War Update: He's Coming Home!!! Ruh roh.

Journal anzha's Journal: War Update: He's Coming Home!!! Ruh roh. 2

Journal by anzha on Friday June 11, 2004 @01:55PM

DoD has stated that my brother's unit, the 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment, is coming home by July 15th. They're not the only ones. The 1st Armored is coming home at the same time. The 2nd ACR was attached to the 1st AD for the recent unpleasantness in with al-Sadr.

*BALLOONS*

*CONFETTI*

He has survived some of the worst things that can happen to a man. Now, he has to deal with the rest.

*cue Psycho Music*

Our Mother.

You see, our mom is one of the craziest, yet uncertifiable, people left in the world. Worse than Shrub. Worse than Kerry. Worse than Dan Quayle. Worse than my ex wife - she at least had touch with reality!

Y'see, reality and our mother are at best passing ships in the night.

On the one hand, she's the caring Mom. On the other, even though I am a 30 yo, she still tries to run my life. Frex, when my gf and I started talking the M word, my mother tried to bull her way in to 'help' (in effect try to take over what was going to happen and when).

Afrex, y'see she and my father divorced my senior year of HS (more properly, my mother left my father). My mom's done really poorly since: my mother and money are like oil and water...no matter how ya try, they never properly mix. That was the source of my father and her getting a divorce. My father wanted to keep a very tight reign on my mother and money. It lead to some ubernasty fights. When their marriage counselor recommended that my father let my mother handle the family expenses - since she was a mature adult, verstehst? - she promptly waaaay overspent, screwed their credit, and was completely and utterly unable to balance the check book. My father took back over the expenses and everything went downhill from there. So, my mother left my father. She then wanted him to come chasing after her. My father finally said uncle and let her go (he'd gone chasing after her twice before). My father didn't date seriously for 5 years after that until he met my stepmother. Once he did, my mother stalked him because she felt they were meant to get back together. From there on, my father refused to even speak to her except through legal channels. My mother then took my father to court - note! *ALWAYS* keep copies of your child support checks. Don't depend on being able to get copies from the bank! *NEVER* give money in leiu of a CS payment. - and screwed him pretty good, but only about a 1/4 as thoroughly as she had tried to. She even said she did it out of spite and then blew the big windfall. *sighs* Now she keeps pining after him and wanting to at least be friends. I avoid most of this cuz I ran from home right after HS graduation and only met in person my family rather intermittantly.

*sighs*

Afrexa, because of my mother's ... inability ... yeah that's it...to deal with money, I offered to help her purchase a place to retire about 5 years ago. I told her so long as it was not too expensive, I'd be happy to. It was the an odd and old sense of obligation: kids get raised by parents and then take care of parents in their old age when they need it. At the time, I was earning about $40k. About a month after that, she called me after a big test at my last job. I'd been at work until about 4 am after being there for 16 hours. I had an hour drive home. The call was at 9am. She told me she'd found some land! It was 640 acres in Colorado. I tried, despite my exhaustion, from immediately lashing out and telling her she was off her rocker: maybe she was able to find an awesome bargain we couldn't turn away from...uh, um, no. After a verbal cornering, despite insisting that it was affordable, she confessed that it was 1.2 MILLION dollars. I immediately vetoed the whole thing and told her that if I devoted all my salary over the next 30 years to that leaving none for food, taxes, etc, I could only cover the payments towards the principle, forget the interest. I told her emphateticly no. We had a fight. She didn't talk to me for 2 months. Then I got another call stating that she'd found some land again. this time it was 960 acres. I cringed, but she stated that it was more affordable than the last. It was 'only' $780k. I vetoed again (I do want to get my own house) and we got into a fight. Of course. Over the next three months we had an argument about the size of the land and the budget. I told her whatever she could get for $100k and I told her most likely its going to be around 30 acres. Finally, she caved. Since she wasn'y going to be paying for it, she didn't have much of a choice. I thought we were on the right path. Then she sprung the house on me. Keep in mind she'll be living alone. She wants a 9k - 10k square foot home. The estimated cost based on what she has in mind will be close to $2 million dollars. My salary is a lot higher now. But there's no way to convince Mom that such a thing is just too unrealistic. She has a hard time cleaning a 600 sq ft apartment! 9k sq ft house?! Riiiiiight.

Yafrex, back when I was in HS, the first girl I was interested in enough to ask out, I got shot down. Because I listened to my mom, I kept after her. I thought that by consulting with a woman, I'd have a better chance at understanding and doing all the right things. Uh, no. As a matter of fact, she guided me into doing all the wrong things. Gifts too soon, persistance above and beyond, etc, etc. All the stuff that geeks tend to do anwyays, but worse. The girl finally told me knock it off, period. I did. My mom didn't. She kept sending flowers and such to this poor girl. Me with my already imploded self sense of self worth and horribly shy, couldn't bare to admit my mom was sending all that in my name. That went on for *6* MONTHS. Finally, my father intervened when I confronted my mom about it. My mother and I had a huge fight at VDay over some chocolate my mother had bought for the girl. I told her I didn't want to give it to this very annoyed girl and my mom had to stop. My father came in after the argument had moved off into another room, opened the chocolate, and started eating. My mother became irrate. My father was a rock that the storm simply could not touch and he was eating VDay chocolate quite happily. I came in after my mother had stalked off and told him a very heart felt thanx. He smiled and said 'I know'. Damn, one of my favourite memories of my dad...he's a hard man, but damn if he doesn't have his soft moments. :) Anyways to continue said story, I stopped telling squat to my mom about my interests in girls. I expressed absolutely no interest at all in them when she was around. Zip. Nada. No hint. Didn't even look when she was anywhere near. Within the next year, she confrontd me and demanded to know if I was gay... *sighs*

Why does my brother have to deal with all this above whatever is normal for him? He's engaged. He brought his fiance down to meet my mother and my sister when he came back for R&R last Feb. My mother despised this woman. When I've talked to her and we've exchanged email, my bro's choice of a fiance seems like a very nice woman, intelligent and articulate as well as very caring. She's finished her degree in teaching and is about 3 years older than my bro. I like her. My father and my other sister like her. Its just my one sister that lives near my mother and my mother that do not. My mother has done such a good job of alienating my bro and co that it looks like she might be noninvited to their wedding. erk.

Anyways my gf is going to be exposed to all this on July 7th when my Mom comes out to meet her. We'll see. My SO really gives me a hard time about my relationship with meine mutti. Her relationship with her mother really couldn't be better. Her mom actually really rocks. Anya - my gf's mom - is one of my favourite people.

My bro and his fiance are going to be married in August or September. My gf and I are likely to get engaged and married in the next year.

One war nearly wound down for my family and another about to begin.

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