What is there to really say?

Life. Right now that word makes me want to vomit up my face. I'm not even sure what that means but I like it.  It feels correct for me somehow.

I guess I'm tired of being tired of this situation.

I have a plan (I ALWAYS have a plan, people.) to escape this crazy place in the Spring.  But now (like always) something else has come up.

My "mother" and I have always had an "eh" relationship.  I was a total daddy's girl growing up and my mother's alcoholism, theft, lies, and general whackery did nothing to improve upon our strained relationship.  I look back on my youth and remember all the horrible and stressful times caused by my mother and her issues and am pretty hard pressed to find a moment in time where I felt good, happy, or warm toward my mother.

She certainly wasn't mommy dearest and as she likes to say I'm sure she "did her best" but I still feel major amounts of resentment towards her lack in motherly instinct and her ability to foster a relationship with me.  I'm sure some of that was my fault, being a bratty daddy's girl of a dad who clearly and overtly didn't seem to even like my mother, but how was I as a child supposed to change or fix that?  Where was my guidance to do better by my mother?  Like children, mommies don't come with a user manual.

I am forever hindered by my lack of relationship with my mother because I don't even have the ability to appreciate those that do have the dream mother daughter relationship.  I think people who are close with their mom or feel their mom is their "best friend" are weird.  There, I said it.  It creeps me out.  I always think, "what the hell is wrong with you people?"

I grew up taking care of my mom, hiding things for her, waking her up from a drunken stupor before my dad got home, lying for her, and having to analyze everything she said for truth.  All of this just to maintain the small amount of peace that existed between my parents on a daily basis.  I remember being pulled out of bed one night by my mother and told to pack a few things because we were leaving only to have my father appear in the living room daring her to take "his kids" away from him.  I am not sure how old I was but I recall holding my brother's hand and being caught in a tug-of-war for a bit until my mother relented and we were told to go back to bed.  My mother opened accounts in my name when I was 14, didn't pay the bills, and then hid the collection notices in a large garbage bag in her trunk to avoid getting yelled at by my dad.  One day, I discovered this trash bag and like the traitor I was I turned it over to my dad.  When collectors called and asked to speak for her I was told to tell them she wasn't home.  Instead, I told them to call back and ask for my dad.  Because of my transgressions, I have been told I am a horrible, horrible daughter and have been compared relentlessly to other people's daughters and told how amazing they are in comparison to me.

My parents got divorced when I was 19. (It was announced the same weekend I and my brother moved out of the home- coincidence? I think not.) My mother hooked up with some loser who promptly got her addicted to meth and managed to blow her $50,000 divorce settlement in roughly 4 months.  She eventually left him when he threatened physical violence when the money ran out.  She lost all her savings, her car, and a ton of things she had taken with her when she left my dad. (Which she did by backing a moving truck up to the front porch while he was at work and took anything that wasn't bolted down- except his dresser, one TV, and his recliner.)  She cashed out her 401K to get a new place to live and eventually got away from meth.  I had no idea but she began drinking again during this time.

Things settled down for a bit and for a while she was on track and she seemed to be okay.  I started to visit her from time to time and she seemed stable.  She remarried and they moved to a new place of their own.  I liked this guy and everything was as normal as it could be for a woman like her.

Then one night at work I was illegally browsing the internet and happened upon a DNJ story about a man who had been arrested for a cold case murder in Murfreesboro.  What do ya know?  Hello, step-daddy!  I called and called and got no response so I immediately went to see her after work.  It was true, he had been arrested, and they had had no idea until the police department had come to the door with a task force and arrested him and tossed the entire house.  She was devastated and he was sentenced to 41 years.

The shit storm continued when Dwayne got sick and we went from head above water to drowning and needed a place to stay.  She jumped at the chance and I thought, foolishly, that this could be a great opportunity for us to have a relationship or at least work on one.  Little did I know who my mother had become over the years.  The situation we are in at the moment is the most embarrassing and infuriating I have ever experienced.  This is an all time low for me.  My mother "retired" (she called up and quit after 20+ years the week we moved in) from her job and now sits at home all day smoking cigarettes and weed and drinking beer after beer all day.  There are days when she gets so drunk she urinates on the couch and all over herself and has to change clothes- just like the good ole days.  There are nights when she is so wasted on pills, weed, and beer that she actually asks my husband who he is. (I've been married for almost 9 years.)  I have confronted her on many occasions but she sees no problem with this because she has managed to accumulate a circle of friends that visit her on a daily basis who participate in the same behaviors.

