My Mom Told Me, "Stop Beating A Dead Horse"...

Am I the only one who finds it even remotely humorous that I, at 30 years old after having graduated from college and served over a decade in the military with all the requisite bullshit that comes with that am still subject to her shit.

Basically, what I am saying is that even though I have managed, for the most part, to cut the apron strings and spend the majority of my adult life (with a few notable exceptions) out from under her autocratic rule. I still find myself doing what she tells me to. Maybe I am a mama's boy, but quite frankly I don't give a shit. She's cool, She's the mom.

So I am going to get off the "making fun of my chain of command" thing for a bit here. Which is what she was referring to with the "dead horse" comment. And I am going to show my loving affection for my dear old mother, and I am going to show that affection the only way that I know how. I am going to make fun of her...mercilessly! (She said it was OK)

First story.

This one happened when I was a baby. So I don't remember it, but it has been relayed to me several thousand times over my life and I am relaying it to you.

My mom used to sing to me, like so many other mothers, she sang "You Are My Sunshine" Which I am pretty sure was written just for me, because well...I am a bright fucking ray of sunshine! Aren't I. Anyways, I would fall asleep to her singing me this song. Now I learned later on in life, in church no less, that my mother has the singing voice of a wounded wildebeest. So my father said, quite accurately I believe that I would fall asleep so that she would stop singing! Anyone who has ever heard my mother sing would agree.

Second story.

So one day my mom, my kid brother and I go to McDonald's. She pulls the car up to the drive through and we are behind a couple of cars and she starts asking us what we want and we tell her. So one of the cars pulls up and she thinks that it is our turn. She pulls up, and turns from us and starts shouting our order into...a TRASH CAN. Now I guess that could be chalked up as an honest mistake, but immediately thereafter my brother and I start laughing at her. She turns back to us, and asks what the hell we are laughing at, and we don't tell her. Why would we this is too much fun. Then she turns back and starts asking the trash can if it had gotten our order. Finally after conversing forcefully with the trash can for about a minute she finally realized her mistake and quickly pulled forward all the while cussing my brother and I out as we continued to laugh hysterically at her.

Third story.

My mom and I were in the car when I was in junior high I think. So we always had trouble with the windows. We could never agree on up or down. So she had finally got a car with power windows so that she could control them from her seat. And lock them so I couldn't undo her evil window plans. So one day I decided to play a little joke on her. She was rolling up my window as we got onto the expressway and right as it got to the top I put my fingers up to the top of the window. Not in the window, but from her side of the car it probably looked a lot like my fingers were caught in the window. Then at about 60 MPH I started to scream in pain. I think that this was my most ill-conceived joke I have ever played on my mother. Why? Because she damn near killed us both. She swerved across three lanes of Chicago traffic while trying frantically to roll down my window. My faux screams of pain, became real screams of terror! I made myself a promise that I would not play any more jokes on the mom while in a moving vehicle. Not out of sympathy for her, but out of concern for my own self preservation.

Fourth & Final Story.

My mom is terrified, absolutely, totally, completely, ridiculously afraid of snakes. Now I grew up near a holding pond, that had little gardner snakes. Not poisonous or anything, but just enough snake to scare the living shit out of her. So I was playing with one when I was a kid, I guess I was about 10 or 11 or something like that. I don't remember exactly what happened but I managed to stick this snake into my mom's bag of clothes pins that she kept in the back yard for hanging up clothes. And I proceeded to forget that the snake was in there. And my mom brought the bag back into the house and put it away. So the next day she wanted to hang up some clothes, so she went in the cupboard to get the bag and what did she find? He clothes pins were moving, so she stuck her hand in there and she damn near had a heart attack. Now being a young kid and not wanting to die prior to puberty I wisely kept the fact that I had put the snake there to myself. Oh yeah, she ran away from the bag screaming and called my grandfather to come and get the snake out of the house. So for years she thought that this little snake had managed to crawl into the bag on its own and she had accidentally brought it in with the clothes.

The next part of this story is tough, because I am not sure that words could do it justice. But I'll try.

So when I was 24 I got married. We had the ceremony and blah blah blah, and we get to restaurant where the party is going to be. And my auntie, God bless her big mouth, says, "Hey isn't there something you should tell your mom" She wheels around and looks right at me like I am about to tell her that this is really a shotgun wedding and my new bride is 2 months pregnant. If I remember correctly, I think she balled her fists in order to pummel me if that was in fact the case.

I looked at her, and related the story of how the snake really got there.

All I can really say is her jaw hit the floor, the look of surprise and utter disbelief is pretty much indescribable.

When she finally regained her composure she unclenched her fists, called me few choice names, and started laughing about the whole thing.

Luckily, this episode taught me what the statute of limitations is on crimes against my mother. 13 or 14 years. Which is good because I have a few things that will be fun to tell her in 7 or 8 more years!

I am done for now.

Later,

I love you mom...