Queen Mediocretia of Suburbia

Vindicated!

When Mom was in her late sixties she had a dreadful time finding glasses that suited her. She had her computer glasses, her reading glasses, and her distance glasses. One time she bought glasses and simply couldn't use them. I said she could go get them adjusted but she was not up for it.

I picked up my new glasses yesterday. Simply couldn't use them. They worked for distance, but if I wanted to read something I had to nestle it under my wattle and look down my nose. I gave myself a day to adjust but I had to call the glasses store after four hours. I couldn't find a way to position my computer monitor under my nose. Same went for my dashboard controls, which I noticed as I drove back to the glasses store.

When I walked in I suspected they'd say, "You need give yourself a few days to adjust. Push your glasses up on your nose. Perhaps you need a separate pair of computer glasses."

Nope. Looked at me, looked at their documents, said, "Why these glasses have been made incorrectly." Evidently there is a Seg (?) number to indicate where your progressive lens changes from distance to reading, and my number was entered incorrectly. I had only a tiny slice of reading at the bottom instead of half reading, half distance.

I have never been so overjoyed to discover a company screwed up. In fact, I said, "You screwed up? It's not me? That is SO GREAT." I almost got up and danced about. Instead, I had a very smug conversation with Mom-in-My-Head. "Gotta stand up for yourself, Mom. Don't always assume it's your fault."

I may have been impudent enough to suggest she be more assertive in the future. While she's dead. Just in case there are progressive lenses in heaven.

Seriously, We Didn't Call This LobsterHospice? Really?

These bad boys are going to be dismantled and put in my belly soon with some butter.

 

Once you start a tradition, you have to uphold it.

I am again celebrating my Mom's life and teachings by killing a lobster with my bare hands on the anniversary of her death. I thought Gary might want to participate, but he does not. When I called from work I found he's back on his diet. I'd call it the six-bite diet, but when I got home it seems he'd consumed several pounds of raw vegetables. He's very uncomfortable right now.

When I heard he wasn't participating, I thought, "Well, I'll just go home and have something frozen." And then Mom-in-My-Head roared, "When I have I suggested that it is even remotely acceptable to put an Event on hold because you don't have a man sharing it with you?"

So, both these bad boys are for me and my Mom.

Mom In Three Boxes

Today was the day Mom died three years ago, so today was the deadline I gave myself for getting her files completely sorted, and it is Done.

I put the lid on the last box and announced "Mom is officially dead." Gary said, "Your Mom will never really be gone," and that is true. When I later mentioned I'm $16,000 in the hole for the repairs and upgrades to her house, he said, "See, as long as you're in debt, your Mom will still be with us." So that's a comfort.

There was no LobSlau this year, because the last two have dissolved into me talking about death, and that's not fun. I did, however, mark the anniversary of her death with lobster on Friday night.

We went to Ruby Tuesdays, because we have neglected that chain restaurant for months now, and I ordered the Lobster Carbonara so that still a lobster may die for Mom, even if not by my hand.

I had asked them to go easy on the peas. I had a few bites. It was very light. A fair amount of bacon. Not much lobster. I pulled a forkful up to the light and looked through the strands for lobster. "How do you confuse 'peas' with 'lobster'," I thought.

A manager appeared. "There's no lobster in your carbonara," she announced.

"I was wondering about that!"

"I'm so sorry. The chef was in the kitchen with his hands full of lobster and was all, 'Where is that lobster carbonara? I wasn't done.' But someone had already served it to you."

So I handed it back over. She returned with a heavenly top sauce and loads of lobster and cheese. And, she asked, "Are you having dessert? It's on the house."

Well, yes, now I am. Cheesecake with blackberry sauce. Not, as Gary suggested, lobster sauce.

So, three boxes: one for family history and photos, one for legal files and certificates and misc., one for anything Mom wrote. That's a nice box. I'm keeping that one upstairs

The Mom Time Capsule

The painters at Mom's have been picking off wallpaper with their fingernails, God bless them. (And I am sure God will: this team of two play soft Christian rock while working.) The house is full of sun. All manner of sins have been painted away. You can no longer tell which side of the bed Dad smoked in. You would think the thermostat had always been mounted three feet off the floor. Mirrors are off the walls and you can see layers of paint never seen since the sixties.

And.... the mirror is off the wall in the bathroom and the time capsule Mom left is exposed.

 

The BIG Reveal! Duh Duh Dunnnnnnn.

A button, reading "What's the sense in having a cat if you don't torment it?"

 

A pin, made in New Zealand, which is a native leaf specially treated with silver paint. I imagine I could add a newpaper article about the Christchurch time capsule they found after the earthquake. However, it might make my future homeowners jealous.

 

A bottle opener from Fairbanks Alaska, and the receipt for what the wallpaper in the room cost. (I removed that, because that $1,000 wallpaper is probably off the walls this very evening. Without the wallpaper, that item would be irrelevant. It would clash next to the timely relevance of the other items.)

 

A grocery receipt from 1991.  Cascade $2.99. Is that good? No idea. When this is discovered again, I hope that delights someone.

 

A measuring tape to show the antiquated way we measured things back in 1991.

 

And, finally, something kind of interesting. It isn't from 1991, in fact, I have no idea where this came from. As far as I know, Mom or Dad never went up in the Empire State Building. But yet, here are a bookmark and a souvenir receipt.

 

At one point Tammy, the painter's assistant, found me and asked, "Did you grow up in this house?"

"Yes, since I was 11."

"I found a couple of things pushed in the back of the closet shelves."

One was a Blues hockey ticket from 1971. One seat: $4. That went right into the Time Capsule purse.

The other thing?

You'll have to guess until tomorrow.

More From Mom From Beyond the Grave

I'm sorting through Mom's files, separating the wheat from the chaff.

Chaff: EVERY receipt for EVERY appliance bought since 1959. Toasters long gone. (Old charge card receipts printed the entire charge card number; that was quaint.) She kept a disturbing number of clippings about MS. Plus many articles about keeping your senses as you grow old.

Wheat: Lists of garden plantings, family history, old Christmas newsletters, and an intriguing document Mom wrote titled "History of the House."

She details who built the house (the Kaufmans), who then bought the house ten years later (the Bartes), what trees were planted and removed, all room dimensions, and all repairs.

We are then moved into the house in third person, as "The Davis Family." After a few more paragraphs about roofs and when they were installed, she writes,

"When the Davises removed the red velour flocked wallpaper in the bathroom they discovered this hole in the wall behind the mirror. Margaret" [that would be Mom] "thought 'if somebody had left us a history of this house we would have know about this hole and the plumber could have installed the new shower in half the time.' So she wrote this little history for you. And just in case there are any little kids in the house the next time the wall is papered she gathered up some interesting stuff to leave there for them to find."

