If It's the Right Thing

When my mother-in-law visited, she told my mom about a plan that sounded to my mom like a Very Bad Idea. It involved my mother-in-law teaming up with someone who was currently in prison but would be out in a year, and buying a big semi-truck together and earning their living being truckers together.

Yes. My mother-in-law. This was her plan. I dearly wish she had told ME about it instead of just telling my mom, but at least she went into a lot of detail with my mom.

My mom and I talked about this a lonnnng time. Basic gist of conversation: "!!!!!!!" For one thing, it seems so out of character for my mother-in-law. But also, we thought it sounded like a con. It sounded to us like the most likely thing would be that the guy would want her to give him "her half" of the money so he could go buy the truck---and then he'd vanish. We suspected she'd sell her house to raise the money. Of course, this is all TOTAL SPECULATION. Maybe he was a stand-up guy and DID have money for half a truck and DID want to travel the country with....well, why WOULD he want to travel the country with her? Well, but maybe he did.

But in any case, my mom, hearing the details, was absolutely certain it was a con, and was certain that my mother-in-law would end up with no money, having been made a fool of by a horrible evil person. My mom was in a near PANIC about this. She said to me it would almost be better if my mother-in-law died than go through something so humiliating and so destituting.

My mom is religious, as you know. So she prayed, and what she prayed was that IF it fit into God's Plan, and IF it was the right thing to pray for, could my mother-in-law die before this happened to her---leaving her dignity and her estate intact.

This was three weeks before my mother-in-law died, so you can see how my mom is feeling a little funny right now, and also why she's very glad that she prayed "if it's the right thing."

Working for Now

Here is what is working for us right now, sex-wise, in this current stage of life (a mix of children, psychiatric side effects, birth control side effects, and general busyness/distractedness, plus a disagreement about how many children to have and various household frustrations): We have sex once a week on an established day.

On one hand, this is not my ideal. I don't like the Fussy Planning feeling of it, the twin-beds-and-scheduled-intimacy feeling. But that's just the feeling of the IDEA, if you see what I mean. It's not the feeling I get from the actual PRACTICE of it. And, happily, once the system is in place, there need be no more discussion of the idea.

I like the way I know it's going to happen and so can work on shifting mental gears: I always have The Next Five Things in my head, and so getting pawed at when I'm trying to focus on remembering chores/errands is unpleasant, but if I put The Sex on my list, I can mentally clear the schedule for it.

I like the way I know there will be a certain minimum of activity, no matter what happens the rest of the week. I like the way it keeps things up and running, so that an Inappropriate Resistance doesn't accumulate merely from a lack of usage.

I also like the way it makes me feel more free to say no, because I know HE knows there is that certain minimum he will definitely get.

I like the way it gives me a heads-up to add a little alcohol in advance.

This arrangement won't last forever. Every couple has Their Issue, and our issue is sex, and so I know it will be a problem again: in my experience, people who Want It More are NEVER really satisfied with someone who Wants It Less, no matter what arrangements are made: they're chronically dissatisfied, chronically certain other people are having better sex lives than they are. But this is working for now.

Hangover

I am a little drinky tonight, and there is on one hand NO NEED because mother-in-law is GONE GONE GONE, but on the other hand MIL Gone meant husband-in-law was looking for a little something, and okay it was kind of my idea too, but anyway vodka was involved, and I swear, vodka is the best thing to happen for sex since TEENAGERS.

Also, here is what I would like to know: why have I never had a hangover? It seems like if I drink enough to be all WOOOOOOOOOOO and tippy, I should pay the price in the morning. How much do you have to drink to get a hangover? Not that I want one. I'm just curious.

Think of Her as Kevin Federline

This visit, I've had an insight into my mother-in-law's behavior. By profession, she works in a home for adults with severe developmental disabilities. I think this has given her an inflated sense of her own intelligence and competence. I think it has also given her certain habits of interpersonal behavior (i.e., telling adults what to do) that have carried over inappropriately into other, non-work relationships. And then let's say that first one a second time: I think it has given her an inflated sense of her own intelligence and competence.

I would also like to take a minute to speak badly of her former husband, my father-in-law. He doesn't get much press time because he's absent, and there aren't many good anecdotes about absence. One reason I put up with my mother-in-law is that as much as I dislike her, I approve of what she's doing: she's regularly traveling a long distance at considerable expense in order to visit her grandchildren. We never visit her, so she comes to us. I may feel like drugging her tea, but I like the concept of her visits, and I hope that if I drive my future daughters-in-law batcrap crazy (and I think statistically it's likely to happen with at least one) they will nevertheless support the concept of me visiting my grandchildren. And I hope I'll drive them nuts more in the "buys WAYYYYY too much crap we don't want or need" category rather than in the "rolls her eyes and does jazz hands until homicide seems like a viable option" category.

My father-in-law, on the other hand, hasn't ever visited. We let him know about each child's birth, and he doesn't respond. I send a packet of photos every month, and he doesn't respond. I send periodic email updates on how we're doing and how the kids are doing, and he doesn't respond. I send an annual Christmas package (this is something I go back and forth on, also annually) and he never responds. The only time we hear from him is every couple of years when he emails me to tell me about his journey to find himself, and to place blame on everyone and everything except himself for his inexplicable behavior (it was a childhood brain illness! it was his upbringing! it's because everyone spreads lies about him!). Then he disappears for another couple of years.

You know how at first it was so appalling that Britney Spears married that pinehole Kevin Federline, and then pretty soon it was like, "I never thought I'd say this but Britney Spears is making Kevin Federline look good." My father-in-law is the Britney Spears to my mother-in-law's Kevin Federline.

