Two Nuts In a Tree

My mom and I have issues. I try to make light out of this. Sometimes I think the only ones who find it funny are the cats.

My mom gets up at the ass crack of dawn. I get up when lunch has farted dawn into submission. This isn’t because I’m lazy, it’s because my autoimmune system goes crazy at night and I can’t sleep, so I end up sleeping best in the morning. This is true even if I get up at six am for an appointment. I still can’t sleep at night. My mom thinks I’m lazy even though my doctor has spent no less than nine hundred and eighty three breaths telling my mom that it is perfectly acceptable an normal that I can’t sleep at night with my health issues.

My mom is also one of those people who is very one track minded. She will promise you something, but if something better comes along she’ll renege on the promise and get mad at you if you bring it up. My mom has always been like this. She says it’s because, growing up my aunt was my grandma’s favorite and she never got any attention. I don’t believe it’s not that, but several of her friends have actually taken up discussing this issue with me instead of her. I love my mom, but it’s very awkward.

My mom is also one of those people who will watch a cat throw up in front of her, walk away from it, and then tell me to clean it up later because “she’s busy.” Obviously I have nothing to do with my life. And I, being the resistant little fuck that I am, refuse to clean it up because she is now sitting on the couch eating and laughing at some ridiculous show, while I have just gotten up and am getting in the swing of the things I have to do that day.

She will also half ass do something and then leave the rest of it in my way so that I will finish it for her. When I was little, I would do it. Now I just move it and go about my merry way. What I’m saying is she’s a sneaky little doohickey. Shit like this just doesn’t fly with me. Ask me to do something or help you with it, and I gladly will. Play sneaky little games to get me to do something and then pretend you didn’t, I will not. I feel like I’m living with a two year old sometimes. It seems like this house has the role reversal. Instead of her raising me, I feel like I’m raising her. More than one comment from friends and family members have been made about this, too.

My favorite moments, however, have happened over the past few days. I’m moving furniture, something I’m not supposed to be doing in the first place, to make room for the bed. In comes this line: “You’re supposed to be helping me paint.” What now? I...didn’t agree to that. In fact, I remember last year when we had snow come in and do damage to my room, I moved the furniture and painted myself. Just because I’m your daughter does not automatically mean I’m supposed to help you paint. Not to mention that I don’t see you helping me move furniture.

Today, while I was busy writing my novel, came the call of the wild. “You’re supposed to be helping me put my room back together.” Totally, because you helped me with mine. I wasn't aware of my "supposed to" until just now.

Several years ago, I moved a piece of my furniture into the spare room. I barely got that sucker in there before her stuff was all piled in it. Forget me getting to store my own stuff in my own furniture. The other day I reclaimed it. Now, apparently, all her crap that is in it is my problem, and I have to clean the room and find new places and reorganize her crap. Seriously?

My mom also likes it polar bear cold in our house. If you turn the heat up higher than sixty four degrees in the eight degree weather, she will be out here so fast, mumbling something about how I’m trying to burn her, that you’ll swear she has ESP. I, on the other hand, am always cold, so I like to turn the heat up to a toasty sixty eight degrees. It’s amazing we haven’t murdered each other yet by either freezing the other one out, or burning the other one to death. Ah, menopause and hot flashes. Her, not me.

My mom also likes to tell me what I need to do and not do to make me feel better. The doctors don’t even know that yet, because they’re still trying to figure out what all is going on. The doctor can tell me not to do something with my mom in the room to hear it, and she will turn around and have a hissy fit if I don’t do what the doctor just told me not to do. This is always a bone of contention with us, because I know my body well. I know how it works and how to ease the current symptoms. Her suggestions are always the opposite of what helps, but if I don’t do them, she freaks out until I either do them and make myself feel worse, or have to lock myself in a room to get away from her.

My mom is also Captain Misser of the Obvious. You can be eating something really recognizable, like a pizza, and she’ll ask you what you’re eating. She’s also, as of recent, really hard at hearing, or really good at ignoring me. I don’t know which. I do know she gets mad when I get snippy with her after she’s asked me the same thing three times in a five minute period, which she does about nine times a day.

As a daughter, I’m sure there’s about a million things I do to annoy her, too. Like I said, I’m a defiant little shit because I don’t like her games, so she probably thinks I'm a back talking little brat. All of this is exciting to me, though. You guys, I think I’ve finally reached the age where I can take all those millions of times she embarrassed me as a kid and make it up to her, which is totally why I do half the stuff I do. Muahaha, I feel so evil. It's good to know when the tables have turned, and if my mom ever figures out how to use the internet properly, I'm sure there will be a blog three times as long about all the shit that I do that drives her nuts. You can't have a loving relationship with someone unless you properly drive them nuts first.