What the ... ? She did? I removed that red flocked wallpaper myself, and I'm sure I would have been in on any caper involving time capsules left for future generations, but of this I have no recall at all. 

"...The next time the wall is papered ... " Of course, how could Mom know about the violent wallpaper bigotry that has overcome the civilized world? I now have to remove all the wallpaper I put up to replace the bordello wallpaper. I'll be sure to check in that hole and see what's there.

Pimpin' Out My Mom

I never thought it right that Mom's blog was on Blogspot, and mine was lazing about here in cushy Typepad. I made the decision to get into Mom's blog, export everything, and import it here.

That would have been a great plan if I could still get into Mom's blog. I should have done it just before "Too Soon" gave way to "Forgot Password."

Of course, that also means I can't delete Mom's old blog. It really was a pointless exercise, copying and pasting all Mom's entries. I think I realized that as I was copying and pasting all the old comments. That's when I stopped and realized this is one of those pointless posthumous missions that produces nothing but guilt.

On a related note (get it? "Related?" I typed it and I just now got it) all the in-law posts are back up. They went through my filter, and of course they all passed, but they still need to get Gary's editorial approval.

Oh, and on a truly unrelated note, I want to update my blogroll with one that will show each link's most recent posts. I know you're in the feed reader. "Pah!" you sneer, "Who actually goes to a blog site anymore?" That makes my vain attempt to resurrect my Mom even more pathetic. Screw you, snobby feed person. I'm going to Paris without you.

My Two Dads

Evidently today is the day that Father Ghosts rise up and say, "Stop obsessing about your Mom! We're dead too. Pay attention to us!" 

Evidently, attention must be paid to these men.  Neither is a dead salesman, though, Jerry was a newspaper editor and Dan was a Purchasing Agent.

A recap: here, or in short: 
Mom met Dan.
Mom met Jerry, dumped Dan. 
Mom married Jerry and had me and Dave.
Jerry dumped Mom.
Mom found Dan again.
Mom married Dan, her true love.

Jerry's Bid For Attention Today

The topic of conversation at lunch today was whether or not one is filled with inexpressible love for ones baby the moment it is born. ("That's all bullshit," said my expert.) (That may not be your experience, but don't argue with my expert.) At dinner, I was told Gary we need extra birth control because I can't fall back on the "bullshit" hormonal safety net if case we have an Accident. And then talk turned to men who just never seem to bond with their kids, and then to Jerry, the Technical Father.

"What did Jerry do for a living?" Gary asked.

"When Dave found him he was the City Editor for the McAllister Oklahoma paper. He was also drinking, and living with his Mom."

"I had no idea he sunk so low! You never told me that!" Gary was shocked.

"What? That he was a drunk?"

"No, that he was living with his Mom."

So. Gary Ethics say: puking up Antabuse, fine, living with your Mom, not cool.

Dan's Bid for Attention Today

Here's a sad tale of two sisters who gambled on the lottery for years, had a falling out, then one of them won half a million, and then the other wanted to share. It reminded me of how Dan would bet on the lottery, first he would size up ... (You aren't paying any attention, are you. The sister who bought the ticket got to keep all the money. Okay?)

First, he would size up the blood alcohol level of his bar-mates. If any were drunk enough, Dad would chat him up. "Hey, I was feeling lucky, and I thought I would buy a lottery ticket, but I'm about 20 cents shy. Loan me twenty cents, and I'll give you twenty percent of the winnings." And of course they would "invest," and OF COURSE Dan would have the same conversation with about ten or fifteen people at the bar, always needing just about 20 cents, and by the time Dan had worked the room into a Big Lotto Syndicate, none of whom had ever seen "The Producers," the Lottery drawing would be on and they would all lose. Awwwwww.

That kind of makes Dan sound like a drunken grifter. He wasn't. It's not like he was living with his Mom, at least.

Mom Will Not Shut Up From Beyond the Grave

I went by Mom's bank to transfer the contents of the savings deposit box to a closer branch. I looked in the envelope where "my" savings bonds were stored and found this note, from Mom, beyond the grave.

She started off impersonal and then went straight for the personal.

"I had these changed to remove Dan's name and add Ellen's. 10/91. (You need a death certificate.) They handle it at Boatmen's - no charge. Put Gary's name on as beneficiary - not joint - Ellen L S______ P.O.D. [payable on death - Ed.]  Gary S______.  If Gary isn't around (!) and you are alone it's your call.  M.D [Mom]."

 

Gary - dissed by a dead woman. That's cold.

More From Mom On the Other Side

We found a cookbook in which Mom stored almost all of her old driver's license or ID photos.

So, I bring you

Thirty-two years of Mom

Since obviously she was keeping them so I could step back and prepare myself.

Below: Thirty-two, just divorced. HAPPY smile.

 

A ten year jump to 42. I am not to blame for this photo. Mom experiments with not smiling.

 

Two years later the smile was back

 

In 1985 Drivers License Photo Technology takes a big leap forward. Mom is 49. I'm  currently 47. Evidently in the next two years my chin will tighten up and my eyes will get bigger. Awesome!

At 52. Not smiling has become a requirement. I think this is the year Dad died and Mom retired.

According to the license Mom weighs 110 below. So 53 will be a big weight loss year.

 

Fifty six.

Finally, at 56, Mom begins to resemble me at 47. Smiles are back! Chins are also back. Mom also discovers a way she can style her own hair, even though she can't raise her arms over her waist. Oh, and I can't wait until those glasses are back in style.

Here she is in 1995, at 59.

At 62, you will notice Mom has made a major fashion adjustment. After decades of dressing to hide her tracheotomy scar, she decides her wattle sort of drapes over it and she doesn't need to hide it with high collars. Right now I'm tempted to send this photo to work and combine it with my current face, so I can desensitize Gary for his future.

And here she is in 01, at 65, wearing my shirt.

 

Of course, she died at 71, but she didn't drive the last few years. 

But here, just for you, an extra bonus cartoon she saved!

Crockpot

The Whomp-there-it-is Pork Loin was parceled out in thirds: one third was the ambitious rolled Emmenthal loin. That was a disaster, followed by the less ambitious garlic and rosemary loin, which then was remixed as the reliable Cream of Mushroom simmered pork, which was Fed to the Dog. So, this last third will be slumming it as Crockpot Pulled Pork with Bottled BBQ Sauce.

