Jeez Louise

I’m just going to get this out of the way right now, right at the beginning, so that there’s no room for doubt: My family is insane. Insane. Not in a “Oh we are so nutty! Look at us all lip-synching to Martha and the Vandellas while wearing our pyjamas!” way. More like a “Everyone’s yelling! Now everyone’s crying! Now more yelling! Oh no now we’re all going to pretend like absolutely nothing happened but the rage! the rage is seeeeething!” kind of way. Dramatics (I’ve gotten the best of all the heritages– French and Irish for absolute Whitney Houston Batshit Crazy Drama, with Scottish thrown in for thriftiness) and grudge-keeping, huge huge love and profound sadness and manic happiness. That’s us.

This does not in any way stop me from loving my family. I love them fiercely and I would do just about anything for each and every one of them. Everyone in my family, no matter how much I bitch about them here, is an amazing person and I wouldn’t change them– yeah, you heard me, I wouldn’t change them. Please keep that in mind as you read the following episode of Basement Dwelling:

The Players:

Mom. She’s my mother, what can I say? The French half (well, french and native). You can read more about her bad side over here at Rob’s blog. She’s forever pessimistic, negative, as if she can’t bear to think that anything will ever turn out properly. It’s like she’s taken on the role of the Bearer of Bad News and is quite serious about it. Oh, and Maman is very, VERY much set in her own ways. If something doesn’t go her way, she tends to pout.
She’s also very loving and the best mom I’ve ever had.

Dad. I tend to think of him as long-suffering and stoic, just putting up with Mom and her shenanigans, but I know that he’s not perfect, exactly. He’s where I get my ‘bottling up of all emotions until they explode in a fiery dramatic supernova’ bit. Since his illness last year he’s more and more frustrated, because he’s not allowed to do lots of the things he used to enjoy, such as smoking and drinking bacon fat while not exercising ever. He also, at the age of 58, works the night shift on occasion. This is important to the story. He has a wicked sense of humour and will do just about anything he possibly can for his family.

My brother and sister-in-law. They’ve been married for uhm… six years? Before they were married, she had never lived away from her parents, nor did she want to. In fact, they lived with her parents for nearly three years after they were married, because she didn’t want to be too far from her mom (she’s the youngest of five kids, and the only girl, and is pretty used to getting her way). Even now, they live right next door to her parents. My brother basically doesn’t put his foot down about anything having to do with this even though he’s not best pleased with their living situation. He works an hour and a half away from where they live, and when he suggests moving to be closer to his work, as she isn’t working outside the home at the moment, she cries, so he drops the subject. They have two kids who are awesome and they are great parents, both of them. I really do like the sister-in-law. I do.

My sister. She’s… gah. She is so infuriating. I don’t know how to describe her without sounding as though I hate her, which I don’t. She loves her three kids. She’s been through a lot of crap in her marriage, which is thankfully ending now, but she’s having a really hard time of it. Still though– they’ve been separated for a year and a half and her ex hasn’t paid a cent of child support, they’re having to eat from the food bank and she couldn’t even buy gifts for her kids for Christmas, but does she try to have the child support order enforced? No. And whenever her ex (who lives in NS, and makes absolutely no effort to see the kids– he’s seen them twice in 2005 – once this summer and once over Christmas) demands his “parental rights” she just says okay. Also she’s gotten it into her head that if she mentions the words “panic attack” it will get her out of any uncomfortable situations (I am not saying that a panic attack is not a legitimate problem. I’ve had panic attacks. They’re nothing to laugh at. But she’s one of those who overdramatizes everything and… argh. You know) so she has “panic attacks” every seventeen seconds. Argument? Panic attack. Kids getting bad grades? Panic attack. No milk? Panic attack.

Me and Rob We are definitely not perfect. You know us, because you’ve been reading our blogs. I’m whiny and neurotic. He farts and then laughs when I start crying and yelling “WHY ROB WHY?!”. You know.

The scene:

Rob and I are hiding out in our basement suite (okay, one room). December 22nd. Mom calls downstairs.

“Louise, could you come up here for a minute?”

I go upstairs. I look around for my mother, and finally find her, in her room, in her bed.

