It is my parents 49th wedding Anniversary today. Although Peggy New Year Resolution is to not to speak to Willis for a year and Willis bags are metaphorically constantly packed they are celebrating this 49th year by the same silliness that put them together in the first place. I have this saying that we were each conceived somewhere between Goddamn and Oh Yeah during Sunday mornings make up session after the Friday night fights and Saturday recovery afternoons. Today, I am sure, they expect each of the children to call and congratulate them on their achievement and listen to each of them in turn complain about what an awful spouse the other is. My mother will complain about Willis being the perpetual asshole and jackass he has always been and Willis complain about how mean and evil Peggy is. This roller coaster of lets-stay-together-damnation that my parents formed 50 years ago has been much discussed and prayed about longer than I been alive. And as much and often as I, myself, prayed for them to divorce and be done with it, they have managed walk that fine line of seething hatred and love. Although Peggy will tell anyone who will listen that she never loved Willis, she will every single day make Willis' dinner complete with his favorite yams and ice water, except on Saturday because that is her day off. Willis, in turn, will complain about Peggy not speaking to him and how many times has he threaten to leave only to never really go anywhere outside of Home Depot and Costco, constantly bringing flowers or fish that only Peggy likes. Somewhere in all this those two not only managed to stay together but have surpassed that fine line of old people who been together so long they look alike. Both are now slightly hunched over and have the same aches and grouchiness. While talking to Willis last week for his Birthday he complained about how no one said anything to him about his birthday at same time telling me about who brought what that day. I f that isn't a Peggy thing I really don't know what is. Peggy, later, explained how to fix a knob on a cabinet, usually a Willis thing. I know now that they will always fuss, fight and argue but they will be together to the bitter end.So Happy Anniversary Parents. Knock yourself out....Please!!
Saturday, February 28, 2009
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Dancing with Mom
My father is sick. His tests came back positive for prostate cancer. The doctors decided to do nothing. One because the cancer hasn't grown in three years and two because he is seventy and they only expect him to live another 10. Maybe. So they are not going to do a thing. Ok I can accept this. No biggie. So I called to see how he is but Peggy answer instead. Dammit. So I go though the usual talk about how much the worse the weather in sunny Sacramento is compared to snowy Seattle, I ask to speak to Wo-wa. Of course Mom wants to know why and when I state I was concerned about his health she asks why again since I never asked about her health. So I ask about her health and she states that right now she is fighting with the doctors at Kaiser Medical offices because, according to them, her heart is just fine. But she is convinced that she needs open heart surgery because she can not catch her breath. Never mind that 8 different doctors told her to lose weight because she too heavy for her small frame but she insist its her heart. So chance she gets, she goes and gets a EKG for $400 and believes one day soon a brilliant doctor will come and declare her dead and she can celebrate her “I told you so” attitude in casket with her very ungrateful children surrounding her.
Since Mom spent her whole life trying to catch some disease or break a bone, literary would be a miracle that it never happened. If anyone else is sick or hurt in anyway she is definitely is too and always worse. A good example of this is when my sister Sheri had some kind of arthritis in her hip which cased her to limp a little. Well once Peggy got an understanding that Sheri's hip was not up top par she started limping. Not slightly, but full blown limping as if she was in some horrible car accident that happened while the rest of us were asleep. I asked her why is she limping and she announces that her hip just gives out every now and then and it must be arthritis and when she went to the doctor’s to get is checked she was told she needed surgery to heal this condition. Then she left the room limping horrible on the opposite leg.
After about 20 minutes of this I am sicker than your father routine I ask again about Wo-wa and his health status. She states that it really isn't all that serious and that she hopes that he dies first and soon, as she wishes to get all of the money he has been hoarding her whole life, so she and her daughters can go shopping. Somehow I know the shopping part does not include me and as much as I hope my father has hidden money somewhere, I suspect he has a hidden family somewhere out there like all old men his age.
I hang up after 30 minutes, having not spoken to my father, as usual. I can only pray for his health.
A Day with My Mother
I was talking to my sister Tricia, the other day about living at 608. She was explaining the craziness that happens everyday, especially dealing with Mom. I counter with the what happened one day while visiting there about four years ago. I went back to Sacramento for my son's high school graduation. I had to stay at 608 to help with packing all of Adam's stuff.
On the third night home I fell down the stairs like a Jamaican bobsledder in 20 feet of snow without brakes. My skin was rug burned in several places along with open flesh wounds on my hands and arms. I was bruised pretty badly on my behind, legs, arms and face. I laughed while getting up and only Alexander checked to make sure I was fine. When I go into the kitchen ask for Band-Aids my mother asked why. I tell her what happened and wondered if she heard it. She says no and says that she falls down those stairs all the time which is why she has never been upstairs in 4 years. I rolled my eyes wondering how the hell she keeps falling down the stairs if she never goes up them? So I went for a walk hoping to feel better but instead ended up very weak. My knee starts to swells and eventually gives out forcing me to forgo my walk. My face and arm goes into the sleep mode, fading in and out and prickly. I realized that my usual clumsiness has decided to show itself on this particular day, which explains the stair slide earlier in the day. It is only 8am, and I have time to kill, but I decide to head back home to shower and relax for the rest of the day.