My crockpot has never been used to cook something while I'm out of the house, because, Mom asks, do you want the house to burn down when you're at work?  (Sorry, Shania.) No, I don't. So I do my crockpot cooking rarely and on the weekend.

But the thick hunk of loin was still rock hard on Sunday morning that's what she said, and after you cook one even partially-frozen turkey you don't make that mistake twice. But waiting for a full refrigerator thaw would put me out to the beginning of the week.

"Other people use their crock pots during the day," I thought. Then I noticed the Ghost of Mom by my elbow. "Buuuut - I would NEVER leave the house when any appliance was on."

"Good girl," Mom said. "Now get your hair out of your eyes."

"Wait -  I bet I could turn the crock pot on at ten p.m., then have it cook while I sleep!"

"Sure," she said. "Do that. It'll be nice to see you again. Of course, you'll have burned to death in your sleep, at least. Don't think I didn't see you leave the room when you made that PieCake earlier tonight."

"I think I'll be okay cooking it at night. I've leaving this in the fridge until it thaws, then I'll cook it tomorrow night."

"Well, that's just crazy. By the way, you haven't sold my house yet? How hard is that? It's not like I made you skate in the Olympics the week after I died."

Breaking News: Queen Mum is Still Dead

Sigh. For those in mourning, the countdown to the two-year anniversary of a parent's death is when you step back and say, as I did at lunch, "Shit. That was hard. But it's ov - "

Over? No, it's not. But miserable though it was, I don't want it to be over. There are stacks.

Stack #1
A stack of Mom's letters has moved like a glacier from the top of my closet to the top of my sewing box. The letters on the very top are to us kids from my Technical Grandparents and refer to me as "Em."  Ellen Marie. Never caught on.

The next set down in the stack are letters from Mom to the Tech. Grandparents. The top one of those caught my eye this morning and I peeled off the others to peek at it. "This will be the last personal letter I write to you," and then she goes on to say, and I paraphrase, "I'm tired of you telling me I have to work on this marriage and an affair isn't really that meaningful and I tried and he didn't." I didn't read any more.

I hadn't read the stack up till now because the stack is finite, and when I've read it all there will be no more of Mom's letters to read. Now I don't want to read the stack because I'll go through her pain vicariously, which you all know is the real reason I didn't have children.

Stack #2
Dave's coming out Tuesday to truck the living room and office furniture back to New Mexico. (And I did say, "See you next Tuesday!" last time he called. He guffawed.) The files had to come out of the office file cabinet, and those all sitting on my kitchen table, waiting to be culled through. Mostly taxes, receipts, every warranty for every purchase, with some interesting treasures. Dizzy Dean's photo autographed for my Dad. Dozens of family photos. And an "Ellen-young" "Ellen-teen" and "Ellen-adult" file.

Stack #3
Mom cleared hundreds of books out of her house in the years before she died. So any book that's still there must have some great importance, right? I didn't realize that until we moved books out of the office bookcase and I almost tossed The Essential Earthman - THE ANNOTATED Essential Earthman. Mine Mine Mine, as are all other books all mine.

Sadly, I have to negotiate space for these stacks with Gary. I know, he's trying to keep me off the hoarding path. But when all the stacks are gone, done are all one-sided conversations with Mom. And you know how I love one-sided conversations.

Goldbugs

A few weeks ago I went to my Work Father-in-law's funeral. Or, alternatively, the man at work who is my "Work Husband" suffered the loss of his father, and I went to the funeral. It came up that both the father and the mother attended my Mom's high school, McKinley High.  I got Mom's yearbooks from my closet so I could take them to work.

The yearbook was the "Nugget." Because President McKinley ran on the gold standard, McKinley students were the "Goldbugs" and the yearbook was the "Nugget." I mean, that's just freaking weird. Like, "Hi, we're the Nixon 'Burglars', and this is our yearbook the 'Scandal.'"

I didn't look too closely, but of the yearbooks ('50 to '54),  two were covered with signatures. "Did she graduate twice?" I wondered.

When I got them to work and Work Husband and I were searching for his Mom, we realized that the first signature-covered yearbook didn't belong to Mom, but her older sister Delores. That's Delores who died in the car accident heading to visit Mom at Mizzou.

So, it was my dead aunt's yearbook! And, even better, Work Husband's mom had signed it.

"Delores - Loads of Luck! I wish you the best in your future endeavors. Love, Dot."

Sadly, Dot is dead herself, so Work Husband can't go home and present his Mom with her faux pas. "Look! You signed this woman's yearbook 'Loads of Luck' and then she DIED the next year."

Photo of Mom

This is currently my favorite photo of Mom:

It was taken the Christmas after she got polio. I don't know what she was actually looking at, but it certainly seems she's looking at her future.

Some days I look at her and she seems resigned but heroic: some days she looks pissed. "Bring it, future," she says, "I'll kick your ass."

"The I Hate to Cook Book" Nostalgia

When I was in going through my recent ill-guided fusion cooking phase, I was at the grocery looking for shallots. "Wait," I thought, "Can't I just use green onions? That was in Mom's I Hate to Cook Book. Shallots are just a fancy name for green onions."

Well, no, scallions  are just a fancy name for green onions, and that helps explain why I had so little success with the fusion cooking, but it reminded me of how much I retained from Peg Bracken's I Hate to Cook Book.

I'm bringing it up in particular tonight because Meryl Streep just commented on Colbert that her Mom did not have Mastering the Art of French Cooking, but she did have The I Hate to Cook Book. My Mom had both cookbooks. I was always involved in Mom's French Cooking experiments because the books were too heavy for her to take out of the bookcase.

In fact, last weekend I used Volume 1 to investigate why my Beef Wellington sucked so much. (Beef Wellington is made with brioche, not frozen puff pastry. I'd made the Julia Child version once and it was indeed fabulous., I'd also used the same book to make French puff pastry from scratch the same weekend - I think I merged the two memories.)

After a little research I found these illustrations. This took me back.

 

I might have Mom's Mastering the Art of French Cooking, but I don't know where her I Hate to Cook Book went. (She purged a lot. "Less for the dumpster you'll park out front WHEN I DIE.") Thanks to Amazon one-click, I know have some one else's Mom's I Hate to Cook Book.

Another Visitation

There was a booksale at TeddyJ today. I donated a sack of books Gary culled from our house. All of it crap: Tom Clancy, The DaVinci Code, John Grisham.

Later, Friend 3 and I were poking around the books, when a mutual friend, Steve, came by with The DaVinci Code in hand.

"Hey, I donated that book," I said, suddenly all proud of The DaVinci Code, as if it were an obscure piece of fiction I had donated. It might not have even been my copy.

