April 4, 2008

• People, mostly friends are funny creatures. You can go months or years without seeing them and then when they think you might be dying, they all of a sudden clear their schedule for you; jump over hurdles that were too big too keep them from returning even your instant messages and phone calls. That's where grace comes into play and I've chosen just to go with it. Life is too short for bitterness and hurt and I spend a lot of time making these friends feel better. Putting on make-up so I look like the person I used to be, laughing at jokes when I'm physically not in too much pain and planning future get-togethers with them to reassure them that I'll still be around in the next few months. It's important to me that these people feel good about our friendship whether the end comes tomorrow or 60 years from now.

  
  

  Family is just as strange and unpredictable although not so easy to placate. This year for my birthday my father came up from Arizona and my brother down from Santa Rosa. My father wanted to come in October when I had my initial surgery but I told him not to. What was he going to do, stand around wringing his hands by my bedside while I lay there legally stoned? Wouldn't have done either of us any good. We don't see each other often enough for him to have seen the good side of me when I was in good health. I didn't want him to come and see me in pain and poor health and have that memory to take back with him when he went back to Arizona. What a horrible existence for a parent. My brother wasn't able to make it down before now due to his own family and financial struggles. When we found out about the additional Gall Bladder cancer and both wanted to come for my birthday, I told them to come. We had a really good time. Well, most of us did. No matter what the occassion, my mother has to make it all about herself (and this wasn't her birthday) and so she didn't enjoy the festivities as much. My birthday was right after Easter and so we had an egg hunt with my nieces and nephew and a great BBQ that my brother put together, we went to the beach and let the kids play in the warm sand and water and on my birthday we went to a local park. My son, daughter, brother and his wife spent the morning of my birthday racking their brains as to my favorite things to bbq, flavor of cake, potato chips and all. Apparently my mother didn't participate in the planning.

  
  

  The day after Easter, I showed up at my mother's house where my brother was staying and my mother was very cold to me. I hadn't done anything wrong to the best of my knowledge, but with my mother you just never know. We got all of our gear and headed out to the beach to give my nephew a place to run. That night we went out to dinner with my father when he got into town and then headed back to our room when dinner was done. The day of my birthday, we headed back down to Mom's for the BBQ. I went into her room where she was dressing and she was stone cold to me. I left in a hurry, not sure what was up. Throughout the day at the party she was ok, not exactly pleasant but ok. I had to take the chips away from her at one point as she sat there eating them all. I went to grab a handful and 3/4 of the bag was already gone. I nonchalantly rolled up the bag after I was done and placed them in the grocery bag they'd been brought in. I'm sure I didn't score points there, but oh well.

  
  

  When my party was over, Doug and I asked if we could stay the night at her house as I had to be back early in the morning for another scan. She sighed and said ok. My brother was staying in her room, she'd given up her bed and had taken the guest room. As soon as he heard we were staying, he offered up my mother's room to me. She just pursed her lips. I told him no, that the air mattress would be fine and told him I would set it up in the living room away from the draft in the family room. My mother, when she heard that, had an absolute fit. She wanted me to sleep in the family room even after I brought up that it was cold and drafty in there and I at least needed to be warm (I'm still recovering from both major surgeries). I asked her what the problem with sleeping in the living room was and she said she didn't want her furniture moved!!!!

  
  

  This is where I'm convinced that my mother would have eaten her young at birth if she thought she could have gotten away with it!! She informed me that I was a guest in her house and that I would sleep where she told me to sleep and then she stomped off. She had the audacity to offer me a nightgown or more blankets before she went to bed. It meant more to her to be in control of where her daughter slept and to make sure her precious furniture wasn't moved and make it all about her than it did to make sure her daughter who's recovering from two major bouts with cancer was comfortable and healthy for the night. Go fucking figure! I'm sorry, if it was my daughter, she'd have had MY bed!! She only offered the nightgown and blankets because she was in the control to do so.......and which is why I turned both down. 

  
  

  I would have gotten up and left at that moment but we didn't have enough gas to go back home and come back in the morning. I ended up sleeping on the living room floor, sans the mattress. I may have cut off my nose to spite my face when it came to the blankets and nightgown but at that point I didn't want a single thing from her. I haven't spoken to her since.

  
  

  Once when we were at my mom's, she burst into tears and told Doug that he didn't know how it felt to have a child with cancer. Which was incorrect as Clinton had a brain tumor at the age of 7, but he didn't get into it with her, he let her have her melodromatic party. When he told me about it later, he told me he was convinced that the tears were because it was all about her and had nothing to do with me. Poor mama has the sick daughter, not poor daughter who's fighting the disease that's eating her body. I wasn't sure I believed him as a daughter never wants to believe that her mother could be that cold-hearted, despite the life-long proof. Sure as shit, when I told her the recent scans were mostly clear, she didn't even hug me. When I told Doug, he said, "why should she, you've just stolen her thunder and it's not about her anymore." 

  
  

  You know, despite 43 years of disappointment, hurt, pain, anger and bitterness, why am I slapped in the face yet again with the fact that my mother is cruel, selfish, stingy and cold. You'd think I'd get it by now?!?!

  • 10:59 pm
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