I do not understand this.  I do not want this type of life and do not understand those that embrace it.  Instead, I have found myself to be the subject of ridicule for my level of education, been called various names for my lack of approval, and have been made to feel like a prisoner in my back area of the home.  I wake up on days off from school looking for places to go to avoid her and her group of cronies and the super awesome activities they participate in.  I know my mother will die because of these choices she makes- either the pills, alcohol, a combo of both, or even the lowlife people she associates with.  I feel that my possessions, Dwayne's job, and perhaps my education are at risk by living here.  We're potentially one police bust away from some serious trouble even though we are not involved.  The best part is- I'm not even sure that my mother would tell the truth about the situation and we might go down in flames due to her dishonesty over nothing.

This situation has all been too much for me lately and has had a negative impact on my attitude, my relationship with Dwayne, and has effected my zeal and joy in the things I love the most.  I would not allow my children to be here over the summer and lived with my in-laws to avoid them having to be around this circus of idiocy.  I owe them more and I owe myself more than this.  So, Dwayne and I made a decision to get out in the Spring- come hell or high water.  Roommates, efficiencies, whatever it takes.  I felt great about this and even though I haven't told her and hadn't planned on telling her until after I signed my new lease, I kind of feel like she will be relieved when we are gone too.  That way she can do whatever she'd like free of judgement and she can wrap herself up in her world and be happy again.

The thing is, something always comes up.

She announced recently that she has a lump in her breast.  She was very dramatic about it and made sure that she had a group of cronies around to get a proper reaction (one of the many things I despise about my mother  is that everything is an act and must have an audience) and they all looked to me for my reaction.  My reaction  (no matter the topic) is judged and measured and then evaluated and discussed at length to determine if it was appropriate, or daughterly enough, and if not, what the reasons for that could be.

Today, she told me she hasn't been able to get it seen about (even though she told me she had gone to the doctor about it already, another unnecessary lie) because she hasn't been able to use the car because she's been letting me use it for school. But really it's because she starts drinking so early in the morning that she can't go to the doctor on most days because she has to prepare herself not to drink on the days she picks.  But she uses me and my use of the car as an excuse instead of facing the reality.  Today, for instance, I have a free day until 6:30 pm but she can't go today "because all of the clinics are closed at noon today."  I called and verified that this is a lie and when confronted with that lie, beer in hand, she started yelling at me that if I didn't use the car she would have already gone.  When asked by she said she went already when she DIDN'T she simply said, "We just didn't go."

I shut my door after we hashed out a plan for her to use the car Tuesday morning to go to the doctor (a conversation that started with a mind-blowingly beat-around-the-bush approach that drives me insane) and I realized that I would be a horrible, horrible daughter if I moved out in the Spring if she does indeed have breast cancer.  Why in the world do I even care at this point?  I am already a horrible daughter to her and to all her friends, whose opinions are far superior to her own and mine.  The thought of my mother having breast cancer leaves me with no feeling.  Shouldn't I be scared? Sad? Angry?  The thought of my mother dying leaves me with only a slight guilty feeling of relief.  My main concern is that this diagnosis and my moving shortly afterwards leaves YET ANOTHER opportunity for me to fail as a daughter.

I'm not sure what do at this point or even what to say to her.  I don't know what to say as a daughter, as a person who is so fed up with this failed relationship, or as a woman who has to think of saving herself.  I don't know who to be or who I have the right to be in this.  I just know that this isn't working and if a potential death sentence, or worse yet, a long term, horrible illness (that will surely require me as a daughter to care for her and then my care will be judged and probably deemed not appropriate) doesn't invoke an emotional response in me- is one even there and will it ever be?