Steve began thumbing through it. He stopped at the first page and said, "Someone wrote in this book."

"What's it say?" Friend 3 asked.

"'This book is an albatross around the neck of Margaret Davis.'"

"Mom!" I squealed, and grabbed the book back from Steve, who then insisted I pay for it.

I had forgotten we demanded Mom read The DaVinci Code. She read it under duress, and annotated it accordingly (annotations listed below).

She illustrated the frontispiece:

 

(I think that's Gary being crushed by the poor house. The uh ... Scaiydt poor house. Or perhaps it's me, what with the boobs and all. If I remember our crime was buying her her own copy instead of waiting for Hot Mom to return ours.)

This is Mom's comment on the last page:

 

And in between there are these annotations:

The Hate begins

Suspicion

Polio commentary(the blurry comment is "Kee-rist.")

Bored

Mary Magdalene

More polio commentary

Gratuitous sex scene

Mirror writing

Plot hole 

Overkill

Mom learns a new word

Alanis Morrissette

Mom learns another new word

It does get pretty lame near the end [SPOILER]

Proof They Have Computer Access in Heaven

I was avoiding Mom's taxes because Turbo Tax would ask if the person these taxes were for was deceased.

This is the screen you get after you click "Yes."

T-Minus 10

This is grim. I had a grim little epiphany sometime this weekend.

My grandmother Lucille (Granceil) had three children, Jimmy, Delores, and Mom.

Jimmy

I could post a photo of Jimmy, but you wouldn't believe it - he was a perfect, curly- haired tow-headed boy. The photo of him as a toddler in the thirties looks like an advertisement. When he was five he got scarlet fever and Granceil was told she had to put him in the children's Quarantine hospital. 

On his death certificate a month laster, the doctor listed: "scarlet fever, measles, mumps, chicken pox, rubella, whooping cough." When Granceil asked why so many illnesses were listed, the doctor told her Jimmy caught all those other diseases in the hospital, and he might have lived if he'd been allowed to stay at home. 

Margaret (Mom)

A few years after Jimmy died Granceil had Delores and then two years after that, Mom. Mom got polio when she was 13, in 1947. The doctors explained to Granceil that it was quite possible that Mom's immune system was too weak to fight off the polio virus because Granceil was very clean, and specifically, "washed the grapes."

Delores

Delores, Mom's slightly older sister, was a poor replacement for Jimmy from the day she was born. She sassed, she disobeyed, she grew up to have boobs and boyfriends and an abortion. At 19, she and "Aunt" Carleen drove to visit Mom during her second year at Columbia. It was raining, and her car spun out of control on Hwy 40. Carleen survived, but Delores was thrown from the car, hit her head on a milepost and died instantly. While the doctors did not place the blame for this one on her, Granceil still felt responsible.

Then, after all that, Granceil started taking in foster children during the next ten years, until her daughter and grandkids arrived from Houston after Mom's divorce. I asked Mom why Granceil would want to take in foster kids; she said she thought Granceil wanted to get it "right" at least once.

So, if anyone asks why I don't have children, I can point them back to family history. We can't be trusted with them.

Chapter One: I Am Born

I thought I'd told everyone the extended version of the first anecdote of my life: In Which I Am Born With an Extra Thumb. Strangely, I can't find it out there. So here it is.

===============================================

Mom, having had a child already, was all too happy to get the heavy-duty drugs when I arrived. I don't know what they gave her, but she was unconscious when I evidently frog-crawled my way out of her vagina.

Later, she came to just as the doctor was entering the room. The doctor assumed since I had been born hours earlier, Mom had woken up, seen me, counted the fingers and toes, freaked out, dismissed me, then gone to sleep again.

Unbeknownst to him, Mom had been sleeping off the drugs for hours, and hadn't seen me. Mom's side of the story was that he woke her up and said, "Well, congratulations on your baby girl. She looks healthy. Seven pounds. You have two children now, that should keep you busy. Well, we'll talk again in a few weeks. Bye for now." Then he left.

Then, Mom says, he stuck his head back in the door and said, "Oh, and don't worry about that extra thumb." Then he left for good.

Then Mom freaked out. Mom called the nurse to have me brought in so she could number my digits, since I'd already been weighed and measured.  While they were fetching me, Mom called my Grandmother.

Granceil said, "Well, you know your cousin had twelve toes AND a tail."

(I don't know if that made Mom feel any better. When Mom would tell that part of the story I always felt a little inadequate, as if, Damn, I should have had a tail, too.)

This is the only photo in which Mom was unable to hide the freak thumb:

You can't count everything on that hand, but know that the digit closest to my belly button is not supposed to look like that.

When I was sitting up on my own, some doctor resolved the situation with a big pair of scissors.

In  about sixth grade I realized I had never been able to bend that thumb, then I put my hands together:

And realized that damn, I have wrinkly old hands for a sixth-grader. No. I looked at the scar and the bump placement and realized they took off the real thumb and left me with the freak stump thumb.

Of course, if they'd taken off the Freak Thumb, I'd have been unable to close my hand without pressing on that little ganglion left over from the nerve for the amputated thumb. Bumping that thing causes me sickening pain. It's my Achilles Thumb.

Observed in Our Living Room and Kitchen

Scene: Expanded "Great room / eating area / kitchen" area in our almost-paid-off starter house. (------->)
Mom's leftover remaining remains are on top of the fridge.

Gary complained from the kitchen, "The only place to put these snacks is on top of the fridge, and that's where your Mom is."
I answered from the couch in the living room, "Then you can't put them there."
"What if I move your Mom?"
"No!"
"She could go on top of the bookcase by the couch."
"No! It's too soon."
Gary picked up Mom's remains box and said, "I'm moving her."
"No! You put Mom back!"
Gary placed Mom on top of bookcase and soothed, "There she is. She'll be fine there." Then he slipped and only avoided falling by catching himself on the couch. "Shit!"
"Really?"
"Shit and pee." Then he added, "Your Mom just laughed at that."

How cute is this?

I was looking through Mom's old writings.

 

 

 

1. What struck me at first was that she signed it "Marge" instead of Margaret. In 1956, Mom was 20.

 

2. This particular short story was a narrative of how she and her roommate Nanci murdered their housemother.

 

3. Interestingly, she experimented a little with Margi. Note the classic circle / dot over the i.

4.Margee.

5.Margi. (Sans dot.)

6.Margye.

 

 

7. - 8. She evaluates Margye versus Margi.

 

 

 

Clearly, Margi (sans dot) wins, because that became her byline in college, plus it's the one she circled on the Margee / Margi / Margye test run.

