Category: Family

Good Golly Miss Molly!

We babysat our youngest grandchild this past weekend and it went surprisingly well. Molly was a totally different child than she was the last time we babysat – a few weeks when they are just over a year old makes a huge difference. Last time she was a ‘mouth-wide-open’ screamer totally determined to punish her mother for abandoning her even when her mother wasn’t there to appreciate the punishment. Apparently, she was fully capable of crawling, but we saw zero amount of that; she was just a screaming lump in the middle of the living room.

This time was shockingly different. The Viking and I spent most of the time just staring at her like she was a changeling. We had only babysat a month previous – how can this little human be the same human from a month ago? The whole experience was a revelation.

The Highlights
  • She mastered the sippy cup. Last time she wouldn’t even pick it up. This time she was a rockstar, one-handing it and performing stunts as she drained the last drop of juice.
  • SHE WALKS! And runs! All around the house like it was an Olympic Speed Walking track. She stuck her little hand up to grab my finger and started dragging me around behind her. Amazing.
  • She loves getting her hair combed. Especially if you accidentally squirt her in the face with a water bottle. When she woke up in the morning, her hair was kind of knotted and sticking in all directions and I thought I should get her looking spiffy for her mom. I assumed I needed to sneak up on her because who likes getting the knots out of their hair when they are 14 months old? She turned around at the last second and got a face full of water and it wasn’t even warm. SHE GIGGLED! I started combing her hair and she got that look on her face that everyone on the planet makes when they are getting a head massage. She grabbed for the spray bottle and tried to squirt herself and when that didn’t work, she handed it back to me. So, I sprayed her in the face again and combed. And again. And again. Until the bottle was empty and she still wanted more.
  • The turkey baster is no longer her favourite toy.

  • She has the smelliest farts I’ve ever been forced to smell.
  • She found a remote control and held it to her ear like it was a phone. She went to the kitchen and started chatting on the ‘phone’, so The Viking and I started answering her from the other room and the conversation became quite complex.
  • She is an epic chair dancer.
  • She TALKS! I had given her a sippy cup of juice and when she had no interest in it, I set it on the table. An hour later she stood beside me, reached toward the table and demanded “JUICE!” Well, knock me over with a feather.
  • She has a stuffed sloth that is almost as big as she is, and she never puts it down.
  • She squinches her face when she smiles and it’s fucking adorable.
  • Watching her facial expressions is like looking in a mirror. She has a ‘what-the-fuck’ face.
  • Fruitloops received the ‘what-the-fuck’ face. Pretzels didn’t and are the preferred snack after grapes.
  • When she poops, she gets this still face and faraway look like she’s listening to aliens.
  • Cook an egg for her and she stuffs it in her mouth with both hands and no, she doesn’t want a spoon, thank you very much.
  • She gives hugs for no reason at all. It’s a ‘wrap her arms around your neck and lays her head on your shoulder’ kind of hug that makes you feel warm and squishy inside.

So, it was a win. More than just a win, though. It was a spectacular success! The one takeaway was that we don’t have enough toys to entertain Molly and keep her mind working. Lids off Tupperware containers and pill bottles filled with beads won’t cut it anymore. And that’s how I found myself scrolling through dozens of listings on Facebook Marketplace. We want to be prepared for next time, after all.

Uh, Oh!

It’s no secret that The Viking and I have had to apologize for Izzie many times over many years to many people within a three-block radius around our house. She’s…well…kind of a mobster but she commits her own crimes. I’m sure she’s tried to rope Teddy into being a hitman, but he’s just not that kind of cat, and I am eternally thankful for that because no one should be subjected to living with two Mobsters.

In case you’ve missed it, here is a partial list of her crimes over the past few years:

  • She broke into a guy’s house via a closed but unlocked basement window and refused to let him use his washing machine for 4 hours. When she was ready to leave, she went to his back door and shouted names at him until he opened it for her.
  • She bullied a neighbour’s dogs into neurosis.
  • She stole a customer’s truck and wouldn’t give it back. He had to come and get The Viking to remove her.
  • She car-jacked a car down the street, but the woman screamed so loud that a neighbour had to get me.
  • She kidnapped 2 newcomers to the block and refused to let them use their back door.
  • She started a fight club and came home bloody, over and over and over again.
  • She sits on top of a cabinet at the back door and slaps every customer as they walk in to pay their bill.
  • She supervised a guy, all afternoon, while he built a fence and then slapped him when he tried to give her a treat.
  • She started a fight with a Raven who came back with reinforcements and turned our yard into Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds. I had to rescue her from under a spruce tree.
  • She taunted a Magpie, Alice Pooper, until Alice shouted insults and curses at her every time she left the house. It was deafening.

So, yeah. She’s a Mobster. The thing is, she’s a lovable Mobster. And it’s mostly men who become enchanted. They laugh about her antics, put food out for her in case she gets hungry during a crime spree, they chat with her when she stops by to judge them. She always came home, though, clear on who her family was.