“Hi Mom. What’s going on? It’s only 3 pm- are you feeling ok–”.

“YOU FIGURE OUT WHAT IS GOING ON FOR CHRISTMAS BECAUSE I’M SICK AND TIRED OF THIS I MIGHT AS WELL JUST BURN DOWN THE TREE AND FORGET ALL ABOUT CHRISTMAS. I’M NOT COMING OUT OF MY BED UNTIL THIS IS ALL FIGURED OUT”.

“Wha–?”

“JUST GO FIGURE IT OUT! NONE OF THESE PEOPLE ARE EVEN THINKING AND NEXT YEAR WE ARE CANCELLING CHRISTMAS AND YOU CAN ALL JUST STAY HOME AND YOUR FATHER AND I WILL DISAPPEAR AND YOU WON’T KNOW WHERE WE ARE!”

“MOM WHAT IS GOING ON?!”

“I’M NOT TALKING ABOUT THIS ANYMORE! GO FIGURE IT OUT!”

So. My father, during this time, was in the backyard looking at a tree or something (he tends to disappear when Mom’s drama erupts. I wish I could). I eventually figured out, through phone calls to my sister and brother, what was going on.

Christmas day has always– for the past 15 years, since my sister got married and moved away from home– been at my parents’ house. Generally with my sister, her inlaws celebrate Christmas on the 24th– they open their gifts on xmas eve, have their turkey, all that, so it all worked out. When my brother got married, it turned out that that’s the way my sister-in-law’s family celebrates too, so there was no problem just continuing the routine. Rob and I, being the eternal vagabonds, have travelled here for the past 2 Christmasses. Well, last year we only managed to get here on the 27th but we gave them plenty of warning.

So. Fine. In anticipation of Christmas going just as it always had, Mom decorated the house, bought the turkey, baked the pies, etc. etc. etc. And then, on the afternoon of the 22nd (three days before Christmas, which she’d been preparing for for a month), she received an email from my sister-in-law.

“Hi there,
Just wanted to let you know that we’re not going to be coming up to your place on Christmas Day. We decided that it’s too much work with two babies. We can come on the 26th instead, or you guys can come here for lunch on the 25th”.

Here were the problems with that one: Dad was working on the 24th, from 6 pm until 6 am on the 25th. Instead of him getting to sleep from 6 until 1 or so when people usually show up on Christmas day, he’d have to spend two hours in the car on the way to their place. He’s OLD! His heart is in danger! He can’t DO THAT! When my mom suggested going there for Christmas supper so that dad could at least get a few hours’ sleep before heading out on the road, in came my sister’s problems. Her ex had asked to have their three kids from 5 pm on the 25th until 5 pm on the 30th and she’d agreed to it. She couldn’t back out! (although he had agreed not to have sex with everyone else he saw when they were married, and totally backed out of that one) So if we went for supper, her kids wouldn’t be there! And I mean, they’re 3/5ths of my parents’ grandkids, they didn’t want Christmas without them. The 26th wouldn’t work out either, for postponing the celebration, because, well, again my sister’s kids couldn’t be there.

Anyway. Mom tried to work something out with my sister, saying maybe the ex could have the kids at 7 on Christmas instead of 5, could she ask him if that was okay? but my sister screamed at her that she was making her have a panic attack and hung up on her, and Mom took to her bed– that’s where this whole thing started.

I tried to figure things out, and asked my sister for help because how come I’m always the one who is supposed to figure this stuff out?, but she told me that she couldn’t help because the whole thing was making her have a panic attack and then she hung up on me.

Dad finally came in from the backyard and he and I talked and it was decided that he would just stay awake and we’d go to my brother’s for lunch. So that’s what we did.

Just as we got there, my sister said “Oh, guess what? After all this drama, turns out {ex} is leaving to go back to NS tonight anyway so we totally could have had Christmas tomorrow!”

GAH.

Mom did get out of bed. She didn’t burn down the tree. I cried, but then I always cry. Dad fell asleep in his chair during the present opening. Rob whispered in my ear that next year, we were going to his parents’ and I am SO on board for that.

*saves for plane tickets*