(Ellen / Ellyn / L.N. / Ehlyn)

(New college-era post from the great beyond at Mom's blog!)

Post-its From the Great Beyond

The day began with a huge fight with Gary. It's my fault, I'll often find that I'll work something out in my head, make a decision, then Gary will submit to me all the same arguments I had worked through, and it's frustrating, because shut up, shut up! I already thought that out. Just do what I say. (Bongo! No talk back to Missy.)

My thoughts had been: "Bring more stuff from Mom's. Uh-oh. No room here. Purge stuff from here. Then bring stuff from Mom's."

Gary's response was "Your Mom is dead! We have no room for her in our life!" except the actual words he used were, "Stuff means furniture! I like our furniture! You want to throw out all our furniture in favor of your Mom's furniture!" But I knew what he really meant.

Anyway, after much crying and consoling and shortcake at Bob Evan's we went to pick up some remaining tiny microscopic knick-knacks and writings from Mom's house. And it was fun, because I kept finding notes from Mom.

In the china cabinet where she kept Great-Aunt Rosemary's painted china I found a letter from Rosemary talking about how she'd worked to get china painting classified as art instead of decor. "Why I didn't know that, Mom. Thanks! And thanks for putting it right by the china."

In the den, attached to the top of the 1950's shoe shine box was an ad from Organized Living with a reproduction box on sale for $35. Good to know, Mom. Thanks.

But the best part was when I found an old issue of Life with this note:

"Page 145 Life
Great Photos of the Century
Life photographer Bill Eppridge took the stark wedding photos in Nov. 1958 of our marriage."

"Who is Bill Eppridge?" I wondered, and turned to page 145, and saw some photos of heroin addicts. "Cool," thought I, "She and Jerry must have met him in Journalism school." As it turns out that is true. Or at least he went to Mizzou, graduated two years behind Mom and a few years before he started covering Bobby Kennedy for Life and took this photo:

But I didn't know that until I googled him tonight. Before tonight the only Bill Eppridge photos I knew were Mom and Jerry's wedding photos:

 

The one above was my grandmother's favorite. Jerry's worried about the bags under his eyes, and Mom has this great "I'm gonna get laid!" smile in the mirror, but Grandceil particularly enjoyed teasing Mom about the great vat of Vaseline in the back corner of the suitcase. (Click for expanditure!)

I'm sure it's that eye for detail that made Bill Eppridge a famous artist.

I Smell Like Chanel

Since the Mom Death File Instructions specify that we let her friends take something from the house to remember her by, Dave and I have been hoarding heirlooms before the MomFest on Saturday. (We don't know what to call it; there's no service, so it isn't a memorial service. It isn't a visitation or a viewing. Frankly, it's a party in memory of Mom. I'm thinking of using "wake.")

I wanted to liberate her can opener, but Dave protested he had just bought some chili and needed to be able to get to it. I tagged the balsa-wood Christmas tree and the Dickens. We were rooting through her drawers (since you never know WHAT people will want to remember her by) and I found an old bottle of Chanel No. 5.

It's old, so you know it's got tortured civet in it.

I put some on. It smells like velvet and powder, not civets or ylang ylang. I tried to think of why, and I realized it smells like Mom going to the Purchasing Agents Dance in her green velvet dress.

I don't recall Mom wearing perfume on a regular basis. For one of their early anniversaries, my Dad bought her a perfume obelisk. I don't know what else to call it. A perfume reliquary? I tried to find it on Google Images.

It looked a little like these, if these were 8 inches tall:

...only Mom's wasn't as tasteful. I can't even call it Mom's, it was Dad's, and you could tell because behind the outrageous gilding, inside the crystal chamber, there was a naked gilt lady holding up the vial that contained the dauber and the perfume. How gaudy was it? I, a ten-year old, thought it was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen.

Mom thought it was so "lovely" she put it on the back of the toilet tank. Since it was top-heavy - "ours" was the size of the one on the left, but it stood on a base about the size of the gilt flower on top - I think Mom hoped it would fall off.

Of course, now I want it. I have no idea where it is.

Bad News, Good News

Bad news:
Arthur C. Clarke is dead

Good news:
...dead, at NINETY ...
...after suffering from POST-POLIO SYNDROME (like Mom) ...
...which he has suffered with since the SIXTIES!

By my calculations, this means Mom has another twenty, thirty years in her.

(This news was so great I kept it to myself for a day, somehow forgetting to push the "Publish" button.)

The Lunch Table Turns

The Queen Mother found herself sandwiched by doctor's appointments today. The lung doctor at 1:30, GP at 10 and no food for 12 hours beforehand. So at lunch she was hungry enough to take the step of dining out in public.

Mom's dined out in public before of course, but not since her arms went into their current decline. Mom's food habits recently have been limited by what she can get into her mouth without lifting her arms. Lately on the weekends she gets to eat what she wants because I've been feeding it to her at home.

So Mom was hungry enough that I said, "Applebee's. Quesadilla?" and she was up for it.

And it worked out really well. I sat on Mom's right, I ate my food with my right hand, and held a triangle of quesadilla in my left I just casually held it as if it were a highball, then I looked off into space absently while Mom leaned in and gnawed on the quesadilla.

At one point Mom lost contact with a diced tomato bit and it landed on the table. I kept the quesadilla hovering with my left hand and nabbed the bit with my right. Then I ate it.

Mom called me a scavenger fish and a bottom feeder.

I pulled the quesadilla away the next time she leaned in.

Her eyes narrowed. "I could bite you," she whispered. Then she demanded my French fries. I could tell I might lose a finger so I gave them to her.

It was a nice moment.

Mom Brushes Her Teeth

Mom let me watch her as she brushed her teeth today. For future reference in case one ever has limited use of ones arms:

1. Design an Arm Prop (patent pending) made of an inverted new toilet plunger sawed in half and affixed to a stand, so.

2. Hold electric toothbrush in right hand and use  recoil properties of a sudden shoulder jerk to elevate right elbow into rubber cup of plunger.

3. Take left hand and unscrew toothpaste cap.

4. Astonish your daughter who is expecting you to squeeze toothpaste into the sink but NO, instead bend down and squeeze toothpaste into your mouth.

5. Rub toothpaste on teeth with tongue.

6.  Lower teeth onto electric toothbrush and run each tooth over the toothbrush.

7. After cleaning teeth, heartlessly drop electric toothbrush directly into sink.

8. Butt head against faucet to turn it off.

I swear to everyone, I asked if she wanted me to help her brush her teeth. This is why I was so disgusted that night when Gary whined, "But I need you to help me wrap the presents."

