Sometimes I just don't know

Well, Most of the time I just don't know.

At least I am feeling more "normal" today. Good thing else all the non important work and relationship worries I am facing today might have sent me into a full blown Depression. I don't even want to use the D word. Much more of a swear word to me than Fuck or shit.

Anyhow don't wanna talk about that Monkey on my back. The one that's most on my mind today is the person who gave birth to me.

I guess from about the time I realised there was something not quite right with myself, I have known there's something not quite right with my mother.

When I think of my emotions regarding her during my growing up years, I recall the fear, dread, stomach in knots, that moment right between where her car pulled up in the driveway till where she walked in the door and I could figure out what type of mood she is in. It would come out quickly, most times.

I'd be able to see if it was a quiet/irritable one, a full blown Demon of anger one, or a good one.

During the good ones, she'd actually pretend to listen to whatever I was excitedly rushing out to tell her about my day. She'd have this faint preoccupied smile on her face. I would blabber on and on. Deep inside knowing she's not actually listening. Still denying it to myself. And usually when I Knew she wasn't paying attention I would start acting out in some way.

I can now look back, as a parent, at how I used negative behaviour to try and get some true attention from my mother. At least when she was busy criticising me, she was there, in the moment. She was listening. She was seeing me. She didn't know or understand me. But right then and there she wasn't thinking of anything else, except how bad I was right then.