But one of her conquests from down the street has crossed a line. He stopped by to brag to The Viking that Izzie has been visiting him and letting him pet her and takes treats out of his hand. Directly from his hand!! It’s one thing for her to just visit, it’s another thing entirely when she becomes a strumpet for any Tom, Dick or Harry’s affection! She has never let anyone touch her; she has a strict ‘no touchy!’ rule. Apparently though, this guy has been on a year-long campaign to win her approval and he’s succeeded!

I was unaware of the treachery until I heard The Viking’s indignation tossed at Izzie. “So! You would rather hang out with the guy down the alley?! You bite my toes at night if I move even a little bit, but you let that guy pet you?!”

Izzie busily started an extensive bath.

“You eat treats right out of his hand?!”

Still bathing.

“And, I had to hear it right from that bragging bastard?!”

The bathing moved to the lady bits.

Surprised, I had to ask, “Izzie’s cheating on you?”

“Yes!!” He bellowed. “That guy stopped right out there in the alley, asking where Izzie was because he hadn’t seen her since yesterday when he Gave. Her. Treats!”

I looked at Izzie. “Really? You’re cheating on The Viking? After all the fancy collars he’s bought you? And the Dynamite sticks you love so much? That’s cold.”

Still bathing her lady bits.

“Well, I’m not feeding her supper tonight.” He said to me, then directed himself to Izzie. “You can go get your supper at your boyfriend’s house!”

Sadly, Izzie seems to be morally ambivalent about the situation. Teddy, on the other hand, has taken advantage of the demographic shift. The Viking is spoiling him outrageously, especially in front of Izzie. She looks at me like ‘What the Fuck?!’

I just shrug at her. “That’s what happens when you betray a Viking. And they have very long memories, too”

One thing I do know – Teddy would never cheat on us. He’s a staunch defender of the home, totally loyal since we got him off the streets. He doesn’t bite The Viking’s toes in the middle of the night either, and hasn’t committed a single crime in all the years he’s lived here.

Because he’s a good boy.

Meet the MoFos

Having Grandchildren is surprisingly easy.  And, unsurprisingly, The Viking is a stellar baby cuddler/entertainer.  He’s a Viking on the outside and a marshmallow on the inside.  Don’t tell anyone though, because we don’t want to encourage our enemies.  Okay.  We only have one enemy, but others could crop up over time.

While I plop down on the floor with Luna, the two-year-old, to play with Picasso Tiles, The Viking makes faces and plays peek-a-boo with Molly, the 6-month-old baby.  We’ve mastered the Tag Team method of child herding, changing diapers, and mixing formula powder.  Overall, we make a pretty good team.

Izzie has turned out to be extremely surprising.  We were a little anxious about how she would react to babies and toddlers given her previous behavior interacting with adults, but she follows Luna around constantly, jumping onto her cat tree if Luna gets a little touchy.  She’s brilliant.  Which is surprising.  We thought Teddy Bear would be the Baby Whisperer, but he prefers a less loud environment and heads for the cat door.

There is a small challenge though. The girls have 3 sets of Grandparents and we all need different titles so the girls know who is who when Mim talks about us.  Two of the Grandparent sets took the traditional titles which left The Viking and I to decide how we want to be addressed.  Easy Peasy!  We’ll use Danish terms.

A short lesson in the Danish language:  In Danish, Mor is the word for mother, and Far is the word for father.  But then it gets tricky.  When you talk about the mother of the child’s mother you say, Mor Mor – mom’s mom.  The father of the mother is Mor Far – mom’s dad.  There is a whole different set of combinations when you talk about the child’s father’s parents, but it’s not relevant right now. So, since I am the mother of Luna’s mom, I am Mor Mor.  The Viking is the stepfather of Luna’s mom so he is Mor Far.

The last time Mim brought the girls for a visit, she confided that Luna decided this whole Danish word jumble is too messy and too much so she calls us…….

………

………

The MoFos.

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I HAVE NEVER LOVED ANYTHING MORE!!

From this day forward……we are the MoFos!  I never want her to stop calling us that.  She can tell her friends that she loves her MoFos, that she’s going to visit her MoFos.  Her MoFos can come to her school pageants and concerts.  She can tell her other grandparents all about her MoFos.  She can introduce us as The MoFos to her teachers, Doctors, friends’ parents, employers, boyfriends/husband(s)……whatever!  And I certainly hope that Molly does the same thing when she starts talking.

Besides, if someone is shocked beyond words, the girls can just shrug and say, “It’s Danish!”  What are people going to do?  You can’t punish a kid for being bi-lingual.

girl hiding behind a white wall, isolated on a white background

 

 

You’re a Nightmare, Alice Pooper

Teddy made friends with a Magpie last summer.  Yup, a Magpie.  I have no idea how it happened, but suddenly Teddy was wandering around the neighbourhood, shadowed by the Magpie, having complete conversations with it.  They were answering each other! I had hoped the Magpie would have forgotten the fledgling friendship over the winter, but no such luck.  It’s back, it’s loud, it’s vocal and it won’t shut the fuck up.  And, along with the noise, we are now Magpie Shit Recipients.

