My Life, My Pace

I must have been lucky. Oh-so-lucky. Because I grew up in a family that placed little to no importance on Hallmark holidays. I still remember being little and making my mom and dad cards for Mother’s Day and Father’s Day. If my schoolteacher deemed it important enough to waste days (really now—shouldn’t I be learning?!) at a time making trinkets for our parents for these Hallmark holidays, they would also get said extra handmade trinkets. And even after I became old enough to have some limited spending power, never did I think that it was wrong that I chose not to buy my parents some big spectacular thing for their respective Hallmark holidays. Why? Because they’re my parents. They know that I love them without my having to prove it to them by buying them expensive things that I can’t afford anyway just because Hallmark told me to on some random day no less.

Enter my dear (said with extreme sarcasm) mother-in-law. She is throwing a hissy-fit (to put it quite mildly) that we are not worshipping her because this Sunday is Mother’s Day. Yes, that’s right, I said worshipping. A card just won’t do. Nor will a gift (which she will gladly take even though nothing is ever good enough for her and it sure as hell won’t shut her up). We have to worship her. I’m not kidding here. She wants us to drop everything and visit her, which usually involves spending way too much money to indulge her in addition to that whole worshipping part. And that whole being nagged at until I’m-thisclose-to-going-on-a-murderous-rampage-starting-with-you-dear-mother-in-law part. And that whole not being appreciated part. And that whole being criticized part. The list goes on. The sad part is that maybe, just maybe, if she weren’t so busy being such a whiny…ahem…witch…I would have maybe actually visited her (Yeah, maybe when hell freezes over. But hey, I can pretend.). Doesn’t she realize that the more she whines like a 2-year-old, the less likely we are going to cave in and actually the madder it makes us? Apparently not. Of course not. Because she’s got several other kids to bend at her insane will. Well, then, why do you need us? I don’t recall ever agreeing to be her servant when I got married. I swear, this woman thought, “Whoo-hoo! New daughter-in-law = one more “child” for me to push around and extract money from (And she’s going to be a doctor, which means more money for me!) because I’m too lazy to get off my sorry ass and earn a real living.” Well, she never in her wildest dreams imagined that her new daughter-in-law was me, who bristles at the mere thought of being ordered around, let alone by such a woman as her. I’m sure she’s kicking herself everyday because she didn’t push her dear son to marry his psycho-ex, who was psycho, but much, much, much more submissive to her craziness. And we all know that submissive trumps pretty much anything else to these people. I think she only approved of me because psycho-ex was sure as hell not going to be making big bucks and she thought she could put up with me so long as she got her free money out of it. What a big mistake that turned out to be for her. I’m sure I could be an axe-murderer and she would love (If this woman is even capable of love, which I highly doubt. I think it’s more like tolerate and that’s already a stretch for her.) me as long as I submitted to her will. But here I am: a doctor-to-be and she can’t stand me. Well, I can’t stand her either, thank you.

Well, back to the story at hand. I have a strange personality quirk. When someone I have no respect for and who I don’t fear because they are in no position of power tries to make me do something, guess what happens. I do the opposite. I just can’t help it. And if there’s such a thing as less than no respect, that would be what I have for my mother-in-law. So how dare she try to order me to visit her? Not to mention that it is not a trivial trip for us. Besides, who wants to make such a trip, sacrificing valuable peaceful weekend time and money, to see the likes of her? We’re already paying more than enough in taxes to fund her (quite undeserved) Medicaid and welfare and the like. She wants us to waste precious gas money to see her only so she can grab us and shake us by the ankles until all our money falls out? And she wants us to put up with her bitching and give her money? Yeah, right, Lady. Who died and made you the center of the universe?

Now if only my husband were just a fraction as feisty as me (read: if only my husband weren’t brainwashed into being a big mama’s boy), we just might have a peaceful weekend. Well, I guess I can dream. And then watch House. We’ll be snarky together. And then I’ll use the snark on my husband when he tries to guilt me into going to visit his queen-of-the-guilt-trip mom. Yes, what a fun weekend it’ll be. I might as well go get a root canal while I’m at it. Make that two.