The Queen of the Guilt Trip, The Mistress of Manipulation

The grocery store.


Yeah, doesn't sound very threatening, does it.


But in my house, one trip to the grocery store is cause for an assload of tension and guilt trips.

Mom is supposed to take care of the grocery shopping, but she's a mediocre shopper at best.

She never looks to see what we need. And if I make a list, she doesn't look for it, or if she does, she leaves it at home.

Usually she comes home with chips and cookies, and maybe some fruit if I'm lucky.

But no meat. No onions. No rice or diced tomatoes. Nothing you would actually use to cook a meal.

The kids started back to school on Tuesday. And Mondays are supposed to be Family Nights when Bean's off. But Monday, I got home from work and she hadn't gone to the grocery store yet, because Tallulah didn't want to go and she was waiting for someone to get home.

It's now 4:30 and she's not looking like she's moving. The kids go to bed at 8:00.

Me: Ok.. so you're going to take Oliver?

Mom: Yes.

Me: Umm.. tonight is family dinner night, Mom.

Mom: So?

Me: So, we have nothing to make for dinner (because you haven't been to the grocery store in a month) and while we could go out, I would need Oliver for that. So are you going to go?

Mom: Jeez!! I didn't know I had to go before you got home!!

There was absolutely nothing to gain in pointing out that she didn't. But she couldn't take Oliver with her if she expected me to be pleased with her waiting.

Me: Why don't we just go this week?

Mom: I'm going!!

I can't win for losing.

See, my Mom may at times seem to be lazy, and she's often the sweetest woman you've ever met. But unless you have no heart, don't make the mistake of trying to do battle with her.

She's the Queen of the Guilt Trip, and the Mistress of Manipulation. Even though I know I'm being manipulated and guilt tipped, it doesn't matter. My mediocre will crumbles before the onslaught of the expressive sighs and multi-layered meanings.

I can't help it.

Bean asked me today if I want to move.

In some ways the answer to that is an enthusiastic

YES!!

But I can't. I'm tied. With the bonds of love.

And guilt.

Vacation Part 4 - Family Bash and No Beating up the Psuedo-cousins

On July 4th there was a big ole bash at Mom & Dad Bean’s. I was starting to feel bad (because I had appendicitis – I’ll tell you later), but it was alright.

Apparently you can have fireworks where they live so there was a whole lot of that going on. But there was also an incident.

My sister-in-law, Sophia, had bought a bunch of fireworks for her son, Grant. And she was going to make him share but obviously, he wanted to be able to shoot some of them off himself. But Aunt Godmother’s boyfriend’s son and his wife “claimed” Grant’s fireworks.

Ya’ll, Sophia is about the sweetest person on the face of the planet. So she didn’t say a word. Nothing. She smiled and calmed Grant while he cried and said nothing.

I was PISSED and all for marching over there and telling them that they were welcome to share Grant’s fireworks, but they were not calling dibs on $100 worth of fireworks that they DID NOT BUY.

Of course I didn’t say anything.

But since everyone was telling me that I had to bring the kids for next years’ bash I told Bean in no uncertain terms that no one was going to treat MY kids that way and get a smile and no comment.

And the kicker for me – was when they left & made Grant give them high fives before they would leave.

I wanted to tell them where they could shove their high fives.

I've Been Caught or How the Hell Am I Going to Talk My Way Out of This One??

**DISCLAIMER** I'm blogging from my phone & that doesn't usually work out very well for me. So please just forgive the massive typos & formatting issues.

I'm pretty sure I'm fucked. I mean I was a little fucked last week when I asked Bean to proofread the Father's Day post and he's all wait a second.. "Bean Bean The Magical Fruit", W.T.F.????? and then he had to go through and read every posting that even remotely mentioned him.

But Bean is smart enough to know that its his own damn fault. If he were religiously following my blog then he would have seen all the posts before ya'll did & objected (not that it would have done much good).

But now Mrs. #2 saw my other facebook profile.

Just to explain, I grew up with Mrs. #2 and we were very close as kids & then my cousin #2 fell for her & I convinced her to marry him (she's all blissfully happy, its good). But in the last few years she's gotten close to Amara and is all thinking that maybe Amara's right about me and our fight is all my fault and it pisses me off, because Amara has ALWAYS been a bitch, and I have always not been (at least not witho. ut. Provocation).