The Haul

In honor of the season and her sturdy teeth, I bought the Queen Mother some candy for Christmas.

I also got her a book with large print, in honor of her literacy and poor eyesight.

Then, in May when we had encountered armadillos in Memphis on the way to the BNL concert, she told us of a basket she'd seen made of an armadillo's shell and had not purchased. So she got this.

Then, a week ago, she said this sentence:

"I'm trying to get rid of things like candy dishes. I have enough crap in my house, and I don't eat candy anymore."

"Oh ... how do you feel about reading?"

Because I figured the candy and the armadillo wouldn't go over, she also got this:

Only because I dimly remembered she likes ONE Screaming Jay song (I Put a Spell On You) which he helpfully puts on every single one of his albums.

And when I realized she really had no use for that, I broke down and got her this profoundly functional and boring item:

(And she was very gracious and thanked me for every gift. I have raised her well.)

Mom Meets Manbitch

I was driving Queen Mom about this afternoon, having taken a half-vacation day, and who pulls up beside us and honks but Manbitch?

We rolled down our respective windows and after some pleasantries, I gestured to Mom and introduced her.

Mom leaned forward and yelled across to Manbitch:

"She is so mean to me!" (Pause for laughter) "She mistreats me!" (Pause for more laughter) "Tell everyone you know!"

And then we drove away.

In Which the Queen Mother Teaches Me About My Heritage

Previously: I refer in the last post to my German Grandmother, Granceil DeWolfe.

My Mom slaps me down in the comments:
"Your grandmother is French. Gary's people are German. Remember she sang the French national anthem to you? Would a Kraut know it? "

I respond:
"Dear Queen Mother -
Are you on crack? Are you a crack mom? Because was her name not DeWolfe? It was not LeWolfe."

Caroline decides to step between me and my Mom:
"De = of in French. So she is "of the Wolves."

Yeah. We are wolf people. Mom and I ignore Caroline, and when I picked Mom up for her eye doctor appointment today, it was ON.

Mom sighed in her pointed Mom Way and said, almost immediately, "French. French Huguenots. Landed Gentry. Learn your facts."

"No, Mom, seriously, I know they were German. That was the family story, how they got their name, some ancestor saved some nobleman from a wolf and --"

(Im sorry if I'm a little incoherent. I;'m tyiping as fast as I can because I bet right now Mom is putting her version of this onto her blog.)

"No," Mom bridled, "Le Loup. Le Loup. French."

"What's with this 'Loop' stuff? DeWolfe! German!"

"French! You question me? You dare to question me?" She rose up and I cringed under her five-foot-two frame.  "It's in the Harding book. We will discuss it when we get back from the ophthalmologist."

I further enraged her during the visit to the eye doctor by referring to my Granceil's fur coat as "Beaver fu-"
"Seal! Seal fur!" she cried, exasperated.

Well, we got back from the eye doctor with a cataract diagnosis and skipped that trivial news by getting right into the German/French debate. "Get the book!"

The book is Florence Harding, a nice thick biography of the "scandalous" former first lady, which is of special interest to our family because a good part of Flo's early years were devoted to her first marriage to impregnation by "Petey" DeWolfe (Granceil's half-uncle) and his snobbish father Simon, who I suppose is my great-great grandfather. I skimmed the index entries and found a spot that said Florence WAS from FRENCH HUGUENOT  descent.

"There you have it! It was Florence, not the De Wolfes, who was French -"

Mom's eyes blazed. Really, she's just like Godzilla with the tiny arms and the blazing death ray eyes.

"Do you WANT me to FIND it? Do you want YOUR Mother with her DILATED CATARACT-RIDDEN eyes to PORE over this book and find the passage that SAYS Simon was French? Because I WILL DO IT."

"Well maybe Simon was French Huguenot too. Maybe that's what he and Florence had in common," I snickered.

Well, in case you couldn't see it coming, page 23 states quite clearly that Simon  was from "a distinguished Huguenot family." so...

"Still, Mom, how could he be French with a German name? She wasn't Granceil Le Loup."

She directed me to the family genealogy, which I started quoting gleefully. "A great favorite of the Emperor of GERMANY!", extreme emphasis on "GERMANY!" to the point of bellowing it. I read backwards until I got to 1427. FOURTEEN TWENTY-SEVEN, when one of the Damn De La Loups followed Princess Matilda to the German court after her marriage and he Germanized his name. Bastard. Traitor bastard. Traitor bastard causing friction almost 600 years later. If he had kept his name I would have known we were French.

I need to stop being stubborn and rational and get more emotional, obviously, now that I am French. (And given that the above geneology came from "Israel De Wolfe," I need to investigate the possibility that we were actually the DeWolfe-Cohens at one point.) And, as a Huguenot, I need to re-think this marriage to the Catholic Persecutor.

In Which we Live the Life of Our Mom

When I was young, but still old enough to attend to myself in the hours after school but before my parents came home, Mom would come home and ask:

"What did you do this afternoon?"
"Nothing."
"You must have done something."
"I watched TV."
"Oh." (pause) "I mean, what productive thing did you do today?"

She got it from her German Mom, she says, and now that she's retired and not well, she has to spend a good deal of time not producing.

I thought of Mom Saturday when I slept till noon, got up, surfed the 'net, took a nap, watched TV, read my book, painted my toenails, and watched Some Like It Hot from beginning to end. (Which, funny movie, no? You think you've seen it? No. You haven't seen it beginning to end in one block. You've seen bits of it between shows and on the Academy Awards. It kills.)

I had a completely unproductive day.

I ignored my list of Stuff To Do.

I wasn't sure how to feel about it.

So today I took another day off. I took off because Gary, in an unprecedented move, got so sick he couldn't go in to work. Usually he is at least healthy enough to whine "I neeeeed asssspirin. Where's my sooooda? Ellen, I left my glasses in the other room, and now I'm in beeeeed..."  So I schlep and carry and get verbally abused because there is an unwritten S______ law that if you are sick you get to be as big an ass as you can. (Oh. OH. And I go to Walgreen's to get bendy straws. NOT the regular straws. BENDY straws. I'll never forget that episode.)

Anyway, oddly, he slept all day and all I did was to transfer his laundry from the washer to the dryer. And slept. I'd wake up, he was asleep. So I slept, and maybe surfed a little, and thought, I can wear my blue pants tomorrow, those are clean. Why iron? And I think I like this unproductive life.

Mom called toward the end of the Wasted Day of Unproductivity. I thought it was because her Mom Senses could tell I was wasting my time, but after I hung up and turned on the TV I realized the Republican National Debate WAS ON AND SHE WAS CALLING TO CHECK IF I WAS DRUNK. Hah! Well, played, Queen Mother, well played.