Have you ever tried to get rid of a Magpie?  Well, trust me, it’s impossible, which means that we’ve been forced to accept Alice Pooper as a family member.  As if we don’t have enough attitude in this house already.

For the past couple of weeks, we noticed that Alice was going above and beyond her normal squawking, to the point that I had to yell at her several times to…

“Shut the fuck up, Alice!!”

It didn’t work because Alice is not only loud, she’s an asshole, too.

We discovered the reason for the increase in vocals completely by accident.  The Viking and I were trying to have a business-related conversation by the garage when Izzie wandered past, followed closely by Alice Pooper shouting insults.  Lightbulb moment!

“Is Alice Pooper pissed at you, Izzie?!”  She gave me a flat, pissy look and went directly into the house.

In the past, Izzie has picked fights with ravens.  We know that because our front lawn became a scene out of Alfred Hitchcock’s ‘The Birds’, and I had to rescue her from under the spruce tree in the front yard.

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We had a long conversation about the perils of picking fights with large birds.  Apparently, I was too specific about the ‘large birds’ I was referring too, because Magpies are technically smaller than ravens.  I have a child who was exactly like this, living on the fringes of technicalities, and I can’t believe I have to deal with the same thing with a fucking cat!

So, Izzie is slinking around, hiding under vehicles, the patio table, the back steps, and the fifth wheel trailer.  Alice Pooper sits on the power pole composing eloquent and savage insults, waiting for a chance to use them on Izzie.  The Viking and I only whisper when we talk to her because who knows how good Alice Pooper’s hearing is?

And now, I’m wondering if I have to start apologizing to the neighbours about Alice’s shenanigans, since it’s Teddy’s fault that she’s part of the family to begin with?  Also, I had a stern conversation with him about befriending large birds, and played a clip of Alfred Hitchcock’s ‘The Birds’, for reference.

I Was Evil Today

I was evil today.  I really tried to harness my evilness and I did beg Better Me to intervene.  I even enlisted The Viking to appeal to my better side, but Evil Me won the day.  That’s what happens when Better Me does all the heavy lifting and has decided to let Evil Me take the wheel for a change.

All it took was an email.  One lousy email.  To ruin the entire day.  Worse…..the email was harmless.  Innocent, even!  But previous email interactions left a foul taste in my mouth from all the sanctimony and Holier-Than-Thou-Dom that prompted my solemn vow of unhelpfulness forevermore.

We all have at least one person in our life who just rubs us the wrong way all the fucking time.  You don’t even like to be around them and those events that require proximity are always dreaded.  You’re never quite sure if they are totally unaware of how awful they can be or if they are aware and just like being that way.  You decide to believe it’s the first thing because who wants to think the worst of someone?  So, you spend years brushing off the snide and taking the High Road, certain that it must be a total lack of interpersonal skills and self-awareness.  But then comes the time when all the excuses in the world can’t explain it away.  There is no other explanation but Colossal Entitlement.

Unfortunately, I’m getting too old for this shit.  Taking the High Road is exhausting – mostly because I’m pissed off, stomping my feet, waving my arms, and shouting curses into the void the entire time.

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Sure, I could give it right back – I’m perfectly capable of treating someone like shit if I really put my mind to it – but I choose not to behave like that.  And, that would make being around me no more pleasant than being around them.  Instead, my brain goes into overdrive; hoarding and composing sarcastic and epithet-laced arguments that will put them in their place if I can only remember them when the time is right.

I had a small skirmish with an old, white guy in the grocery store parking lot a while ago involving a parking spot that I was already in but he wanted.  He behaved badly, I made a gesture, he said, “You don’t need to act like that, Missy” and I said…..

“If you’re going to act like an Asshole, I’m going to treat you like an Asshole!”

I was pleasantly surprised by my brilliance.  On the spur of the moment like that.  I usually have to wait until 3:00 in the morning to come up with such a perfect gem.

The Viking did manage to rein in my more militant inclinations today.  I didn’t write a scathing diatribe like last time, outlining and dissecting all the ways that a certain comment pissed me right the fuck off.  No, I just returned a quote and left it at that.  I don’t have to be ashamed of myself for behaving badly – I hate it when that happens – and chances are the recipient won’t even catch the significance.  Given the un-self-awareness and all.

Besides, isn’t there some adage about confession being good for the soul?  I do believe that makes all of you Confess-ees.  And that means I have a very, very good soul, doesn’t it?  And maybe I wasn’t actually Evil today.  Maybe just thinking about being Evil doesn’t actually make me Evil.  I do have self-control, after all.