I don't think this will change my plans to jump ship in the Spring because I feel that I have tried my best and that you can't save someone who doesn't want to be saved- especially someone who apparently loves playing the victim.  So, if I'm a horrible daughter- I might as well save myself and fulfill that label, right?

Wherefore art thou motivation?

I recently got a promotion, of sorts.  A promotion that comes with no pay raise but more hours.

I think I've lost my mojo for school.  I was so excited for it to begin but now that it has I'm so very tired.

I dropped one of my classes today and am now down to 12 hours. My online psychology class just wasn't happening.  I nailed a discussion question and didn't get full credit because I didn't "interact" with my classmates.  Then, today, I took my first test and got a 70.  A "70".  I don't make 70s, people.  The 14 pages of notes I took over the PPs and chapter readings did not help me because I was asked questions like:

You have a friend who works for a fast food chain and is dreading completing his performance appraisals.  What can you say to encourage him to complete them?

A. "No one pays attention to performance appraisals anyway!"
B. "Performance appraisals are an essential part of business and help develop effective training techniques."
C. "Performance appraisals help weed out employees that should be fired!"
D. "Just do your job and complete your performance appraisals!"

I selected "B" and got it wrong.  Less than half of the material I'd read over was on this test and those embedded quizzes that I scored 100s on weren't on there either.  So, I vented to Dwayne, dropped the class, and put my book up for sale on Amazon.  Over it. I'm too old for this kind of class.  I am also too stressed about classes that I need to proceed to mess around and try and scramble to make up for a 70 all semester.

I'm in study hall working, or blogging, with people who aren't motivated to do their work either.  So, as they avoid doing theirs- I'll avoid doing mine.

Tales from the Smokehouse

I asked my mother and her friend to kindly stop smoking around 4:45 p.m. today so that way I could make a delicious bacon and parmesan pasta dish for my hubby.  He deserves such delicious dishes because he has been working 10 hr days for about a week and a half and really just because.

Asking them to stop smoking while I prepare a wonderful meal didn't seem all that outrageous to me especially since I have made this request many times before.  Apparently, today it is a huge deal.  My mother's friend decided not to drink her last beer but instead take that last beer home with her and drink and smoke to her delight at her home.  My mother then bursts into my room and berates me for making her friend mad.  Here are some highlights:

"You KNOW she always leaves before 5 p.m. "
"Now she isn't going to come over here tomorrow- because of YOU!"
"You are the reason I don't have friends!"

Naturally, I fire back a few choice words to her, about her, and about her "friend" because it seems to me that grown ups should have more to worry about that someone asking them to refrain from smoking for an hour or so. She slams the door and hides herself in her room- completely devastated that her friend might not come over tomorrow.  This speaks to the absolutely needy nature of my mother beyond anything else.  She fills this place with people, people she drinks and smokes with, people she gossips with, and then those same people are the ones she talks so horribly about to me when they leave.  And I have made many of these people pissed off on more than one occasion and I can only imagine what is said about me.

I go out and start to cook and she floats out of her room and politely comments on how good things smell and how she can't wait to taste it.

I am confused by this behavior so I make a simple request:  "Can you pick a mood?  Because not even 15 minutes ago you came into my room and jumped my shit over your friend and now you're out here being buddy-buddy. Pick one."

Her response: "I just want to be your mother."

What the hell does that even mean? I don't know and god knows she doesn't either.

I just want some pickles, damnit!

If only I could go back in time and punch my 16 year old self.  Straight in the face. I tell you I'd punch myself so hard that I'd dump that asshole boyfriend, take all AP classes, start putting in scholarship applications, and buy some self confidence from a voodoo priestess.

These things never got done because I was in "love", I wanted a "break" from all that studying, I had "plenty" of time for scholarships and college, and because I didn't know that I was lacking in self confidence.  What a dumb bitch.

And now? I get excited when I can buy myself a $2.50 jar of dill pickles or get Dwayne a $8.99 haircut.

I hereby call shenanigans on adulthood. 

SHENANIGANS, I say!

Love. This.

Summer Reading......