Anyway, so she found my new I-get-to-post-whatever-the-fuck-I-want-to facebook profile & friended me and is all why'd you get a new profile?????.

I want to say to be honest with her. I wanted to be able to say whatever I wanted. But then she'll wonder why she's not my friend and I'll have to tell her.

And I don't want to.

She picked the bitch. She couldn't drive 30 minutes to come to my birthday party or to my kids birthday parties, but she drives 4 1/2 fucking hours out of her way to stop in at the bitch's son birthday party to stay for 30 minutes.

Its pretty obvious who is more important to her.

So why is she making me answer this question?? Ugh.

Practice Makes Perfect

**DISCLAIMER**

My potty mouth really ran away with me during this post.. I'd really like to apologize, but you did, after all, come here of your own free will..

I am absolutely convinced that talking to yourself is like pot. Everyone's done it, but not everyone admits they have.
I'll admit it (on both counts, talking to myself & trying pot - though for the record, it was only twice but I did inhale).
I talk to myself all the time. I like to think of it as personal pep talks, but alot of times it's rehearsing for imaginary conversations.
For instance, if I'm on my way home from work and I've gotten an email from Oliver's teacher that says he threw a chair and then he skipped class (that last part has never happened, the first part has, several times - my boy has anger management issues), I might want to rehearse for the conversation I know is coming. Because honestly, what I really want to say goes something like this:

Me: Oliver, what the fuck is the matter with you, why did you go ape-shit on your teacher?!?! I think I will have to take your flat screen TV, and X-box 3 and put them in my room as punishment, you'll have to make do with my big-ass TV and Super Nintendo. Now maybe next time you'll think about it before you decide to act like an evil little shit.

But I totally realize that I can't call my son an evil little shit, and I probably shouldn't say "WTF?" to him either. Thus the rehearsal.*

Other times I practice for conversations that I know are almost certainly never going to happen. Like today. My bitch, I mean sister**, is in town and asked Mom and the kids to go to a movie and then dinner with her. I really don't like the idea of the kids spending time with her. Not only because I don't trust her, but also because I hate that they think she's nice and that she cares about them. I hate knowing that at some point she is going to hurt them.

But I wasn't off of work yet when Mom needed to leave and if she really wants to torture herself by spending time with the evil bitch then I should be supportive. So the kids are with her as I type, and on my way home from work, I practiced what I would say to her if she were speaking to me, it went something like this:

Me: Amara, I really don't know what your problem is, since you've never bothered to actually tell me, but I pity you. You have surrounded yourself with all of these wonderful people who don't know you. They know you're sweet and funny and caring and all of that bull-shit, but they don't know the insane and vindictive things you are capable of. You only have one friend that actually knows you and you don't even like her that much.
You have cut yourself off from your family and embraced your in-laws like they are some kind of saints. I don't get it. You MIL is a slut, and your FIL is a snob (and also kindof slutty) but you think they're fantabulous. How the hell are they better than our Mom?? At least she never deliberately hurt us.
You're a sorry piece of shit, and I don't want you around my kids anymore. You can't have your cake and eat it too, you have to pick. If you want to be one big happy fucking family you have to acknowledge my husband and apologize to me. If not then fuck off.

Unfortunately, she's not speaking to me, so I will never get to deliver my diatribe, and when we see each other at family functions, she puts on a great show, so that the whole family thinks I'm the problem. It pisses me off, obviously. But really, if I'm being honest, it's probably a good thing she's not speaking to me, because I get very doormatty with her, so if we did talk it would probably go like this:

Me: AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!! I miss you.

* I promise that I'm not THAT bad of a mother. I would never actually say that to Oliver. I would eventually come up with something very stern, yet supportive and ground him (unless he chose to be beaten, in which case, who am I to argue??)
** I haven't had a normal conversation with my sister, Amara, since the week before Perry moved out. Don't ask why, because I don't actually know, when I asked she said that I was "too sick to understand and she wouldn't talk to me until I got some help". I have never so much as touched my nephew and neither he nor my niece know who I am. I suspect that our evil, vindictive, back-stabbing, self-serving and very bi-polar cousin is fueling the fire, and I'm fairly certain that her husband, Mr. Incredible is thrilled.