Mom

Here's a photo of my Mom:

She's standing behind a bank of pink surprise lilies in her garden. We love the surprise lilies because they arrive early summer, they bloom, you heartlessly mow them down, and they bloom again on the week of our birthdays.

Mom taught me how to garden. Even, better, she taught me how to cope. I've been in the vicinity of a number of Moms lately, with teenagers, and they don't teach their teenagers how to cope. So the teenagers drink, or smoke, or cut, or starve. My Mom, on the other hand, has had a lifetime of coping with adversity, and she does it better than anyone.

So, she taught me how to garden, and how to cope, and if you know those two things you can rule the world. I'm very lucky to have this mother. Thanks, Mom! I love you.

In Which I Am Profane

Yes, this is the post that has the profanity. It is not my profanity. (That would be this post.)

Sharp as a Tack!

Mom proved her brilliance and superior memory today. She remembered a game/parlor trick we used to play in my youth. It was called Black Magic, and evidently I was adept at it. I can not remember a thing about it. Mom remembered the rules and sloooowly explained them to me. I kept thinking, "This must have been your other daughter, the illegitimate one you had that summer you were a groupie with Eddie Fisher."** Then she got up and slapped "Black magic game" into Wikipedia and here it is. Amaze your friends. I still don't remember a bit of it.

**Sarcasm.

I Have a Secret! Whoops, Now I Don't!

So, there's this new guy at work. Let's call him Non-creepy New Guy.

He was explaining his college career, and in the course of his college history said, "And then, when I became a Mason -"

"A Mason?" I squealed in delight.
"Yeah."
"Like a Secret-society-special-handshake-also-known-as-the-Illuminati MASON?"
"No. The Illuminati? Are you serious?"

And then he set me straight on the Masons. Actually, I already knew the Masons were good. But they really are shooting themselves in the foot with the pseudo-secret aspects of their organization. And of course, that's what I kept riding the New Guy about.

Eventually he tired of me.
"I've said too much," he grumbled. Then there was a long pause. "Masons are GOOD!" he muttered, but I heard him.

Well, the Master Architect must have been greatly amused, because as I related this conversation to Mom this weekend, Mom said:

"Well, I think your Grandpa Ray was a Mason. My sister was in Job's Daughters. And your Grandmother was in some Eastern Star thing ... The Sisterhood of the Easter Star? Something like that."
"It can't be Job's Daughters," I said to Mom, confident that I know everything, "That's like a Jehovah's Witness thing."

Well, Mom should have pinkie bet me, because of course we went to Wikipedia and found ... that I have Mason blood! Of course! Who has every copy of the Big Secrets books? Who loves a good secret handshake? Who was born to be a Worthy Matron in the Order of the Eastern Star? Me! Me!

Sadly, the Mason Way was not the path Mom's family took. Even though it appears Step-Grandpa Ray must have made it to Master Mason status, he was ill-equipped to be a Mason at heart, given he was one of the most selfish men ever to walk the face of the earth. ("Three meals a day and snacks at night!" - Granceil.)

Also, Granceil was evidently not suited to be a good Matron Mason, because as Mom described it, "Oh, the way she would roll those dark eyes, and they would flash, and she would say, 'Horseshit!' She thought the whole thing was stupid. And Delores didn't like anything."
"Why didn't you get to be in Job's Daughter's Mom, if Delores was?"
Mom made a face, which at first I didn't recognize, because I don't often see Mom affect the faux "Pity me! I'm a cripple!" face.
"Tooo fraiiiillll" she whined, and rolled her dark eyes.

Well, I wouldn't become a Freemason now if you went down on your lousy stinking purulent knees and begged me.  And, just in case this put you in the mood for the Monty Python Architect Sketch, click here.

Christmas Newsletters

I don't send Christmas cards, and after years of this anti-social behavior I don't get Christmas cards either. I certainly don't send out a Christmas newsletter, but I love getting them and reading them. "Our youngest, Amy, has proved to be a challenge, but we are sure she soon will find as much success in school as her older siblings." You think, "My God what did Amy do this year that no one can find a kind word to say about her?"

After Mom's kids were grown she starting sending out a Christmas newsletter, in inimitable Queen Mother fashion. This is her newsletter from 1997:

It has been an eventful year.

In January David flew from Albuquerque to meet a woman he had been visiting with via the Internet. They liked what they saw and were married within the week. They settled down in Steelville.

At some point lightning struck their trailer and fried all Dave's media and electronic stuff as well as his computer. He then took a hard look at his surroundings and with his wife's encouragement departed from the silent scenic Ozarks for the fast track here in St. Louis.

As luck would have it I had shattered my right upper arm, elbow and wrist in March and thought it might not be a bad idea for Dave to hang out here. He agreed, so we fixed a little apartment in the room behind the garage and we got all his media repaired, replaced, and humming again. He finally settled down enough to get divorced and on Dec. 23 got that over with.

On another note my dearest friend and mother-in-law died in September. Her mind was bright as a penny up to the end, when her 92 year old body failed her. She wasn't here to share my concerns when Ellen was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis.

"STOP!" you say. "This is the most discouraging, depressing letter for anyone to send out at the most joyful time of year." Well, you could imagine that if you didn't know better. Actually, both my kids have been there for me in ways I would never have dreamed possible. David is just the most handy person I  ever have lived with. He can fix plumbing, electrical things, empty gutters, caulk, shop, cook, and clean. The list is endless. And Ellen ... "

(Edited to fit your screen.)

I am proud to say that people always crack up when they get to the part about my MS. You did too, didn't you? It's okay.

I'm not having the best month so far, myself, nor is Mom. I think what I need is just one more little thing to push it over the edge into hilarity...

Don't Rain On My Tirade

So I was puttering about Queen Mom's Northern estate today, talking about Gary, and I of course used the word "tirade." In a sentence. As in:

"Gary started off on a tirade about - "
"TI-rade," Mom said.
"I said that."
"No, you said tiRADE. As if it rhymed with parade."

I remembered when Michael D_____ and I were dating, and he said something was "banal." He pronounced it "BAYnull." "Bah-NAHL, darling," we corrected him. Nope, turns out both are correct.

That is why the first thing I did when I got home was look up tirade, and luckily for me both pronunciations are acceptable.

However, I would never gloat about mispronunciations, especially to the Queen Mother, because she witnessed the Unfortunate Incident Occurring on My Twentieth Birthday.