I’m just going to chalk this up as Better Me – and The Viking, of course – managed Evil Me more than I initially thought.

Broken Moms and Dads

So, I’ve been wrestling with this post for days already and it’s driving me nuts.  I would just drop the whole thing and find something else to write about but there is an article that I want to share.  It came in my email and punched me in the face.  Hard.  And I’m pretty sure there are a lot of Moms and Dads that need to be punched in the face, too.

I don’t want to write a novel on why the article has impacted me, so pay attention because it’s going to be fast and dirty.

I married a child when I was 19 and then gave birth to two more children.  The marriage was shitty, the children weren’t, and as time went on the marriage became shittier and shittier until I almost killed my shitty self.  The only reason I didn’t was because I couldn’t leave my children alone in a shitty situation.  And then every time a shitty thing happened I ‘over-reacted’, ‘needed to take more pills’ or ‘needed to see a therapist again’.  I didn’t understand that the shitty-ness that led to my self-killing would become the shitty weapon that would be used against me forevermore.  I also didn’t know that all that shitty-ness could be passed on to the children like a virus until they became shitty, too.  I was staying in the shitshow for the children because how would I ever be able to support them without the shitshow, but what I actually did was enroll them in Shitty Bootcamp with one-on-one shitty tutoring.  And as the children grew into adults with superior shitty-ness skills, shitty drama happened more and more frequently with higher and higher shitty-ness levels until finally, during Christmas 2018, the shitty threshold was epic-ally breached and shitty-ness exploded and killed me.  The shitty event took only 15 shitty minutes and even I – by now an expert on shitty-ness – was awed by the level of shitty-ness one person can contain and willingly fling.

And that’s the shitty short version of the whole shitshow.  And, as you might imagine, I don’t do shitshows anymore because it killed me and made me want to literally self-kill again.

Thankfully, there’s a Viking for that…..

…..and he gave me several very good reasons why I shouldn’t self-kill and should stay with him forevermore because he’s not shitty.

And this brings me to the Elephant Journal.  I found it when I was still up to my neck in shitty-ness, trying to understand how my life turned into a complete shittery despite my best efforts.  If you have shitty-ness in your life, check out Elephant Journal where they will give you shit-free articles to make you feel better.

It was one of those shit-free articles that punched me in the face: To the Broken Mom who finds Strength for her Kids by Tiffany Timm.

Go ahead and read it.  I’ll wait.  It’s very short but full of love……

Ms. Timm understands shitty-ness, no?  And I’m here to share my shitty shitshow so you know that you aren’t alone in your shitshow.  I can’t trust my judgement anymore because, well, it was shitty, and never ask me advice about parenting because it’s total shit, too.  However, I am willing to dive into the shitty deep-end with you and wallow in shitty self-pity.  And then I’ll help you out of the shit and tell you that you’re awesome despite all the shit people say.  All the best people have survived shit and escaped all sorts of shitteries.  Including you.  And me.

So.  I see you, too.

A Bubble of Slightly Hysterical Laughter

I woke up January 2nd to success – I survived the holiday season.  I wasn’t very confident going in, expecting the worst, but it turned out much better than I could have hoped.  Don’t get me wrong, it was grim, but it could have been worse.

This past year has been nothing less than a nightmare for me.  A year in which I was forced to confront my demons, to look at myself with brutal clarity and make decisions I never thought I would have to make or could make.  At first, I was stuck; I didn’t know if I could move forward or if I even wanted too.  There were times I just wanted to quit, when the sum of my past failures were too heavy to carry and the weight of future failures too much to contemplate.  To be completely honest, had there been a handgun in the house I would have used it.  Without a doubt.

With the absence of a handgun, I had to consider my options.  I was caught up in a vicious mantra of “How the FUCK did I get here when this is the exact opposite of what I set out to do?”  Is this what the world’s worst case of Cognitive Dissonance feels like?  I’ve spent more than a decade admitting I’ve made mistakes and trying to correct them, hoping to build bridges to better relationships but the sum of every action, every word has put me right here in a pile of shit.  And I own it all.  Every tiny thing.  It’s mine and I play with it constantly, picking at every detail wondering if I should have handled each thing differently and if I had, would it have turned out better?  If I could go back to 1982, I would avoid life at all costs.

I suspected three years ago that I had utterly failed in the one goal I ever gave myself and I spent the following 8 months in counselling.  It wasn’t until Christmas 2018 though that I knew in my bones everything I had done in the last 35 years had been a colossal failure.  I knew it because the judgement was handed down by a Howitzer who took no prisoners and the sentence was more horrible than I could ever have imagined.  It was very apparent that the goal was to cause the most amount of pain in the most vicious way possible and it was a total success.  I didn’t catch all the issues during the firestorm; they came so fast and so loud it was impossible to comprehend them all.  What I did manage to understand left me confused and shocked.