MIL Report, Day 8

My mother-in-law has the greatest respect for a former co-worker, EVEN THOUGH the former co-worker is a Mormon. Despite being a Mormon, that former co-worker is a real good person in many ways!

My mother-in-law didn't vote for Obama, herself, not because she's racist. She thinks it would be GOOD to someday have A Black in office! Just not THIS PARTICULAR Black. The fact that she didn't vote for him reflects positively on her: she is SO AWARE that Blacks = People Too, she can even distinguish one from another!

I was looking for a puzzle piece. She said archly that if I cleaned under my couch she thought I'd find a WHOLE LOT of missing things.

I brought up a bag of chocolate chips from the supply in the downstairs pantry, which is located in the part of the basement reserved for storage and workshop. She commented she'd noticed I wouldn't need to buy chocolate chips for a good long time, heavens no! When was she inspecting the pantry, I wonder?

I came home from the store. She asked what AMAZING BARGAINS I'd found today. Jazz hands and rolling eyes.

She said she needed to know where our hand mixer was. I guess I don't expect her to keep a mental inventory of everything in our kitchen, but I think we've had the "We don't have a hand mixer" conversation more than half a dozen times now, so I'd expect it to sink in eventually. Instead, when I said "We don't have a hand mixer," she made this face:


Except her eyes were way buggier, and rolling around in her head, and she swung her face from side to side in addition to clapping her hands to the sides of it, and she made a loud strangling sound. I said, "Yes, I don't know how, but somehow we've managed to survive all these years without one. It's a wonder any of us are alive." I said it like I was being funny. I was not feeling funny.

During dinner, she said out of the blue that she'd once been to this restaurant where they had "Lumpy mashed potatoes" on the menu. She couldn't figure out WHY anyone would WANT lumpy potatoes. That is just NUTS. Why would you BRAG that your mashed potatoes had lumps? She supposed it proved they weren't from a box, but LUMPS? Bleah! ...Do I need to specifically say that at this dinner we were eating mashed potatoes and that they contained the occasional lump, or do you know my MIL by now?

Minivans

I don't know WHY people are always making fun of how unsexy minivans are. They are WAY easier to have sex in than regular cars.

MIL Report, Day 5

Marie asked if knowing I could blog each thing my MIL said made it easier to deal with. YES. In fact, it makes it like a GAME. She says something and I think, "Yay!" and I jot it down. If she goes too long without saying anything, I start getting anxious: "I'll have nothing to say! I'll have to say she's being fine and there's nothing to report!" It reminds me of the fun of blogging dieting/exercising/cleaning stuff: shared sorrow is doubled joy.

And so dawns Day 5. Ah, Day 5. Day 5 is when, if she were staying a week, I'd be thinking, "I THINK I can make it. Just two more days." The time she came for 2.5 weeks, I was thinking...well, I was thinking some dark, dark thoughts, and they involved shovels and moonlit fields and mysterious disappearances. For this visit, when there are 10 days but only if I count the arrival day, when she didn't arrive until after lunch, and the departure day, when she's leaving early in the morning---and I DO INDEED count those days, not with other houseguests but with her---I'm pretty sure I can make it but goshy-gee 7 days would be better.

Day 5 is, I think, the day she settles in. She's not feeling nervous or awkward anymore.


1. I bought 4yo daughter two 2-packs of belts (on 75% off!) at Target, not because the child NEEDS four more belts but because I couldn't decide between the two 2-packs (and because they were 75% off!). My mother-in-law had several things to say on the topic of belts, in addition to saying every 10 minutes or so, "Constance! [Child] needs those pants pulled up again!":

1a. I was saying the problem was that if I made 4yo daughter's belt tight enough to keep the pants up, it would bisect her. MIL: "Yes, well, the day will come when we'll all be looking back and saying remember when 4yo Daughter had no hips?" Er, no. I don't think we WILL be doing that. And I think that anyone who DOES choose to say such a thing can say hello to that shovel I mentioned earlier.

1b. We were at a store and 4yo daughter saw a belt she liked and asked if we could buy it. My MIL said to her, "I know a certain little girl who has puh-LENty of belts, considering she can only wear one at a time!"


2. My MIL wanted to go to Walmart to buy the kids their Christmas presents, to avoid shipping costs. (She takes stuff to one of those mailing stores. I don't think she realizes they charge A MILLION DOLLARS MORE than the already-expensive post office.) She suggested she get clothes, because "HEAVEN KNOWS they don't need any more TOYS."

3. Yesterday evening the topic of milk came up (no, I don't know how it came up---what am I, a court reporter?), and she said she just never could stand the taste of it, didn't like it as a child and didn't like it any better now. I said my mom didn't like it either, but that I did like it, and that I was hoping that would help me avoid the osteoporosis my mom's side of the family has had trouble with. My MIL: "Oh, I think that's more a problem with petite women, and I really don't think you qualify." Me: "...Uh...I... [*mind searching desperately for ANY response*] ...Well, both my grandma and my mom..." Mother-in-law, interrupting me to repeat herself: "I'm just saying, that's really only slightly-built women who have trouble with that, and I really don't think you qualify." Me: *picks up a notepad and pen and wrote it down*

3b. Have I mentioned before the way she will repeat her first point nearly verbatim, as if making a second point? Well, she does do that. She'll make her point, and if you argue with her, or if you make your own point, she'll repeat her own point JUST AS IF she is refuting your point or shoring up her own argument, but she is saying THE SAME THING. It is nearly impossible to continue the argument without following her lead and repeating your own point a second time.