Catch up

I went home for mother’s day. Much to the delight of my mother, of course. We actually managed to spend the entire weekend without getting into a fight. It’s only happened a few times before. Perhaps I wasn’t home long enough? No matter, I think she had a good time and enjoyed all of her gifts. We did have the dreaded “when are you going to have a baby” conversation. Which apparently, was a common theme for the weekend. With my mom, it’s more like the “I guess you are going to be a horrible daughter and never give me grandchildren” talk. She’s resorted to calling the cat, the “grandcat.” A term I find appalling and called my mother out on the use as she has had this cat for 13 years – long before she was ready to have grandkids. But I digress. As we were in the car for the drive back from shopping, I realized that my mother had not stopped talking for at least a half hour. In fact the drive home was non-stop talking on her part. I managed to get a few comments in but really, she wouldn’t stop. I can see why my dad tunes out. I would.

Mother’s day was an odd one; spent the morning with my parents, stopped by a friends’ house on the way back to Seattle and then made it home just in time to see my in-laws. I then proceeded to make a horrible joke about MC to my MIL as she was telling me how wonderful he is. I’ll back up a little and give you the start of the exchange so you can really get a flavor for the conversation. It went something like this:

MIL: Your husband made us the most delicious dinner!
Me: Yes, MC (not his real name) told me he was cooking for you.
MIL: Well, it was just so delicious and such lovely presentation.

(By the way, I detest that she uses the term “your husband” to refer to her son, who has a NAME!)

* * *

MIL: He’s is just so thoughtful.
Me: :Yeah, he is...most of the time. (smirk on my face)
MIL: Oh no, for a man he really is very thoughtful.
Me: Oh sure, except when he eats all of my food...

I should know better than to dissuade my MIL from her belief that her son is PERFECT. Really, I should. I know that he’s thoughtful. But he isn’t PERFECT. No one is. It’s my own warped response to hearing a parent GUSH about their child. I don’t believe I have ever heard my mother gush about me. She’s more likely to insult me than praise me.
So my natural tendency is to make some snarky comment to bring a dose of reality into the situation. Let’s just say, it didn’t go over very well. I ‘confessed’ the whole incident to MC. He just gave me a bemused smile and I can assure you that he will forget all about it. I, on the other hand will do the same thing again and laugh about it later, because sometimes, I’m just not very nice.