I called them the following morning anyway, despite The Viking’s livid disagreement, to apologize for the things I thought were the major issues.   At that point, I knew I was done, but I was determined to go with my dignity, if nothing else, intact.  Then, I crawled into my cave and sobbed for the next two weeks.

I might have stayed in that cave for the remainder of my life, but two women* came to my rescue.  I love these beautiful people almost as much as I love The Viking.  They have their own harrowing stories of pain and utter despair, but they are still standing with grace and love and I refuse to do less.  They deserve what support and love I can give them as they have done for me.

Between sobbing events and sometimes during sobbing events, I desperately searched the internet for answers.  How do I survive this?  How could I have failed so epically?  Guess what I found?  I’m a Co-Dependent groomed from childhood to spend my entire life apologizing for my existence.  I also found hundreds and hundreds of parents, in the same position and as devastated as I am, searching for help and support.  The sheer magnitude of pain is staggering.  There isn’t a lot of support out there and most people are too ashamed to talk about it even if there was more support.  I debated whether to post this or not; ultimately, I decided that posting it can’t make my situation any worse than it already is, and perhaps others will tell me their stories.

There was a brief opportunity, a few months ago, that had the potential to resolve the problem, that maybe the words spoken in the heat of the moment would be withdrawn.  Unfortunately, the sentence was firm and implacable.  So I said things I wish I hadn’t, but I hated going down without the slightest resistance.  And now, I feel guilty and ashamed.

However, after exhaustive self-reflection something occurred to me and it’s at this point that it gets better.  The thing about accepting that I failed is that I can decide to accept that I failed.  It is what it is.  Once I accepted that I failed in the past, it only stands to reason that future efforts will have the same results because I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing, what else to try or how to fix it all.  I’m completely out of resources.

So, I leaned into it, absorbed every fault and flaw and failure and when I was done this is what I found:

When you are this low, you can’t possibly do worse.

When you’ve lost everything there’s nothing left to lose.

Nothing I ever do for the rest of my life could possibly end as bad as this.

No fear can be scarier than what I’ve already faced.

No pain can ever come close to what I live with now.

No shame can be greater than the shame I am already carrying.

Once you’re broken you’re broken, what more can happen?

If you think about it though, that’s freedom   

The worse thing that could possibly happen has already happened and since I’ve survived it the rest of life can only be better than here.  Failure isn’t a permanent condition and it doesn’t have to define who I am or my worth.  And I do have worth, it’s just not here.  So, I laid it all down.  Every hope, every option, every strategy.  I admitted defeat.  After all, I can’t blame them because they are what I created.  The end of the dream that turned into a battle; a dream that I probably shouldn’t have started to begin with.

And that’s where I found redemption

Suddenly, the vise around my chest collapsed and my shoulders relaxed.  My mind stilled for a long moment and the cloud over my head disappeared.  There was a bubble of slightly hysterical laughter in my stomach.  I felt like I had been hanging from a cliff by the tips of my fingers and suddenly just let go.  Relief was instantaneous.  If the fall kills me, so be it, there are worse things in life than a quick death and at least I’m not still hanging on like a pathetic supplicant hoping someone will offer me a hand.  Instead, I’m free.

Who would have thought that giving in to the despair and admitting defeat would ultimately save me?  I’m still dealing with suicidal thoughts and I unexpectedly sob at random times when my losses catch me unaware.

I’ve learned that love isn’t guaranteed to be where you think it should, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist anywhere else.  And my love may not be appreciated one place but in another place it may be cherished.  We don’t need to be perfect, we just need to be kind and sometimes the biggest kindness is to walk away, for yourself, but also for those you’ve been struggling with.  The peace you feel may be just as sweet for those you have left behind.

If you’ve been through this hell, I’d love to hear from you.  Misery loves company but comfort can best be found in numbers.

With Love from Me to You

 

*I’m talking about you Annette and Johanna – you wonderful, bright stars.

I Have a Skeleton in My Closet!

My Great-Grandmother, Mabel Applegate, wrote a book of her life that began at 2 o’clock in the morning on January 2nd, 1897.  She had quite a few of the books coil-bound and gave them to all her children, grand-children and great-grandchildren.

It’s marvelous.

I wanted to add on to her story.  I wanted to preserve the family history, so I started working on my parents’ story several years ago.  It’s been a LOT of work!  I scanned almost 800 photos to save on a stick to be shared so everyone in family could enjoy them.  I spent hours and hours talking with Mom and Dad, taking notes and asking questions.  Then I started writing the book, deleted it, started over, tried editing it, deleted it and started over again.  Eventually, I found my way through it and can finally say:

I’M DONE!!

It’s true!  I sent the entire manuscript to one of my sisters, Janine, and she went through it all for me.  I was worried.  What if she thought it was terrible?  What if I insulted someone?  It’s terrifying to put your work out there for everyone to critique.  My anxiety is through the roof, but I’m in too deep to back out now.  Thankfully, Janine loves it and says I shouldn’t change a thing.