I created a list of books I'd like to read over the summer and that list keeps on growing. Since my Velveteen Rabbit post I've read more, abandoned one, and added to my list from other readings.


I read about Fragile by Lisa Unger in a cooking magazine I'd been browsing through. It seemed very interesting but I found the writing to be "eh".


When K was here we took a trip to the library and I picked up Hemingway's A Moveable Feast, which is about his time in Paris. It seemed so very interesting and Hemingway has a way of pulling me in but he, for me, is just so bulky verbally and hard to read. I always have to concentrate very hard to read Hemingway and always feel like I've been in battle afterwards. I think it took me 3 tries to read The Sun Also Rises. Which is a very good but very lonely book. With the kids here and craziness going on around me I had to move Feast to the end of the books to read list. I will not accept defeat.....but will accept a small retreat. K picked out a book by Laura Hillman called I Will Plant You a Lilac Tree. It is a memoir of Mrs. Hillman's time in several Nazi death camps and tells how she came to be on Schindler's list. K never opened it so I seized the opportunity and read it myself. It is a young adult book and is a terrifying but amazing story. I am glad I read it because in it Mrs. Hillman references an Austrian poet by the name of Rainer Maria Rilke. I was enchanted by the sections of his work she referenced so much that I looked up a book of translated poems locally.


On my most recent trip I picked up Poems from the Book of Hours by Rilke, A Doll's House, Fahrenheit 451, and Fractions = Trouble. A crazy mix, I know. Rilke was selected due to Mrs. Hillman's references. Ibsen and Bradbury just because they are classic and should be read over and over. And Fractions = Trouble is a children's book by Claudia Mills about a boy named Wilson Williams who has had some problems in the past with math and is struggling with fractions. This book is so cute! I was walking by the children's section and just couldn't resist!

Though my original list is longer now and I am getting sidetracked by other readings I am very happy with the way my summer reading has gone so far. I've discovered a Rilke poem that I absolutely adore and have posted below. (Yay for discovery!)

Untitled

 

No, my life is not this precipitous hour
through which you see me passing at a run.

I stand before my background like a tree.

Of all my many mouths I am but one,

and that which soonest chooses to be dumb.

I am the rest between two notes

which, struck together, sound discordantly,

because death's note would claim a higher key.

But in that dark pause, trembling, the notes meet, harmonious.

And the song continues sweet.

- Rainer Maria Rilke

My pity party.

There are roughly 33 days until school starts and I can't wait!  I know it will be stressful and probably chaotic but along with that chaos comes forward progress.  I've been saying all summer long, "When the kids go back....." Well, they are back home now and I hate to say but it wasn't a moment too soon.

N & K came back with us from our amazing TX trip to stay for a bit.  N only stayed for 2 weeks since he had a UT band camp to attend so we spent the first two weeks doing something, anything, every day.  It was sort of a continuation of the TX trip.  I planned meals, activities, etc to keep them entertained and out of grandma's as much as possible.  They of course spent time with her but she gets very cranky easily so we try to keep it light.  And my mom? Well, she is just not appropriate for children so we avoided her like the plague.

After N went back it was just K and I most days and we actually had fun.  We went window shopping in Green Hills, Cool Springs, etc.  We got some funny pics taken together and it almost seemed like I had a partner in crime.  The funny thing with K, and maybe it's this way with all girls her age, but she is a chameleon.  I never know what to expect from her and am never really sure if I am in or out.  When her Aunt K is around; I'm out usually.  Because Aunt K has money that she very willing spends on all kinds of random crap for K.  No matter the fact that she is supposed to be flying back and already has a box of things that won't fit in her bags- but I am the only one who thinks of these things.  And please believe me when I say that I don't begrudge K getting all she can get while she is here since the remaining parts of the year "the favorites" get showered in gifts that my kids and the ATL kids can only dream of. 

But I thought this year would be different and it really felt different for a while.  Especially, after the crazy Facebook fight that got started by Aunt K- targeting 14-yr-old K and 21-yr-old H, because I defended her and was outraged and expressed that outrage and it seemed like she got it- that what was said was not OK and that I was on her team.  That lasted about a week.  After Aunt K apologized and they all went out for mani/pedis I was out again.  Let me clear one thing up....I'm not saying that she should hate her Aunt K forever or for that matter even be mad about it and not talk to her.... I'm just saying remember who defended you. 

