why

Okay, so it's not the main reason that I'm happy to be moving away from here. For the record, all the main reasons for moving away from here are positive ones. But I have to say goodbye to my elderly aunts before going, of course, and Aunt Grace and I had plans for a nice private lunch today. I called Aunt Marie on Monday and asked her if she'd like to have breakfast with me on Tuesday (yesterday), and she said, "Now, I know you're having lunch with Grace on Wednesday so I'll just come along then."

What could I say? "No, Aunt Marie. You're a difficult and vaguely obnoxious person and I'd rather have time alone with Aunt Grace, whom I've been friends with for more than 30 years. Furthermore, I know she won't want you to join us, either."

Nah. When it comes to my elderly family, I wouldn't say it if my mouth was full of it. The last time I had a minor run-in with Aunt Marie it was when Aunt Grace had her first heart attack. We heard about the hospitalization a day after the fact, and scrambled to get over there and see what was up, and a good thing, too. Making phone calls to notify the rest of the family was secondary at that point. Aunt Marie raked me over the coals about why we didn't call her immediately, why she had to wait an entire day to know that poor Grace had a heart attack, how could we have ignored the need to call her and let her know?

After listening to this for 15 minutes while trying to get to the hospital to meet with one of Aunt Grace's doctors, I finally said, "Gee, Aunt Marie. I'd have thought you'd have been more concerned about Grace than about exactly when we called you." In other words, this isn't about you, fer chrissakes.

Okay. A week later I had to suck it up and apologize. For saying the truth. It hurt her feelings. Golly. In my defense, I will say I stuck to my guns and told her that at that moment, I didn't have time to be listening to her complain about when she was called, since I was late for a meeting in the hospital. "I didn't hear you ask about how Aunt Grace was doing, just about how hurt you were we didn't call."

I knew Aunt Grace would be peeved that Marie is coming along. There wasn't much I could do, though. Marie is sneaky and devious and led me to believe that Grace knew she'd be coming. And I know the reason she wants to come: Aunt Grace always picks up the tab. Is this mean of me to say? Probably. But it's the truth.

Mom used to complain about how cagey and sneaky Aunt Marie was, and Nancy and I used to say, over and over, "Gee, Mom. She's your only living sibling. Try to be nice to her." So Mom is up there laughing at me right now, I'm sure of it. Okay, Mom. You were right. Aunt Marie is an A.B.*

I get it. But I don't have to put up with it much longer.




*Aggravating bitch. This is also my nickname from Mom. My aggravations were just quite a bit different from those of Aunt Marie.