For my twentieth birthday, I went to see some friends of my Mom, because I was just THAT popular, and on the way home she asked what I thought of Carolyn's house.

"I liked the inside," I mused, "but I didn't like the fuk-aid."
"The what?" Mom asked.
"The fuk-aid, Muthuuurrrr," I sighed, and if you took my picture at that moment you could put it right next to bershon in the Urban Dictionary.
"I have never heard that word. Spell it," Mom demanded.
I sighed. My god, she went to college, how is it she doesn't know anything? "F-a-c-a-d-e," I spelled.

And  that is why I bow to my Mom in all things pronunciational.

Queen Mom Falls for It

After refusing to allow a link from my blog to hers, Queen Mother has given in.

She claims she refused me a link because she thought I might be embarrassed. I didn't tell her, but when the waitresses at Ozzie's Sports Bar and Restaurant tried to embarrass me on me birthday I got up on the chair and yelled to the diners, "HEY! EVERYBODY! IT'S MY BIRTHDAY AND THESE PEOPLE ARE TRYING TO EMBARRASS ME!"

So, check out my mom's blog! Queen Mum's Blog on the links on the left, or http://royaldynasty.blogspot.com/

Queen Mother Again Cheats Death!

Last time I was at the Queen Mother's residence, I wanted to turn off her printer. I no longer mess with finding the on/off switch for any appliance (she waved dismissively); I just yank the plug out of the socket. In this case, the plug was on a power strip, so that threw me. Next time I shall just yank the entire strip out of the wall, because what I found was terrifying. I truly haven't been able to speak of it till now.

In trying to find the right plug I touched them all. One of the plugs was the type that looks more like a box than a plug. It was an adapter. And it was melted, people, melted! Melted like a block of butter in a microwave. Luckily I didn't touch the part that was completely liquefied. Luckily, I did not curse. (Mom was right there. Can't.) So I yanked the entire scorched surge protector out of the wall and dropped it into the brass trash can. Mom reports the adapter continued to melt and then adhered to the can.

(Actually, I find this an example of quick thinking on my part, unlike the last time I touched a plug. I began pulling my blow dryer plug out of the wall with wet hands and thought (this is word for word): "Huh. That's a funny sensation. Weird, it stops when I take my hand away from the plug. Huh. You know what it feels like? It feels just like when I was in Jr. High Science and the teacher gave us an electric shock in our module on Electricity. Maybe it's an MS thing, like Lhermitte's sign. No, that's in the spine. Hey, this is an electrical plug, MAYBE SOMETHING IS WRONG WITH IT...AAAAAGGH!")

So, as is our wont, Mom and I dealt with the scary situation by fantasizing how much worse it could have been. Mom pointed out that since she'd had me take down all the smoke detectors because they were making tiresome shrieking noises and she couldn't turn them off that she would not have been awakened if there had been an electrical fire. (She got away with this by telling me the respirator she sleeps with would have drowned out the sound of a smoke detector.)

Then she was a little let down because she remembered electrical fires don't cause flames, but lots of acrid smoke. And then I pointed out that since she sleeps with a respirator maybe she wouldn't experience even the acrid smoke. This was untenable. The goal of the fantasizing is to comfort ourselves that Death, it was cheated.

Then I pointed out that the respirator pulls in air from the room, and it was possible the filter might even take out all the acrid from the smoke. Completely the wrong move. Mom looked at me as if to say "Did I not teach you how to play this game?"

I cheered her up by telling her that the last time I spent the night (after her fall) I found the noise of her respirator to be immensely comforting, because it was proof she was still alive. Of course, sometime that night I realized the sound of the respirator meant nothing, she could have died in her sleep from kidney failure and how would I know? I was listening to the respirator breathe, not listening to Mom breathe. I could have let her sleep till noon the next day, all cold and dead and blowing up like a bellows. I told Mom that. She loved it.

The Queen Mom's Birthday

A few notable things happened on the Queen Mother's birthday:

1) She got a card from a friend showing an old lady in a crown and caftan with a caption something like "Queen for a Day", which the friend amended to ready "Queen Mother for a day  ever."

2) She got another card which presented one woman saying to another: "Bitch. She only has two chins." I found this particularly amusing since I have always had a second chin. I think when they "corrected" my double thumb my body compensated by growing a double chin.

3) She did not understand the present I gave her for a full two minutes. It was a set of all the Michael Apted Up Documentaries - in which he follows a group of British kids and re-visits them every seven years.

"The Up Series." (Blank look.)
"Yeah, Mom. You know...Seven Up?"
"7-Up?"
"21 Up ... the last one we saw was 35 Up..."
"Oooooohhhhh." Polite but still baffled.
"The little boy who wanted to be a jockey, but then [SPOILER ALERT!] he was too big to be a jockey, and that one guy who became homeless - "

Finally she got it. I was a little worried. When you see something every SEVEN YEARS SINCE 1977 you would think a person would remember it. I've always heard it was the short-term memory that is the first to go, but evidently not.

Well then, just in case, Mom - don't forget today's my birthday!

Birthday Week

When we were first married, one of the many (Many. MA-NY.) things Gary and I had to work through was the birthday issue. My family celebrates one's birthday, remarkably, on the day one was born.  The in-laws like to play around with which day shall be the Feast of the Birthday. The date is not particularly relevant. It doesn't bother me, but it seems that sometimes an entire birthday goes by unacknowledged because the Birthday Observed happened last month.

Back to when we were first married -- I asked Gary to do something. He looked puzzled and said:

"But it's my birthday week."
"Pardon?" I asked, in complete and total disbelief, because I'd been married long enough to guess what was coming.
"It's my birthday week.  I don't have to do anything during my birthday week."

Well, young and foolish, I let him get away with it. Possibly I thought it was another Catholic thing with which I was unfamiliar. At any rate, the next March I again asked Gary to do something. He looked puzzled and said:

"But it's my birthday month."
"Oh, that's a load of crap. Last year it was a week."
"No, really, it's my birthday month. I don't have to do anything during my birthday month."
"Fine, then in August you'd better watch out."

Of course, I forgot until mid-August, but then I played the birthday month tradition as if I were born to it. "No, I can't cook / clean / drive / answer the phone because it is my birthday month."

The S_______s deny any knowledge of this tradition. "Birthday WEEK? Birthday MONTH?" they laugh. It is lucky we didn't have this tradition in my family, since Mom and I generally have our birthdays in the same week.

And speaking of the Queen Mother --  here she is on the Throne:

Miracle #4

Add another miracle of things Lost and Then Regained:

After Nine Days, the Queen Mother is back in her quarters. Raise the flag! The electric power is back.