I think having kids without having kids is harder than actually having kids.  I am responsible for them just as much as if they'd been pushed out but without the benefit of that automatic and kind of- "you're stuck with me" attachment.  If I had pushed them out perhaps I'd view things differently.  Like a sweet dusting of rainbow colored sugar on them and every bad thing they did and said.  Not that they do a lot of bad things but on the off occasion that they do- I'm the mean parent and hubby is the nice guy. Always.

I try to be the relaxed parent/step-parent/aunt. Because I know what it was like growing up with my father being the rigid ass that he was.  So, when my beautiful niece H told me she had had sex for the first time I was calm. On the outside.  I held a calm, logical, and great conversation with her.  On the inside, I rambled insanely to myself and began shouting STD statistics and pregnancy facts. 

I try and let the kids be as open as they need to be and let them make small and large choices.  An interesting example of this that made me realize how juxtaposed my demeanor as a step-parent and my emotion as a step-parent are happened a little while back.  It was right before T graduated and I had the "best" idea for a small graduation present. A St. Christopher medallion.  I am not Catholic and none of the Mills clan is but I read about the story of St. Christopher and loved the idea of him protecting the kids on their transition from HS to college (how I romanticize things).  I had given a necklace to H for her graduation present and she loved it.  So, in my mind I decided I was going to create this tradition, girls get a St. Christopher necklace, guys get a medallion as part of their HS graduation.  How wonderful it would be and perhaps they would carry it on and it would all just be so great.  But the logical part of me knew that T had made some comments in the past about religion and I, being the relaxed one, the logical one, decided to email him my case and surely he would see my side and LOVE the idea.  Well, I got a response that said that while the sentiment was "nice" the thought of a St. Christopher medallion was a little to "god-y" for him since he thought all religion was "bullshit" anyway.  He thanked me for asking his opinion though.  I was more hurt by this than I thought I would be.

I'm not even sure what the point of all this is. Perhaps that it is hard being a step-parent, that you shouldn't look for loyalty in a 14 yr-old girl, that you shouldn't ask for opinions if you don't want to hear what is said, and that it sucks feeling like the kill-joy all the time.

The last week K was here, T flew in.  He was here for roughly 2.5 days and the hubby and I argued all the last day.  I had had enough of K's new attitude and between that and a string budget, two boxes of overflowing items to be shipped to TX that were ALL K's and would not fit in her bags, and the fact that their flight left at 6:10 am was all just too much for my patience and when hubby got an attitude I melted down.  Which then caused him to do the same because instead of my usual patient, loving smile and understanding attitude he got "I-don't-give-a-fuck" Sally.  When K started crying because she realized that her mother hadn't booked her seat next to T, I had to go into survival mode and just shut down.

Hubby packed her bags, washed her clothes, readied her for the return home, checked them in online- everything that I would normally do.  This pissed him off even more because as I was told it was like "I was trying to teach someone a lesson" and being a "hardass".  I just listened to him whine and complain and bit my tongue.  Because even though I know he was wrong and being an ass I knew he was out of his element, sad since they were leaving, and just as stressed out as I was.  (I am an amazing wife, I know, applause for me.)

Thank God there were not problems getting them on the plane, they took off on time, and landed safely.  I didn't even bother thinking about the box that needed to be shipped back- I removed myself from that situation and made him handle it. (And wouldn't you know that the ONE time he handles it instead of me, Aunt K decides she will ship it from work- thus making it free. Fuckers.  I hate them all, every one.)

Now that the kids are gone we're back in our temporary residence at Sue's Smokehouse.  We've settled into a new routine and there is peace in the valley once again.  I'm not the hardass now and I make his world spin every day with a delightful smile.  I'm still taking him to and from work but that will stop once school starts - I'm counting the days quietly.

Perhaps this marriage and step-kids thing is teaching me patience after all.