Holidays, or why I’d rather have a root canal

Denise Swanson

(Note:  Denise Swanson, writer of the wonderful Scumble River mysteries, has agreed to give the Femmes an injection of fresh blog. Denise has published nine entries in the adventures of Skye Dennison, a generously curved school counselor with an interesting assortment of suitors. Skye finds as many bodies around Scumble River as the Femmes find in their various locales. MURDER OF A BOTOXED BLONDE was Denise's most recent book, and the next(MURDER OF A CHOCOLATE COVERED CHERRY) will be on the shelves in April 2008.--Charlaine)

Any holiday gathering from the Fourth of July picnic to Christmas dinner has the potential for disaster, and my family hates to see any wasted potential. I often wondered why we seemed incapable of having a get-together that didn’t end in catastrophe, then I realized it was due, at least in part, to the mother-daughter relationship.

This complex bond allows two adult women to go from each other’s biggest supporters to each other’s biggest pains in five point two seconds. A mother and daughter can be having a loving conversation that results in one of them stomping out of the room boiling mad a nanosecond later. The urge to be with your mother can be a visceral craving, but it can also be the one visit you would give up chocolate to avoid.

In my mystery series, Skye, my sleuth, and her mother, May, have a relationship that somewhat mirrors the one I have with my own mother. May wants what is best for Skye—at least what she thinks is best for Skye. And Skye loves her mother, but has to fight to maintain enough distance to hang on to her independence. In fiction, it can be pretty funny to read about this struggle. In real life, it can cause an otherwise sane, adult woman to yell, “You’re not the boss of me.”

Take the previously mentioned Fourth of July picnic. The ambulance would never have had to be called if my mother hadn’t said, “Is that how you’re going to chop the onions?”

My immediate reaction was, hell yes, but out loud, I said, “I was. Why?”

“Well, it’s up to you, but I’d dice them,” My mom replied. “Everyone will think you bought them that way if you leave them in big chunks like that.”

After hearing how I had come to cut the tips off of three fingers, the female EMT who was bandaging my hand, said, “That’s exactly why I volunteer to work holidays.”

Major holidays like Thanksgiving are worse. I remember a friend of mine telling me that once she ended up asleep under the dining room table after eating all the rum-soaked fruit from the punch bowl on this family celebration.

She was thirty years old at the time, but when she had picked up her mother to go to the family dinner, her mother had said, “You’re not going to wear that are you?”

“Well, I sure don’t have a change of clothes in the car,” my friend snapped.

“It’s just I asked your cousin the doctor to bring a friend of his and that outfit isn’t the most flattering.”

Eek! A twofer. Not only did her mother imply she looked bad, she had set her up for a blind date.

Which leaves the big daddy of all holidays, Christmas. Who knew a gift could result in a visit by the fire department? Before quitting my day job to write full-time, I worked as a school psychologist. I used to dread going back after Christmas break because I usually had a line of kids wanting to talk to me about their less than wonderful holidays.

One year, the first person in line was an adult—a teacher I had worked with for several years. Let’s call her Gloria. Gloria was an extremely competent woman and I had never seen her ruffled—even when a student had threatened to blow up the school. This particular morning she was close to tears.

As she sat down and started to tell me her story, she methodically shredded tissue after tissue from the box on my desk. It all started when she gave her mother a computer for Christmas. Gloria had had a baby the previous summer and wanted to be able to e-mail her mom pictures since they lived in different states.

She figured she could teach her mom how to use the Internet during her holiday visit. After trying to convince her mom that, no, she didn’t have to hold down the button on the mouse to make it move, and that yes, the computer uses the telephone line, but no she did not have to hold the receiver up to the monitor, more complications arose.

Gloria’s mother developed an irrational fear of pop-up windows, and freaked out when the little arrow turned into a hand. But what sent Gloria over the edge and resulted in her meeting the new fire chief, was when her mom accidently strayed into a porn site. Her mother got so flustered she insisted on immediately going to confession. While her mother was gone, Gloria, realizing her mother wasn’t ready for the technical age, decided she had better take the computer back and exchange the computer for a nice bathrobe.

This next part isn’t real clear to me, but for some reason Gloria put the laptop in the oven—she said she knew they were going out to eat and she wanted to hide the computer from her mom and it was too cold outside to put it in her car. When her mom got home from church, Gloria was de-stressing in the bathtub and her mother decided to bake cookies.

The fire chief was really nice about the whole thing. She said that she had moved from New York all the way to Illinois, to avoid situations like this with her own mother.

Gloria said that next year she was going to Tahiti for Christmas. I wonder if she really did.

The mother-daughter relation is already weighed down with powerful feelings, adding an emotionally charged holiday get-together to the mix is just a fire alarm waiting to go off. So this year, be careful out there.

Comments

[Kristina L.]

I hope your fingers are OK now.

It's funny how holidays can bring out the worst in people. I remember as a kid, during big family holidays, feeling depressed and wandering outside to hang out with our German Shepherd. That wonderful dog always seemed to sympathize with me.

[mary]

And I thought I'd had bad holidays before. :) Thanks for visiting us, Denise. I wish you very happy holidays that do not include EMTs this year.

[Denise Swanson]

Thanks Kristina. It was a long time ago and my fingertips didn't even scar. As a child I always ended up playing with the animals, too.

Thanks Mary--Actually we had the opposite this year. One of my cousins is an EMT and the ambulance came to pick her up as they had a woman who requested a female paramedic. Now that would only happen in a small town.

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