The last thing to do before having it printed, is to transcribe Mabel’s book into the back of my parents’ book.  Since Mabel’s book was printed, there have been great-great-grandchildren born and I want to make sure that her story isn’t lost to the following generations.

While I was transcribing, I came upon a story she told about Andrew Hellman, alias Adam Horn in 1820.

What?!  Now, that’s interesting!  An alias?  Ooooo…..I hope it’s because he’s a pirate and that he collects powdered wigs, pinching them off the person’s head without them even being aware that it is gone!

I’ve read Mabel’s book several times but for some reason I’ve completely forgotten about Mr. Andrew Hellman and why he needed an alias.  He was only a tailor, after all.  This story was passed around in the family, but Mabel copied the text out of a book from that era.

According to the author of that book, Hellman was…

“…a young man of good personal appearance, sober, steady, and industrious, well behaved and mild in his demeanor and withal, intelligent and well informed.”

That doesn’t sound like someone who would need an alias.  I continued transcribing.

“He seemed, however, to have imbibed a lasting dislike to the whole female race, looking upon them as mere slaves to man…..a convenience for the other sex, to serve in the capacity of hewer of wood and drawer of water: to cook his victuals, darn his stockings, never to speak but when spoken to, and to crouch in servile fear whilst in his presence.”

Ugh!  I think I know why he needed that alias!

Hellman met a farmer named George Abel who was Mabel’s great-great-grandfather.  Hellman managed to hoodwink the entire family, by

“…restrain[ing] the fiendishness of his disposition.” 

Isn’t that Fabulous?!

Completely taken in by Hellman’s act, George lets him marry one of his daughters – Mary.  She is described as

“…in the twentieth year of her age, a blithe, buxom and light-hearted country girl, with rosy cheek and sparkling eye, totally unacquainted with the deceitfulness of the world.”

What a delightful description!!  The entire story is written like this and it’s fantastic!

Long story short:  Hellman begets a child with Mary – a girl and he’s not happy about it.  He begets another child with her – a boy but he’s not happy about that either because he thinks Mary was screwing around and refuses to acknowledge the boy as his.  The third child is another boy who is, you guessed it, apparently not his either, and Hellman threatens to kill Mary if she has another child.  She doesn’t.  Hellman tries to poison Mary, but she figured it out in time.  He then poisons all three children, two of which die.  Then, Hellman chopped Mary up with an axe.  Henry, the surviving poison victim, was visiting his Uncle at the time or he would have been chopped up as well.

Hellman escapes custody before he can be brought to justice, flees to Baltimore, assumes the name Adam Horn, and marries another woman.  He kills her, too.

“On the 4th of December 1843, the prisoner [Hellman] was brought into Court to receive the awful doom of the law…..that he be taken to the jail of Baltimore  County, from whence he came, and from thence to the place of execution……there be hanged by the neck until he be dead.”

So, pinching powdered wigs wasn’t the reason for the alias.  I’m disappointed, to be honest.  A powdered wig pinching pirate (say that 3 times fast) is so much cooler than an axe murderer on a branch on the family tree.  On the other hand, Andrew Hellman turns out to be a celebrity among the Unquiet Souls enthusiasts.  I checked.  He’s the unwanted gift that keeps on giving.

“He haunts his former house/the road by his house/the local lovers’ lane, ax at the ready for new, teenaged victims…”  taken from:

http://hauntedohiobooks.com/news/hatchet-man-a-story-for-atlas-obscura-day/

I suppose I shouldn’t complain.  We do have a skeleton in the closet and that’s more than some people can say, right?  And maybe, if I put a teaser at the front of the book, it will get new generations interested.

 

 

Corpse Legs

First and foremost, I want to send a huge Shout Out to all the people who sent hugs and luvs and support when my Father passed away last month.*   You all have my deepest gratitude.  Thank you.

The two weeks surrounding Dad’s passing were the most stressful of my entire life and it goes without saying that when I get stressed I do Stupid things and the greater the stress the greater the Stupid.

Two days before the funeral, I ripped through my closet looking for something to wear only to find that nothing fit (thank you Diabetic Medication).  I went shopping and found a dress, then stood in front of the two colors of pantyhose the store had in stock.  And I definitely needed pantyhose to disguise my poor un-tanned legs (thank you, shitty summer).  Light or dark.  Light or dark.  The dark ones were stupidly dark but the light ones were close to the actual colour of my legs, so those were the ones I grabbed.

And now…..a quick word on Anxiety.  There are going to be people at this funeral.  Even worse, Family people.  Family people who know every stupid thing I’ve ever done, have heard all the stories, have re-told all the stories and watched me humiliate myself in spectacular fashion on numerous occasions.  They aren’t terrible people; they just have knowledge I would rather they not have.  And the effort to avoid more humiliation in front of them fuels ever more anxiety.  To be honest, I’d rather stand in a crowd of strangers because those people have no point of reference to compare – they take me as I am, right at that moment, totally unaware that I’m a train wreck waiting to happen.  They’ll be just as surprised as I am when shit happens and it’s easier to avoid strangers than it is to live down the reputation that precedes me at family events.

