shiva, pt 2
much love to everyone for your well-wishes.
maybe at some point i'll go into more detail about all of this, but-
yesterday morning, before we went to sit shiva at grandma's posh retirement home, mum cornered me in dad's workshop (in the basement) and combination guilt-tripped/fought with/cried at me for over 20 minutes. laurie was of course waiting in the car with the baby for us to go, and when she came in to see what was keeping us, did a 180 and walked away.
mum: *blah blah blah blah GUILT TRIP*
me: stop guilt tripping me, it makes me LESS likely to do something i may be inclined to do.
mum: i'm not guilt tripping you!
mum: ...
mum: and grandma died and i'm hurting and why can't you think about ME more, i'm in so much pain! you don't understand my pain! why can't we have the relationship i want us to have? and my sister has BREAST CANCER and you never call me back when i call you and I'M IN PAIN RIGHT NOW. THINK ABOUT ME. blah blah blah.
me: and see that? is exactly what i'm talking about.
mum: FINE. I'M A BAD MOTHER, IS THAT WHAT YOU WANTED ME TO SAY?
me: ...
of course, this was much more in depth, and ended with my informing my mother that she needs to look up the definition of a guilt trip, and her shooting back that no, maybe i'm the one who needs to do so.
mom popped her zoloft on the drive to shiva, trying to hide her tears by staring out the window, and while i felt bad to a very certain extent, my overwhelming desire was to just go back to philly. right then. because my mum and my communication is so bad, and she is so self-absorbed, that she needs to pop zoloft after because of us. me. this. whatthefuckever. love it.
so then, we sat shiva... for about 3 hours... it was boring and uncomfortable, but also good... except for the couple of bright points, like where my dad tried to say i went in and out of hating him and mum in a juvenile fashion, but i'd liked -him- better when i was in high school. standing next to me saying this, with a hand on my shoulder. yeah. i looked at him, and said that actually, i'd disliked both mum and him during high school. cue smile.
yeah. laurie couldn't believe his nerve, seriously thought i was within my rights to stab him, and applauded my self-control.
then we went up to grandma's apartment where mum tore grandma's jewelry boxes apart looking for some pink pearls cousin barbara lent to grandma, but of course telling everyone what she was doing so no one would think she was STEALING JEWELRY, YOU'RE MY WITNESS JEFF, OKAY? (cathy, no one is going to think you're stealing) and then going off on how everything is going to be divided and, btw, mum wants the damned cookie pot. which bob (one of the three sons) has already claimed. and isn't mum getting into a pissing contest over the DAMNED COOKIE POT. JESUS CHRIST.
at the same time as mum was pissing over every spare item of value in the apartment, dad was exhibiting his penis RE his knowledge of lawyers, who would handle things, everything should be settled by rosh hashana. yay. bob was trying to be affable, covering up his true asshole nature, and jeff was twitchy. because his mother was dead and they were going through her belongings.
different coping mechanisms, all.
after that, laurie and i finally escaped (oh, what were we doing during grandma's deconstruction? ben was watching the file/monetary proceedings like a hawk, laurie was playing with avery, and i was reading a book i'd brought) we headed out to arlington, ma (near boston) to see the house of a friend of hers, tomtom (her gps system) got screwed up and directed us to a warehouse in billerica (otherwise known as shackville, ma), and then the 3.5 of us (incl. avery) met up with my cousin scott, one of the triplets, and part of the trifecta of my first crush (aka, the triplets- scott, eric, and michael... but mike just because he looks like scott and eric, who i wll forever love in that 8-year-old who crushes on her 18-year old cousins way).
dinner was good (bertucci's), even if tomtom made us about 2.5 hours late to it, talking was awesome, scott is still my favorite (er, until eric becomes my favorite again, i am fickle), and we got home by 9pm... with avery screaming and screaming, because the poor kid is totally off her cycle, doing -really- well, but still, it's tough, and then crawling into bed right after laurie got avery situated. my parents were not yet home, hallelujah.
