There was a lot that I needed to catch up on today, and it still feels like I’m hopelessly behind, but I kicked things off this morning with a 1.5 mile walk. The PT said to limit myself to a mile at a time for now, since I’m usually dragging my left leg and shaking by the end of longer walks, but that was already happening at the one-mile mark so I elected to push it a bit anyway.
When solo, I either listen to library audio books or wander in silence, often thinking through something I’m writing (or soon to write). Today I made a deliberate choice not to think about my family, which is in chaos at the moment as Tom continues her descent into madness. The drama rests solely with her and our parents; the rest of us siblings are on the sidelines, though she keeps trying to drag us into it in messy, childish ways.
Crankenstein’s surprised, almost guileless reaction to so much of it reminds me of my ex, who disliked my parents and Tom a great deal. Despite her clouded vision in other interpersonal matters, she saw them quite clearly and encouraged me to disentangle myself from their dysfunction. It was the first time in my life that anyone silently observed our dynamics up close and said “They take advantage of you and it’s wrong,” which was quite a profound experience after a lifetime of dutifully doing, and sacrificing, whatever my parents unreasonably asked.
Later, Crankenstein noticed some of the same things, but there was also a lot she didn’t see for assorted reasons: she was busy, for starters, or inattentive, or she simply didn’t want to see it. My family is, at its best, fairly close to her ideal: big, boisterous, tight-knit, quick to poke fun at each other and end disagreements with mutual jokes. The scales have fallen from her eyes with this Tom saga, particularly when it comes to longstanding issues pretty much all of us but Felix have with my mother, and she finds it disappointing.
I detailed some of our mother-daughter angst in an old post called “Lonely Girls,” which only scratched the surface of a difficult relationship I’ve wanted to walk away from at times but never have. For one thing, I’m not sure my mom could handle a separation. But also, what purpose would it serve? There are parents so horrible that I understand why their kids completely sever ties, but mine aren’t in that category. The troubled parts of our past will always exist, but so will the nicer parts and the potential for a healthier future — unless Tom, who’s trying to pit them against their other progeny, gets her way.
Wherever it was I was going with this has been lost in a sleepy haze, but it had something to do with how odd it is that it’s apparently taken Crankenstein 10 years to understand that I’ve known who my mom is all along. It makes me wonder whether Crankenstein understands that I’ve also known who I am all along, and that I know who she is, too. And it makes me feel bad for her, because I know how much she wanted my mom to be someone she wasn’t — she wanted it almost as much as I once did.
On a happier note: I could (sort of) taste again today and smelled some of the disinfectants I used to clean the bathrooms earlier. Muriel is still odorless, though, which is disconcerting.** And Auntie V is about to return on Eight is Enough, her luggage hopefully packed with only the finest wigs, caftans and kimonos. I’ll cover it tomorrow, time permitting.
* “Some Girls’ Mothers Are Bigger Than Other Girls’ Mothers” was too unwieldy a title for such a slight post.
** Phantom smells (primarily smoke) were one of my earliest YOPD rumblings, and over the last year or two my sense of smell diminished enough that Crankenstein — a perfume and candle aficionado who’s always shoving things under my nose and asking for an opinion — noticed. But I never had any trouble detecting Muriel’s signature dog scents prior to Covid. All will be right with the world when she tries to lick my face and I almost pass out from the disgustingness again, or when I can bury my face in her scruff and honestly coo, “You smell faintly of corn chips today, my little Frito Bandito. What should we dip you in? Cream cheese? Chili? Refried beans?!”