Anyway, the morning of the funeral, I made myself a promise to just let it happen.  Take what comes with dignity and grace and hope for the best.  Deep breaths.

And it worked.  Until I was getting dressed and realized that those fucking pantyhose were too light!  So light, in fact, that my legs resembled something from The Walking Dead.  I would have tossed them and went au naturel except I hadn’t shaved my legs because I had Pantyhose!  That’s a terrifying choice to make on the day of your Father’s funeral – corpse legs or hairy legs.  I feel another ‘Typical Lori’ story coming.

Just forget about it, Lori.  There’s nothing you can do about it now so stop beating yourself up. 

And that worked brilliantly until I got in the car and saw my legs stretched out in front of me.

Geezus!

via GIPHY

I almost chickened out completely at the Funeral Home, but I put my chin up and wiggled my way through the crowd.  I found the Funeral Director in the middle of the foyer and asked where Mom was – in the Family Room, of course.    I was relieved for exactly 23 seconds until I realized the Family Room was filled with Family.  White spots started dancing at the edge of my vision and my chest tightened.  Fuck me!  I immediately looked for the Sister I was most comfortable with and headed in that direction before I passed out.  Everyone was looking.  Probably without judgement but that would end as soon as they saw myfuckinglegs!

I sat down on a sofa behind my Sister and said, “Look at my legs!  They look like CORPSE legs!”  She turned around, most likely to tell me to keep my voice down when discussing corpses at this particular moment but before she could say anything, I lifted a leg and made point-y/stabby motions at it.  “CORPSE LEGS!”

And then my mind froze, and my vision darkened.  Did I just say the word “Corpse” at a Funeral?  My Dad’s funeral?  Christ!  Not only did I say it, but I shouted it, didn’t I?  Everyone in the entire building heard me compare my legs to a corpse.  In a building built specifically for corpses.  Sweet Jesus!

via GIPHY

At the Luncheon in the Seniors Centre, I hoped to get a cup of coffee and a dark corner.  That wasn’t to be, though.  What followed was a wonderful/terrifying hour of hugging and exchanging pleasantries.  People who were friends of Mom and Dad, came to introduce themselves and they were so kind and sweet.  One of them had been wanting to meet me because my Dad always talked about me.  Oh Gawd!  Really?  What stories do you know?!  A teacher from 6th grade came over.  “Mrs. Venables?!”  She had been hoping to see me, too.  Oh Gawd!   Please don’t tell an embarrassing story from 6th grade.  I hoped I wasn’t the only person in the family she was hoping to see.  My favorite cousins were there, and it was so wonderful to see them again, too.  There were many others and, joy of joys, no one told a humiliating story about me even once.

That I heard, anyway, but I’m willing to accept that as a win.

So, I lived through it.  None of my worst nightmares happened.  I was worried for no reason at all and I should learn from this experience.  Besides, no one will remember my Corpse Legs by next week anyway.  Or will they?

Pre-booking my next Anxiety Attack now.

* Especially you, Catherine – the card was perfect!  Cherie did excellent!  Give him a hug for us.

R.I.P DAD

My Father passed away August 23, 2019 and we laid him to rest on August 30, 2019 – he was 81 years old.  The funeral was stiff and religious and everything that He wasn’t.  I give my sisters and I a bit of grace because we’ve never planned a funeral before and the only Funeral Home in town gave less than stellar services.

The largest complaint I have about the service, aside from all the praying, was the Eulogy.

Written by me.

In a sweating panic of fear and confusion.

I had 6 tabs open on Google with examples and instructions for writing the perfect Eulogy and it didn’t help in the slightest.  I spent 5 hours banging my head on the keyboard, swearing liberally and snapping at The Viking every time he walked in the door.  I sent a frantic, curse-y, all-caps Messenger post to my sisters vowing off even going to the funeral.  I was utterly humiliated by the end result because it did no justice to my Father.

The largest obstacle, for me, was the person who would be reading the Eulogy – a devout, religious man who “wouldn’t say ‘Shit’ even if he had a mouthful of it”*.  He is a perfectly wonderful man but my Father was the antithesis of a devout and religious man.   I have very few humorous stories of Dad that don’t involve sex or bodily functions and those are exactly the type of stories that could cause a devout and religious man to pass out at the podium.

I don’t know why Dad specifically requested this man to give the Eulogy.  Perhaps he couldn’t think of anyone else?  Who knows?  I also don’t know if I should have been the one to write the Eulogy because it’s more than just a little obvious that no religious, devout man would happily read anything I’ve written, especially in front of a full house of mourners.  There was a single horrifying suggestion that I stand up in front of all those people and give the Eulogy, but the only way that was going to happen was if someone bodily dragged me, kicking and screaming and summoning demons, to the front of the room and physically tied me to the podium.  Watching me try to talk to more than 3 people at a time is like watching an explosive train derailment in slow and graphic detail.  No one should be subjected to that, and, frankly, I deserve points for recognizing that fact.

