Last night my mother made pie for dessert. For three people. I commented that we didn’t have dessert very often when I was a child, which opened the flood gates of denial and weirdness. Mom bossed me around for a few minutes and told me that we had dessert ALL THE TIME when I was a kid. I don’t know why this even matters, but it does. Maybe because I’m trying not to become a lard ass, but we only ate dessert on special occasions.
Insisting that my childhood was AS IT WAS, prompted my mother to harrumph, “I’m SO sorry you had such a deprived childhood.” At this point my dad and I rolled our eyes as she continued to name all of our old neighbors, who she was going to email to prove how wrong I was about dessert. Um, yeah, because all those people who were casual acquaintances, made only because of geographical ease? They will know exactly what happened in our house. For fucks sake! Half of our family doesn’t even know what happened inside of our house. Because we thrive on secrecy, denial and repression. Just like all families. Right?
I still can’t believe this all started because of pie. PIE!
The whole pie argument was very much like talking to my paternal grandmother, who remembers all six of her sons as total and complete angels. They never cried, fussed, snuck out of the house, were rebellious or acted in any sort of unbecoming manner. Especially not the drug addict or the sociopath. ANGELS! ALL OF THEM!
All this freaks me out because I don’t relish joining the land of dementia. Sure I like rainbows, unicorns and blue skies with white puffy clouds…but I also like reality. I like knowing that life is fucked up and hard sometimes. I like having conversations of substance, even thought they aren’t always pretty, and not just a forty-five minute description of a bloody Sunday drive.
I am totally not regretting my decision to live with my parents; neither are my future therapists or the voices in my head.
“For fucks sake! Half of our family doesn’t even know what happened inside of our house. Because we thrive on secrecy, denial and repression. Just like all families. Right?”
I just fell in love with you all over again.
Boy do I know how that is! I learned very quickly that you don’t talk about anything personal in my family. You can have discussions about politics, literature, music, movies, religion, but you don’t talk about who you are as a person and you don’t ask questions about who anyone else is.
Thank god for good friendships!
“Because we thrive on secrecy, denial and repression.”
Oh yes. I know that one well.
If it makes you feel any better – I NEVER remember EVER having ANY sort of dessert at your house.
I don’t think it’s as much dementia as PARENTAL GUILT.
Pop a few kildets out of your hoo-hoo and it (like rampant post-birth yeast infections) suddenly becomes a vast part of your psyche.
Sigh.
I think this trick is in the parents manual. My mom has similar tactics. Maybe they are feeling guilty because we turned out weird or something. Who knows?
You should have heard my mom’s oldest (of 11) sister saying “my childhood was perfect” to my mom. Considering my late, unlamented grandfather was a drunk and a wife beater (he died before I was born) I’m thinking she is the QUEEN of denial….it’s just amazing.
Oh god, I hear you. What usually sets my mom off is a casual mention of my dad. “What did your dad get you for Christmas?” “He got me a toaster.” “WELL I’M SORRY I CAN’T BUY YOU NICE THINGS LIKE TOASTERS. MAYBE YOU SHOULD SPEND CHRISTMAS WITH YOUR FATHER FROM NOW ON!”
Now instead of engaging her, I just say, “okay.”
After reading this, I had the most brilliant idea. That maybe there should be some sort of certification, or test, that people have to pass before they have children. I dunno, it’s just a thought.
If it makes you feel any better, I’m pretty sure that most families are fucked up. And on the upside, it makes for some thought provoking AND entertaining conversations.
Are you sure my mother and your mother aren’t the same person? I haven’t seen my mother in a while; she could actually have moved to Utah with her other secret family, for all I know.
All the worst fights get started over pie. It’s only the good fights that end with someone getting a pie in the face.
If I want to get my mother riled up, all I have to do is say I don’t remember her reading to me as a child. She claims she read to me ALL THE TIME, and I have no real doubt that this is true…she WAS a reading teacher, after all, and I COULD read on my own before kindergarten, and I STILL read voraciously to this day, but…I don’t REMEMBER it, exactly.
It’s fun to needle my mother. Hee.
Pie was the real reason behind the Iraq invasion. Not WMD like Bush wants us to think. It was because he heard Saddam made a mean pecan pie.
WTF is that with not remembering things as they were? My mother in law claims her sons never acted up in public ever (and says it each time my son does, which is sooo f-ing helpful). i think its selective dementia: they only remember the things that make them look good.
Yeah, who really knows what goes on in a household? I will tell you who, the second youngest of seven kids.
I like how dessert can lead to such disarray. So sad. I want to meet your parents some day.
Again I feel like we are connected somehow. When my mom was here a few months ago, I made lasagna. My kids asked if my mom cooked a lot when I was little. I laughed and said no, she almost never cooked. She argued that fact even though what I said was FACT. She almost never cooked. True. Apparently she stewed about it for weeks before finally emailing me a list of things she CAN cook. To which I wrote her back and said “just because you are able to, does not mean you did”. She still insists that we ate real food, while I insist we had crackers and ice cream most nights. FACT.
But maybe senility will be fun too, right?
A BLOODY Sunday drive might be pretty interesting, like something out of the Middle Ages, right? And parental memory seems to be directly linked to the amount of guilt associated with it. The guiltier they feel, the more they want to forget.
In our family we sit around with beers talking about how (not) awesome our childhoods were. Escape to your new family more often please.
Noooooooo. Please say you did not move in with your parents. Run, screaming! I don’t know what compelled you to do it, Pants, but I assume it’s necessary. You’re bravery is breathtaking!
I like Punchlinewalking’s comment – ‘reflection’ is the perfect counterspell for parental voodoo.
Another good parental control device: read the “Love and Logic” parenting books. I notice my mother responds well to being treated like a six year old. It actually seems to make her happy! It makes me wonder whether this may be the first time in her life someone has provided her with parenting.
Shouldn’t be my job, though. No way.