I have been trying, albeit on a somewhat inconsistent basis, to find a way to disengage from my parents, and have frustratingly concluded that it’s like removing the white from the rice that Asians are partial to. It is hard enough to handle your own baggage, dealing with your intellectually challenged asinine boss, failed relationships and unremarkable experiences, then to have to deal with the residual dysfunctional issues from your organic producers.
While some people cleverly develop a natural inclination to detour from any familial ties, I find it quite arduous to sustain any egregiously negative emotions toward my mother. While I can disengage from certain friends, and even Hubby at times, I simply cannot flip off the emotional switch when it comes to mother. Perhaps it’s the nature of mothers that makes it inconceivable to just not give a toss.
Mothers are hard to comprehend and neglect because regardless of the countless incidents of inexplicable failures and social disasters in your life, they are always there. Few siblings, not to mention friends, will stick around after the first few puke sessions, let alone a life time of it. Mothers always seem to worry about your daily nutritional intake, your conspicuous cough or sneeze, and your struggling career, something that most people barely feign interest in. Despite the misguided ineptness you feel because you dishearteningly think you never seem to measure up to their notion of the ideal son or daughter, you never truly feel like an outsider or disregarded in their life in the same fashion that friends or spouses may make you feel.
Perhaps my perspective on mothers is predisposed because I only have one parent, and ostensively abandoning her while I gallivant off to Thailand has put me in an emotional pickle. Confounded by sporadic episodes of guilt and depression, I have resorted to writing down all the things I would like to say to mother prior to departure. I’ve taken some proactive measures by scribbling on my invisible notepad all the things I want to coherently articulate, meanwhile mentally preparing myself for the likelihood of a psychotic breakdown accompanying her reaction. In anticipation of said breakdown, I’ve prepared three strategic responses to her apprehensive reaction.
Tell her the trip may be relatively short, and with the inevitable failure of my mission to acclimatize to living abroad, that she will probably see me within three months begging for unrecompensed room and board.
Tell her that I will have a particularly astonishing ocean view apartment in Thailand where she is welcome to come and stay for as long as she wants.
Tell her that Hubby plans to financially support me while I laze around in the lap of extended vacations and life of luxury and decadence, a life which she would be proud of.
While I’m cautiously optimistic of the measurable truth in each scenario, I must be prepared for the consequential worst case scenario, wherein she spews a self-righteous tirade about how thoughtless I am for barbarically abandoning her in my pursuit of a surreal utopia. I hope that’s not the case. Mothers do not practice cruel kindness, right?
Even if she does thrust forward a tirade of guilt-ridden judgments about my mystifying decision to gallivant to Thailand, it’s disingenuous to deplore mother just because of the powerful, omnipotent love which involuntarily forces her to behave in this deranged, mentally unstable manner.