To make up for the ‘Worst Eulogy in the History of the World’, I’ve decided to post what I would rather have written.  So, here goes….

Dad was the only son of an only son, born in New Mexico, USA on May 9, 1938.  He grew up being the centre of attention until his young life fell apart.  His father died when Dad was 9 years old and his mother died when he was 11 years old.  An Aunt from Canada brought him to Alberta when he was 12.

Not one to dwell on tragedy, Dad decided his main occupation was to enjoy life and either amuse or disturb anyone and everyone around him.  If he hasn’t offended you at some point in time, you probably didn’t know him.  He was always telling you “where the bear shit in the buckwheat” and “don’t eat that Harry, that’s Horseshit!”  He loved to “poke you with a sharp stick” then sit back and see what happened.

There was always a joke on deck; a gross one if he were sharing it with men, and only slightly less gross if he were sharing it with ladies.  And every once in a while he left someone bleeding in his wake as he pursued the next laugh.  He didn’t deliberately try to hurt people, it just happened while his sails were full and he was performing for his peeps.

Dad had another side to him, though.  He was the man who plastered mud on a bee sting and straightened the handlebar on my bike.  When a neighbourhood bully smacked a big rock with a bat and it hit me in the stomach, Dad hauled me to the kid’s father, pulled my shirt up and showed the damage.  The result was never in question once Dad was involved.

He taught us all to change a tire, check the oil and add fluids to our vehicles.  We all learned to drive in a red Ford Courier truck – no power steering, no power brakes, a 4-speed manual transmission.  We learned how to saddle a horse and ride.  How to chop wood and build a campfire.  We all learned to work hard and to take pride in everything we do.  He was MacGyver and John Wayne rolled into one – he could do and/or fix anything.  I asked him once if he minded having 4 girls and no son.  Without a thought, he said “There isn’t a single thing that a girl can’t do, that a boy can, except pee standing up.”  Of course, we all know that girls can pee standing up too, but we are definitely less accurate.  He made his point though.

When Dad walked into a room, everyone knew he was there; he wasn’t a man to be ignored.  Not for long, at any rate.  He was hard-headed and stubborn as a rock.  He rubbed people the wrong way many times and offended others and blustered his way through delicate situations like a Sherman Tank.  If there was a chance to ‘torment’ you, rest assured he would find it.  If you happened to disagree with him, his eyes would spark and snap and he would carefully and quietly tell you exactly how and why you were wrong and that was the end of that.

He was also the man who listened to an excuse and told you to find your ‘sympathy’ between ‘shit’ and ‘syphilis’ in the dictionary.   He was the guy who explained what an Orgy was when I was 8 years old and saw the word scratched on the bathroom wall at school:

“You know that thing under the bridge in the story Three Billy Goats Gruff?  Well that was an Ogre and when it’s just one Ogre, it’s called an Ogre.  But when you have more than one, like two or three of them, they are called an Orgy.  And do you know what more than three Ogres are called?  An Orgasm!”  

Truth.  Seriously.

It was always ‘colder than a well-digger’s ass’ or a ‘witch’s tit’ depending on his mood and things always worked ‘slick as goose shit in a tin horn’ whatever that meant.  He sang songs like:

She was a great big fat girl twice the size of me

And you ought to see her when she squats to pee

She has hair on her snatch like the branches on a tree

Oh Nellie put your belly next to me**

Or….

I love to go swimming with bow-legged women and swim between their legs

There were plenty more of them, too.  At a family reunion about 10 years ago, my sisters and I realized that we only knew the naughty version of nearly every campfire song ever written.  We opted out of the sing-along in favour of another activity, obviously.

Dad loved life and loved people and loved a good joke.  He was happiest in the middle of a crowded room, bull-shitting and swapping stories.  And, he was the best story-teller I’ve ever met and I’ve met my share of story-tellers.  He was honest and hard-working and always ready to lend a hand, as long as you understood who would now be in charge.  He was a Construction Foreman in the Oil Patch after all, and he knew how to get things done.

The last couple of years were difficult for Dad.  Cancer didn’t care how tough he was or how angry he got.  It wouldn’t be bullied or intimidated or ignored.  He never gave in to despair though, and he didn’t go without a helluva fight.

He was the rock in the family, steady and dependable and always there if we needed him.

And we loved him.  Rest in Peace, Dad.

He leaves his wife, Lois, 4 Daughters, 10 Grandchildren and 6 Great Grandchildren.  The world is a poorer place without him.

 

*Another of Dad’s favorite sayings.

**Honestly.  Can you see a devout and religious man reciting this?