 years to tell your mom she’s a c*nt. 

Go ahead.  Do it right now.

If you don’t like how she’s treating your siblings SAY IT or you’ll live with the regret forever.  Grow wicked verbal balls.  Let her beat the sh*t out of you and smile while she does it.  It’s a much better choice than cowering from words that will stay in your head forever, crushing your soul. 

Always stand up for yourself, never back down.  It’s the only way to live.

Reasonable Resolutions ~ No More Maggots

(POSSIBLY INAPPROPRIATE FOR A WORK ENVIRONMENT)

* * * * *

THIRTY FREAKING YEARS OF FAILED RESOLUTIONS CONDENSED:

Eat right!  Fruit, vegetables, protein (fiber added after 40)!

No cursing or screaming, well-modulated voice, don’t be a bitch! 

Diet plan: “No sugar, no flour.  Weigh 142 by June 16th!”

1982, 1984, 1987, 1991, 1995, 1999, 2001, 2005, 2007

* * * * *

On January 1st, 2008 I published REASONABLE RESOLUTIONS FOR 2008.  I’m overdue for a review.

I will not be writing new resolutions for 2009.

At this rate, these should last another 50 years.

(Updates are written in bold italics!)

* * * * *

1.) I will continue to avoid all dutiful obligations of a wife and mother until it is absolutely imperative that I perform (i.e. cooking, cleaning, playdates), as I profess a profound love for my family.

No doubt I’m following through.

My husband shrunk a “dry clean only” sweater I tried to wear this morning (laundry incident #2 this week).  I called him at his high-stress important job, let the phone ring eight times  & called him a mother-f’ing Pennsylvania hick.  There was maybe some off the wall comment about his poor grammar, too, but detailed memory & black rage are incompatible.

He was not angry when I called later to apologize, so I said nothing when he forgot two chicken breasts in the oven this evening (for 3 hours) after working a full day at the office.  I am thoughtful like that. 

During a conversation with my daughter today, as she tried to speak from her heart, I told her to please use her finger to comb her eyebrows.  I can’t think until each tiny hair is aligned perfectly.  As she continues to ramble on about something or other I wonder how long before I can have her waxed, wonder who I can trust.  I think, “I am mentally deranged.”

Last week she fell asleep on the couch at the pseudo-in-laws, so afterwards I told her she drooled & snored, then her head fell on someone’s shoulder.  She kept asking “REALLY?!”  Saying, “NO, I DID NOT!”  I kept doing imitations and thinking of more hideous possibilities.  It was her fault for getting so excited, cause that totally egged me on.

Check.

Hey, at least I didn’t do THIS!

2.) I will keep my ass shaved to the point that it will not hide dingleberries in the bush, my underarm hair at no more than one-quarter inch.

Not really an issue, I am more like a hairless cat every day.  The problem is I hate hairless cats.  I will commit suicide if I ever remind myself of one of those hairless dogs with a crest on top of my head.

3.) I will refuse any and all sexual advances from strangers who find me incredibly fascinating, no matter how badly they beg or plead for my attentions.  I will continue to protect my “Exit/No Entry Zone” at all costs.

I was only approached by two strange men this past year, both at my brother’s funeral, one with quite a large beer belly plus a heart condition.  Both appeared to find me intoxicating & that’s a trait I’d like to whole-heartedly endorse, even under such tacky circumstance.  Show me adoration & you can capture my attention for at least 12 days while I pretend your buddha belly is a magic 8-ball instead of impacted feces. 

I’m not into perfection. 

(If I wasn’t married, I mean.  The dude I sometimes call “MO” or occasionally “BABY JESUS” has enthralled me for 15 years, which means he’s more magical than the spawn of David Blaine & Sylvia Browne.)

I have most certainly protected my Exit/No Entry Zone, other than that damned hemorrhoidectomy.  In that singular instance my direction was “FULL SPEED AHEAD” before losing consciousness. 

4.) I will never watch television for more than fourteen hours in a single day.  I will uphold the standards of all in-bred midwestern white trash as I avoid anything educational unless it relates to bi-sexuals like Tila Tequila or naked dwarves.  I will continue to try to find a way to work “That’s what she said” into all conversation.

I can’t prove it, but I think the computer was an even bigger issue this year.  Many times I just never went to bed.  There’s not enough time in the day to blog AND read blogs.

Plus that extra piece called life. 

How do YOU do it?

As for television, I still stay far away from the Discovery Channel in favor of “Housewives of Atlanta” & every other freak show.  That damned Vicki on ”Housewives of Orange County,” Real & Chance of  “Real Chance Of Love” and my beloved Sugar of this year’s ”Survivor” are so much better than actual pain in the @ss family members. 

Like these . . .

 

Are you wondering who those people are?  Look closely . . . 

5.) I will bathe more often than my mother, so that my brother’s girlfriend never says that I reek of butt odor as bad as my brother when he just comes off the road.  If I can smell my tampon I will acknowledge the need for a new one.

Do I get a ribbon for succeeding at this one? 

I’m sure my brother would be pleased he’s still getting named in the resolutions.  Well, maybe not.  I’m leaving it in anyway.  By the way, anyone know where the term P.U. came from?

6.) I will not beg my husband this year to take me out in his police car for my birthday & run the siren & lights, nor will I ask him to pull over & ticket people of my choosing (even though if he really loved me he would do this).  I will not search for his gun when visiting children jump on my good furniture with shoes & sticky fingers.

Change my mind on this one.  Some resolutions are stupid.

7.) Since I made my husband purchase a large house with a huge & expensive swimming pool, I will take a dip at least twice next summer.  I will attempt to invite people over at least once for a pool party & will not spend more than $1,000 on accoutrements for the get together, namely cookie cakes and new patio furniture.

We managed to find a middle ground by inviting lesbians instead of in-laws, which pleased the husband.  Perfect.

8.) When I am feeding the smelly, squealing guinea pigs multiple heads of Romaine lettuce I will consider the possibility of making a salad for our human family.  I will cook a single meat loaf for my husband at least once during each season & I will not insist that he applaud, although it would be good if he did.

F*ck that.  I live for an appreciative audience.  I must have been on drugs when I wrote some of these (or at a minimum, high on chocolate peanut butter ice cream.)

9.) I will keep trying to find a job where I will be greatly appreciated and highly paid for knowing a little bit about everything but not much about anything in particular.  I will try to perform work daily and not tell lies like I did at my last job, i.e. broken arm, broken collar bone, dead relatives, electrical failure.

No such job exists.  Since Target refused my application, I give up.  The humiliation factor is ridiculous.  Plus, one of my few talents is the ability to create believable lies.  Why should my skills be denied? 

I like making others feel good when they compare themselves to me.  Unfortunately, it’s a non-paid volunteer position.

10.) I will maintain a level of cleanliness in my house that does not invite insects of any species, I will spill nothing in the car that could cause maggots to breed again.

SCORE!  Success at last. 

Low expectations, better than anti-depressants.

* * * * *