I was Raised this Way
My Mum reminds me of Marge Simpson – a devoted housewife that everyone depends on. Just like Marge, my mum can pull out her mad skill whenever the need fills her – she sometimes needs to prove she can seriously kick some ass. However, as like Marge, my Mum always realises this isn’t her life path and puts her apron back on – she is a homebody.
Thankfully, my Dad is not like Marge’s husband – unlike Homer, my Dad is a workaholic, he “fucken loves beer” and does what my Mum tells him. These two people are seriously made for each other. They’ve been together since my Mum was 15, she had her first child at 19 and she always sent us three kids and my Dad off to school/work with delicious packed lunches every day. One day while eating my ham, tomato, cucumber, cheese and lettuce sandwiches – with just the right amount of salt and pepper – one of my school friends looked at my sandwiches with envy. “Sooooo, what’s on your sandwich today?” – I told him – “but how do you keep the bread from going soggy?” he asked. I explained I didn’t know and perhaps my mum encloses the filling with lettuce…? “I’ve just got marmite on my sandwiches again” he said with glum repulsion.
I don’t know why my Mum continued to be so nice to us into our high school years. As kids we were the equivalent of satan’s spawn themselves. My favourite game was antagonising my Mum so bad that she’d finally lose her shit, takeoff her jandal and chase me down the passage way trying to swipe my naked ass. Each dodged swipe made her furious, which in turn made me laugh louder. I would run in front of her with my white, fluffy hair all matted into a birds nest at the back. I’d try and grab glimpses at my Mum running after me winding up for the next swipe so I could dodge it right in the nic of time – the point of the game was to make her think she was actually going to get me while in mid swing. I’d dodge right at the last millisecond – best game in the world! I think this is why I enjoy sport so much to this very day.
Alas, my mum was clever enough to realise I would never take my punishment seriously, so she gave up and told me to “wait till your father comes home -you won’t be laughing then”. All day, she’d remind me – “your Dad’s going to be home in a couple of hours. Hope you’re ready for a hiding” she’d warn. “When your Dad was naughty as a kid, your Granddad would whip his ass into shape with a stick – bet he’ll use the same punishment on you!” she berated me.
I told her with bravado that I wasn’t scared – but I was. I was sent to my room to wait for my punishment. I was scared frozen. All I could do was sit in the middle of my room and try to think of ways to get out of this. Maybe I could run away – nah can’t get any food together. Maybe I could hide in the garage – nah too cold. Maybe I could just say sorry – nah I’m not sorry. After a while, I heard the dreaded sound of the door open and close as my Dad arrived home – this made my stomach drop and I envisioned having to go and find my own stick and then be beaten until I was made to say sorry. I could hear them murmuring and then long silences, and then snorts of laughter – which I thought was seriously evil. How could my own mother think getting a hiding was funny?! Maybe I had taken things too far – I was starting to doubt myself.
Finally my Mum came to get me from my room. “Come on you. Your father is very mad with you”. She made me walk in front of her and was nudging me in between my shoulder blades to make me walk in the direction of the lounge. My Dad was standing in front of the TV with a belt. He had folded the belt in half so it was doubled over and had each end of the folded belt grasped in his adjacent fists. He brought his two fists together so his thumb and forefinger knuckles were touching. He then swiftly pulled his fists away from each other so the belt made a slapping noise.
Well! I just laughed and dropped to the floor, clasped his ankle into a bear hug and yelled “pull me along the floor Dad!” Which he did. We all laughed, joked and played but not without a talk on how I should be nice to my mother. Yes Dad, I will – I promised.
With having parents so young, growing up was really fun -but it was a real strain on them financially and socially. With this strain, came the need to ensure us kids had more than they did. They encouraged us to have a career and see the world before settling down with the person of our choice and have kids only when we have the financial means and support to do so.
My late Grandmother however had a differing want. The moment each of us grandkids would turn thirteen, my Grandmother would ask “when am I getting a great grandchild?” My mother was so proud of my response – which was passed down from my older cousin and sister – “oh no, don’t look at me for that” I said, and I confidently pointed her in the direction of my brother who was next in line to turn thirteen. None the less, my mother was in no way ready to be a grandmother at the age of 34 and she wasn’t about to take any risks. She immediately pulled me aside, as she had done with my older sister when she was thirteen. “Don’t you dare” she hissed in my ear “don’t….you…..dare….do that to me”.
Filed under Uncategorized | Comment (0)
I have a Cat
My cat loves me. She always wants to be near me, she waits for me outside the bathroom door and I’m pretty certain she would take a bullet for me. She considers herself to be my protector and she takes this responsibility very seriously.
When men come into my life, she makes her presence known with immediate effect. If we’re sitting at the dining room table chatting and having a coffee, she will jump up and sit right in front of my face with her back to my man-friend. If we’re watching a movie on the sofa, she will creep up behind him and lick his head until he moves. If she can’t lick him away, she will sit on his knee and fart.
I find men are very weirded out by my cats’ behaviour. They often feel threatened and accuse her of being jealous of them and ultimately get into a ridiculous power struggle with her – but she always wins.
I am willing to consider I could be wrong, maybe it’s not the ridiculous male ego that’s the problem – perhaps it is simply that age old ‘crazy cat lady’ syndrome. If a single woman over the age of 30 dares have a cat, it appears she is looked upon as being ‘mentally ill’. In any case, I find my cat is a good ally to have around in the game of culling out these short sighted idiots. And she really seems to enjoy her role in my odd family – made up of me, my cat and my chickens.
One man-friend, who I shall call ‘The Ego’, had a particular problem with my cat and got into quite an avid power struggle with her. He would do mean things to her like shoo her off the sofa, he wouldn’t let her into the house unless she waited quietly for a least five minutes and he wouldn’t let her stay inside when raining and no one was home. In response, my cat would jump up on my knee and start purring and smooching her head under my chin, all while looking smugly at The Ego. Even though The Ego was trying to pretend my cat didn’t bother him, he was quite annoyed at this apparent ‘fuck you’ and things escalated pretty fast.
One morning, The Ego was heading out the front door and was eerily faced with my cat looking up at him jarringly and with blatant intent. As he hesitantly stepped out the door towards her, she turned and started running in front of him, plopping poos as she went. Her evil plan was to get him to chase her, all the while stepping in her trail of poo. He was too clever for this and saw straight through her game. He placed little pieces of wood on each poo and texted me to ‘beware of the cat shit at the front door’. He was concerned for my clean shoes you see – Tui ad right there.
Even with all the effort to hide his fury, I could tell The Ego took my cats’ defiance personally. That night, after work, he decided a meeting needed to be held about her. “She has some kind of bowl problem” – he stated with all the seriousness of a qualified vet – “and I think she needs to be put down”. Instead of acting as he would have liked, by bawling and saying: “oh my superior that is man, I realise you know best, as I am but a mere, dumb, blonde woman…. “, I simply explained that my cat didn’t like him and, quite frankly, she’s a very good judge of character.
“Well! It’s me or the cat!!” he spat with superior grandeur.
If my cat lays a massive shit an elephant would be proud of, inside the house or at the front door, I know I have done something to upset her. She mostly gets upset with overcrowding the house with a lot of visitors at once. If she is visibly upset, I will dote on her and try to make her more comfortable – my house is her house after all. If men can’t take me for all I am – cat, chickens, career, independence, prosperity and all, they can fuck off.
Filed under Uncategorized | Comment (0)