My teeth are chattering.....I'm sitting in my parent's basement wondering if I'm shaking because it's a Lake Michigan special frigid 9 degrees....or if I'm still recovering from the drive.....or if I'm nervous about what's coming up in the next few days with them.
It is wicked cold....the special wet sub zero cold that slaps you mercilessly here in the Midwest. During the day with a blue sky and sunshine... it was tolerable....but as soon as night hit....all the charm vanished.
Yesterday's drive was tough. Blizzard driving....not in my repertoire anymore.
The drive was long and slow and tedious. Cars were littered to and fro like some giant got mad and tossed them to the side of the road.
I hit the brakes gently because of a snow plow and suddenly I was sliding from one lane to the other ...gaining control....losing control....the car spun suddenly and I ended up perpendicular to the lanes but at least not moving.
Ahead of me....a nice deep ravine....which I stared at for a few seconds.....a nose dive down the slope would have meant an intimate encounter with several big oak trees.
And today my parents....what a fucking mess.
My mom....good in so many ways....but paranoid and hording and suspicious in some ways that are endangering their safety now. She quite her checking account because she thought the bank was taking her money, she hasn't made car or house insurance payments, ignoring credit card bills.
I tried to reason with her....asked if I could help her...got firm and told her if the house burnt down that would have nothing since she hasn't paid her home owners insurance..but she gets belligerent and illogical and says she owes no one money....she berates my father...and just gets mean....a trait she has always harbored but at least when she was "normal"there were inhibitory controls.
I wish I could get in the car and drive someplace now...anyplace really......but instead I'm sitting the basement...with the fat crazy isolated cats....who are not on her cute list anymore...(a trait I share with them)and wondering what the hell to do...where to start.
There is so much to shake about tonight.
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