As soon as I get there, my mother announces she needs to go to Auntie Barb’s to drop some things off. She has to go today because she already promised she would and Auntie Barb is waiting, but she cannot go until after 11am because Auntie Barb does not get up until then. I have no idea how come Auntie Barb called her before 11 while still asleep. Maybe they have some kind of witchcraft sleeping communication thing going on. I really don't know, I just want to lay back down but instead, I take a shower and get ready for Auntie Barb’s and painfully give up any thought of resting for the day.
My mother gathers things to put into the car and as we pile into the car Mom brings out several garbage bags full of clothes and whatnots then proceeds to have me grab two boxes of canned goods to put into the car. Visually limping and bruised my mother says I am over-exploiting my injuries and I should just “chill out".
At 10am my mother, with exorbitant joy she skips down the eight poach steps to the car. She loads the trunk with various plants and grocery’s she supposedly can ill afford to give away, but none-the-less, she continues to bring bag after bag of clothing and such to give to Auntie Barb. She jumps into the car as if she is 25 not 73 and smiles happily as I finally pull away from the curb.
Along the way she chit chats about various family members and comments on how great cousin Phyllis treat her mother Barb and how Phyllis daughter is just wonderful even through she gave her two kids to their grandmother and mother so she could party like its 1999. We head to her sister’s house as she continues her tirade of her ungrateful children who never pay her any attention or give her what she needs. Then tells me I need to make her an doctor's appointment before I leave so she can get checked again for heart failure. As I roll my eyes again, I wonder if there is anyway I can push her out of the car and get away with it.
I finally pull up to Auntie Barb’s house a full 20 minutes later and proceed to get out of the car pop the trunk and pull the various bags out. Now mind you I always disliked this aunt. She would call us "dirty little niggers" when I was child and she always thought she was better than my mother. But here we are bringing her groceries and clothes. Go figure.
Halfway up the driveway Auntie Barb opens the front door and says “Dede how is Seattle? I’ve always hated going there. I used to go every year to see my in-laws and found it too cold and rainy”. I say nothing. Instead, I turned to look for my mother whom I just knew was right behind me, she wasn’t. She was still in the car. I frowned and wondered what the hell she was doing. There was Mom, who only minutes ago skipped to get into the car hollering “Dede! Come help me I cannot get out of the car. You know my heart is bad”! I was momentarily confused, how did her heart get bad in 20 minutes in the sitting position? Did she have heart attack while I was driving and I just completely ignored her? Somehow, she miraculously managed to get out the car and very slowly walk up the sidewalk limping horribly, with a cane. Where in the hell did that cane come from? Damn! she sure is a good actress!
By the third unloading trip to the car, my mother managed to get inside Auntie Barb’s kitchen and start with the usual gab of who takes the most medicine and the best names of them. My mother pulls out her gallon sized freezer bag with a bunch of medicine bottles in them. She makes sure to show Auntie Barb each and every one of them and tells her what they are for. Barb shares all of hers while walking hunched over, back and forth in her tiny kitchen. I don't understand why she doesn't just sit if she is not feeling well, but whatever. They discuss who has the worse diseases and symptoms and why their various doctors are idiots. they both argue that their own diabetes is worse than the other. This discussion goes on for about 30 minutes then it on to the who has the worse children routine.
My mother never misses an opportunity to complain about how ungrateful her children are. She has 10 living children who are all neurotics and need professional counseling by the time we all got to be about 20 years old because she was always so unsatisfied. Auntie Barb fusses at me, the one daughter that always gives mother whatever and takes her wherever she wants about being nicer to my mother. Mind you they have all this energy to complain but not enough to stay well.
After the first hour of sheer boredom and neurosis to which I was called ungrateful and uncaring at least a million times, I received a welcome call from a sales representative on my cell phone. This gave me out to leave the house and go outside. After getting rid of the overzealous Sales rep I called my niece, Angela. I had to apologized for not listening to her about Grandma Peggy craziness while she was living there. My bad, I almost forgotten how my mother could be.
I forced myself to go back inside for more self-torture for another hour. Auntie Barb shoves six bags of varies clothing plants and can food towards my way to “Put these in the car for your mother because she really needs them” I could swear that this is the same exact stuff I took out of the earlier but ok.
After 40 minutes of goodbye and happiness at the thought of actually to being able to drop this mother of mine off she announces, “I need to stop off at Raley’s to pick up something for dinner”. It is now 2 o’clock and no one normal thinks of dinner at this time. But me the ungrateful daughter proceeds to prolong my journey to Raley’s.
I think of how I am going to get my mother out of the car this time. I wonder if she going to be pulling on my arm as I try to help her up out of the seat. By the time I get out of the car my mother is already in the store pulling out a shopping cart and looking at the pasties. I bravely walk into the store and push the cart allowing her to stick whatever she wants into the cart. Everything is sweet and dessert like and for the life of me I cannot figure out what happened to her diabetes she had earlier.
At the checkout counter my mother complains to anyone who will listen that her Mother’s Day will be bust because her ungrateful children will not be giving her a $100 each, so she will not be broke. What really pissed me off is that I was standing right next to her. Finally after loaded car and traffic we are back in the driveway of home and my mother bounds up the eight stairs into the house and sits in her favorite chair. I left alone to carry all the packages big and small into the house and set the table for dinner that we will eat precisely at 6:15 pm. It was 4 o’clock and Mom is eating pasties and smiling.