maybe at some point i'll go into more detail about all of this, but-
yesterday morning, before we went to sit shiva at grandma's posh retirement home, mum cornered me in dad's workshop (in the basement) and combination guilt-tripped/fought with/cried at me for over 20 minutes. laurie was of course waiting in the car with the baby for us to go, and when she came in to see what was keeping us, did a 180 and walked away.
mum: *blah blah blah blah GUILT TRIP*
me: stop guilt tripping me, it makes me LESS likely to do something i may be inclined to do.
mum: i'm not guilt tripping you!
mum: ...
mum: and grandma died and i'm hurting and why can't you think about ME more, i'm in so much pain! you don't understand my pain! why can't we have the relationship i want us to have? and my sister has BREAST CANCER and you never call me back when i call you and I'M IN PAIN RIGHT NOW. THINK ABOUT ME. blah blah blah.
me: and see that? is exactly what i'm talking about.
mum: FINE. I'M A BAD MOTHER, IS THAT WHAT YOU WANTED ME TO SAY?
me: ...
of course, this was much more in depth, and ended with my informing my mother that she needs to look up the definition of a guilt trip, and her shooting back that no, maybe i'm the one who needs to do so.
mom popped her zoloft on the drive to shiva, trying to hide her tears by staring out the window, and while i felt bad to a very certain extent, my overwhelming desire was to just go back to philly. right then. because my mum and my communication is so bad, and she is so self-absorbed, that she needs to pop zoloft after because of us. me. this. whatthefuckever. love it.
so then, we sat shiva... for about 3 hours... it was boring and uncomfortable, but also good... except for the couple of bright points, like where my dad tried to say i went in and out of hating him and mum in a juvenile fashion, but i'd liked -him- better when i was in high school. standing next to me saying this, with a hand on my shoulder. yeah. i looked at him, and said that actually, i'd disliked both mum and him during high school. cue smile.
yeah. laurie couldn't believe his nerve, seriously thought i was within my rights to stab him, and applauded my self-control.
then we went up to grandma's apartment where mum tore grandma's jewelry boxes apart looking for some pink pearls cousin barbara lent to grandma, but of course telling everyone what she was doing so no one would think she was STEALING JEWELRY, YOU'RE MY WITNESS JEFF, OKAY? (cathy, no one is going to think you're stealing) and then going off on how everything is going to be divided and, btw, mum wants the damned cookie pot. which bob (one of the three sons) has already claimed. and isn't mum getting into a pissing contest over the DAMNED COOKIE POT. JESUS CHRIST.
at the same time as mum was pissing over every spare item of value in the apartment, dad was exhibiting his penis RE his knowledge of lawyers, who would handle things, everything should be settled by rosh hashana. yay. bob was trying to be affable, covering up his true asshole nature, and jeff was twitchy. because his mother was dead and they were going through her belongings.
different coping mechanisms, all.
after that, laurie and i finally escaped (oh, what were we doing during grandma's deconstruction? ben was watching the file/monetary proceedings like a hawk, laurie was playing with avery, and i was reading a book i'd brought) we headed out to arlington, ma (near boston) to see the house of a friend of hers, tomtom (her gps system) got screwed up and directed us to a warehouse in billerica (otherwise known as shackville, ma), and then the 3.5 of us (incl. avery) met up with my cousin scott, one of the triplets, and part of the trifecta of my first crush (aka, the triplets- scott, eric, and michael... but mike just because he looks like scott and eric, who i wll forever love in that 8-year-old who crushes on her 18-year old cousins way).
dinner was good (bertucci's), even if tomtom made us about 2.5 hours late to it, talking was awesome, scott is still my favorite (er, until eric becomes my favorite again, i am fickle), and we got home by 9pm... with avery screaming and screaming, because the poor kid is totally off her cycle, doing -really- well, but still, it's tough, and then crawling into bed right after laurie got avery situated. my parents were not yet home, hallelujah.