Here's what was in it (don't look at the mess on the floor behind it):
Pickles (dills, spicy dills, sweets and spicy sweets)....she wins awards at the Minnesota State Fair for these pickles...and preserves (strawberry & blackberry), and honey toffee (these she didn't make, but picked up in the Ag building at the State Fair).
You know how I was feeling like I wanted someone there...I wanted community and just companionship...well just getting this package felt like getting a little bit of that when this arrived. Just enough to get me through the day.
And, of course, this was tucked into the top of one of the boxes...a bit of my mother's humor, which now everyone who works for FedEx has experienced:
And yet in the midst of all this goodness and love, the following feelings also came up:
"I love my mother a great deal, but she is one of the reasons that I feel like I go through life communicating in code. I can never be straight forward about what I feel about anything, it seems, and I recognize from her and our interactions, how this began. And this is rearing it's ugly head for me right now...this code. I feel sometimes like I can hardly say fully or be seen in all the good and bad parts of me. I can't make myself vulnerable in that way because I was raised by someone who wouldn't/couldn't see the bad in the world - who denied it, and to be a part of her world, I cut off a part of me. It's not her fault really...she did what she had to do to cope with a husband who rarely saw the good in anything, especially himself. For a long time, I thought I was more like her...now I worry I'm more like him...and in reality I'm some fucked up combination of them both."
It can never be just about getting pickles, can it?
I got to talk to WritingInAK last night, briefly. Things are going to be tough going for her and E, but it sounds like they have a lot of willing support from friends and family. I'll have to go looking for some reading material for her tomorrow...
11 comments:
Pickles! Pickles pickles pickles for me! Oh I mean you, I mean us :) hee hee. Interchangeable evidence #27589:
I woke up this morning from a nightmare where I was screaming at my mom. I woke up with a clenched jaw and sweaty pajamas feeling guilty. thankfully i will bleed any second.
I think a party is just what you need, especially one in your honor. :)
Parents are never easy. For me it was more about my father, though my mother of course played her part. No, it seems pickles are rarely allowed to be pickles. But whatever influence your parents had on your developement, I think you're a pretty wonderful, caring person who deserves the best from life. So there. ;0)
I'm so glad that your friends have support to help see them through. My best wishes to them as they continue to recover.
Fox - thanks for that...it's amazing and confusing, init?
HC - so mom only sent pints of sweets, but should I bring some (and dills) to the party friday?
Aravis - I definitely have father stuff too, but I'm really just starting to deal with mom issues. Layers upon layers is what it all is.
What are these bad aspects you think you may have inherited? They are not apparent.
yes, parents are complicated, though.
red
Red - the bad side of me would be anything that was painful or hurting...the part that didn't (and still doesn't) like my body. The part of me that is angry. The part of me that has issues with my sister...Oh, I could go on all day.
I know that those things aren't "bad" per se. Or I should say that my rational brain knows that, but that's how it got translated when I couldn't voice it. There's a part of me that goes around feeling like a big fraud - if everyone just knew the real me, they'd run screaming in the other direction.
Not very nice to you, my friends, is it? Because then you are all just easily fooled push-overs.
Okay, enough therapizing today.
SHOULD you bring pickles? I'm not letting you in the door without them! No just kidding, I love you WAY more than pickles :) Please bring them tho'
...and thanks for the New Year's wishes!
Mothers love to send care packages. I'm 48, and Mom still sends them. Aren't they great?
Ok these things are going around the net and I'm making up my own too. You can answer any way you like: email, bulleting, blog, whatever.
Don't try and pull any gender crap, you have to answer!
1) What's your favorite color of nail polish?
2) What's your favorite place to kiss someone else besides the lips (on your face)?
3) What's your favorite place you like to be kissed, besides, etc etc?
4) What's your favorite pasta shape?
5) What big lie did you get away with when you were younger?
6) What big lie have you been busted for?
7) Who are 3 famous people you'd love to date (if you are partnered, then answer as if you were single)?
8) Who would you most like to smack for being an ass?
9) What are 3 states you'd most like to try living in for a couple of months?
1o) What is one thing about me that you don't know that you are (even mildly) curious about?
That pickle picture has me drooling!
Don't we all think that we are fooling the others at least some of the time? I know I get those feelings or negative thoughts that make me question whether I'm worthy of other's love or not. I guess though, by now I also have enough examples of positive parts of myself to carry me through when I face the less desireable parts. But that is what a true friendship is, taking the good and the bad, and finding a balance somewhere in there. And for me also not being scared of letting what I feel is ugly in me get out and shared with some friends that I know, or hope, can take it.
I agree with p'tit-loup. I think we all feel like frauds sometimes. It doesn't mean that we really are. We're not always the best judges of our own character, filtered as our opinions are by baggage from the past. You're not perfect and you're never going to be. None of us are. But you can still be pretty spectacular, and you are.
I had about a 1/3 a jar of those dills tonight. Nummy!
You all rock!
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