Mudder’s Day
Oh, I just want to vomit with all the Mother’s Day postings on Facebook. I “liked” as many photos as I could stomach before shutting down the iPad and grabbing a shower, in hopes that this would be the day I finally escape my own mother on a weekend and go grab a bagel somewhere.
Of course she made me breakfast while I was in the shower. And I’ve been yapping for four weeks about going and getting a bagel. By myself. I don’t get breakfast any other day except those that I intend to sneak out of house unaccompanied. Which is a sin, I tell you, a sin!
I know, worse problems to have, right?
Mom got gifts and a big day out yesterday. And of course she wants to know what’s on for today without actually asking or demanding. You know what I want? What I want every weekend. Peace and time at the beach. Considering all I have to do is take the elevator down to the first floor and walk a few hundred feet, you’d think I get the beach all the time. But she’s frail and can’t walk and is just a delicate little flower, so we always end up bypassing the beach so I get to drive her to Wal-Mart and Dollar Tree and Dollar General and Winn-Dixie (ugh. Worst grocery store ever) and Big Lots.
And by the time Monday rolls around (and you can assume I feel the same way about being a working stiff as anyone else in this world), it’s almost a relief. Until about 5 p.m. Monday when my patience gets tested like it does every day at that time, and any amount of calm I’d previously possessed gets a bullet put into its head.
In any event, that’s about when I realize my mom is all I’ve got. And while I want to shoot to kill everyone on Facebook who’s dragging their mom out for brunch and gets to deposit her at her home while I’ve had mine living rent-free in mine for seven years (at least she cooks and cleans. Although I’d prefer cash), she’s the only one I can talk to about all the characters and drama in the so-called life I’ve made.
So, today I say, hey thanks for not being able to keep your legs closed and getting knocked up at 16 (that was sarcastic in case anyone missed that) and thank God you had good parents who helped to take care of me even though we were dirt poor and they died penniless and sick instead of enjoying an albeit meager retirement and now I have a load of goddamned guilt that keeps me from kicking your ass out although I do derive great pleasure in my ability to share my disgust with just a simple snarky phrase.
But I do say thanks for letting me say what I have to say and keeping on keeping on. Because if I were alone in having to deal with all the bullshit in my world outside this crumbling palace of an apartment, I’d be fired or dead or on drugs or some combination thereof.
So I’ll keep trying not to scream as she sings-songs in baby talk to the cat all day and night and keeps about a thousand empty boxes in my dining room “for when we have to move” even though we’ve been here four years and I cry every time I have to lift up the iced tea and move the paper towels aside to get to the box that sits on top of the toilet paper every time I need a fresh roll.
I’ll keep going back to work every day to afford this palace so that princess can continue living in it. And I’ll be grateful for the free therapy she provides and the good comfort food she gives me to make it all better in her own little way of trying to make herself useful to me.
And that’s more than I can say about anyone else in my world. So, happy Mudder’s Day, mom. I could have done a hell of a lot worse in that department. And if I didn’t have you balancing out everyone and everything else, there’s no telling what might have become of me before now.