'tis the season to consume some valium

fa-la la la la, la la-laaaah!

gentle readers, please excuse my absence for the last four months. and i apologize if anyone was left to worry that mam and i met our untimely demise at the hands of our white-trash neighbors after playing "dude, who hit my car" one too many times. and quite sadly no, white-trash neighbors did not sell their house (damn you, bursting housing bubble!) and until the day the bank forecloses on their property, white trash momma continues to share our driveway.

but that's not really why i have been so negligent in posting here... i think i alerted folks to the other housing nightmare i would soon be embarking on -- helping my mother sell her house.

in the midst of talking my mother out of her own self-induced anxiety attacks, i also managed to pull together 3 sample chapters and full book proposal for the idea i pitched to a literary agent i met last year. it only took 12 months and whole lotta chutzpah to hit the send button on that one.

but really, the most pressing reason why i have neglected this space is my mother. between talking her out of buying a double-wide trailer in a 55-and-up ghetto fabulous development to avoiding her phone calls -- not once or twice a day, but upwards or three and four times(!), to dealing with her meltdowns when i don't help her take out the trash right now, well, she's one step away from having a fatal accident with her pillow if you catch my drift. as much as i probably needed to write about those events (and i may still in a few months when it's less painful and i can see the comic value in the experience), sadly, i must say i tipped back a few slugs of crown royal on the nights most worthy of such instead.

this latest asault, though is what causes most people that i've told to physically wince -- WINCE -- as in actual facial distortion at my impending doom.

my mother is coming to stay with us. for 6 weeks until she can move into her new place on january 4th, 2008.

SIX WEEKS, FORTY TWO DAYS and way-too-many hours to count. during the already touchy christmas season because for me, even the "regular" family get-togetherness the holidays bring is no day at the beach with all the leftover sand in the va-jay-jay irritation.

fa-la-fcucking-la. seriously, what gods have i pissed off to endure this? (true, there are probably so many...) and i know this sounds horrible, but what irritates me the most is the loss of freedom, and quite possibly, my adulthood that my new house guest will rob me of. "what time are you coming home tonight?" "are you still sleeping?" "what time will you be home from work?" i'll be a teenager all over again, only this time, i'm married with a mortage.

oh goddess, that's not the worst of it. save me from all of the talking!

mam and i have two loves -- sleeping in and silence. there are evenings where we don't speak to each other becuase i'll be writing in one room and he'll be watching tv in another. less talk-y, more do-y of other stuff. my fear is that my house guest will latch herself onto my earlob like a leech and force evil words into my head about such exciting topics as what she and her coworkers ate for lunch, who won dancing with the stars?, and the likes and dislikes are of the newest QVC host or hostess. if my head doesn't explode first, what's left of my brain my just leak out of the ear she's not presently attached to. shudder

say what you want about how evil i sound, but when she called me at work (cornered, if you want my honest opinion) and dropped her bomb, "i can stay with you, right? you're not going to leave me homeless, are you?" well, what do you say to that?

if my life was an episode of ally mcbeal, i'm sure what would follow would be a dream sequence of me screaming into the phone, "yes! by all means, bring your crazy-ass, stalker self directly into my home so then maybe, i won't think i'm crazy when i see a white car parked outside in my driveway that shouldn't be there just because i chose not to pick up your 7th phone call of the day to remind me of the dialogue in call number 6!"

instead, when trapped like a rat in a cage, i accepted my fate. there was no escape. if i said no, what are the alteratives for her? a hotel for 6 weeks? my brother's tiny condo? and goddess forbid, what if i did say no? it would have been less painful to brand myself with the scarlet BD (for bad daughter, natch) than to suffer what was sure to be the most egregious assault against a mother to date. all the breederly types in mothers-against-drunk driving and mothers-against-lead-based toys would surely pop my picture on billboard with such witty slogans as:

"what breaks a mother's heart? a bad daughter who refuses to shelter her homeless mother", or "pure evil" splashed against a particularly hideous picture of myself.

so in accepting my fate, i slowly said into the receiver. "yes, mom. you can stay here until your new house is ready." and ever since, i have been stockpiling wine like vineyards all over the world had simultaneously blew up, taking the world's supply of wine with it.

the moral of this post is if i'm not too drunk to hide with my laptop in a closet, i'll try to post more frequently. bear with me. momma is coming home.

dare i even say it, pray for me?