The last person holding out hope

Some of you will recall that the main reason I set up this particular blog was so that I could share stories about my grandmother. For those of you who don't know that story, no one in my immediate family reads my Seriously? blog. A few years ago though, some people who kept up with my feed on Facebook found me to be hilarious and told my grandmother's sister about it.

Word got around that I was sharing stories about Grandmother. It got back to her, she called cousins to see what stories I was telling, thinking they would be endearing (I'm not sure I have any of those, sadly enough), and I had to delete all my stories before my cousins found them and reported back. I back searched and found a lot of them and posted them here. I needed a safe place to rant from time to time, and took a long break from any posts here, but on occasion, I have a story to share and don't want some people to see it. (It feeds no where, is not Google searchable and I send very few links to here, only when I post.)

Today's installment begins last week and covers two subjects, sort of. Last Sunday, it was announced at church that a man died who was related to family that was close friends of Grandmother's. Actually, my grandmother was a surrogate grandmother in the wedding(s) of a couple of girls around my age. Obviously, these girls were closer to my grandmother than I am. Anyway, I actually called my grandmother (which is rare and only because my mom was out of town) to see if they announced it at her church since the family goes to church with her. They did not. She was more into the details of this guy than anything going on in my own life.

Well, Mom had to go pick her up the other day (she lives in another town), take her on a couple of errands and bring her back to Corsicana for the weekend. My dad had planned for me to come over and eat. Thankfully, and an answer to an unspoken prayer, my friend Rakia called and invited me to meet her in Dallas.

Yesterday, I got my dad out of the house for a while to rescue him from the non-stop chatter. And my mother turns into Grandmother Jr. sometimes when they are around each other. Well, she's not that bad. However, my Grandmother is ALWAYS right about EVERYTHING. And she disagrees with you just for the sake of disagreeing. And she only talks about people she knows and really doesn't care to listen to you share about your life and the people you know.

Her latest thing is she's been ANY and EVERY where that anyone else mentions ever having gone. My dad caught her though. She's not visited a former brothel that my parents went to on their last trip. I think I'm thankful I didn't go in more ways than one.

Paige called me yesterday afternoon to see if I needed a sidekick for the night. Oh, more than she knew! We were only around Grandmother a few minutes before she caught on to this disagreement and been everywhere mentality. She was shaking her head and getting anxious pretty quickly. And voiced this to Dad and I without hearing us having complained about it.

Dad is always saying out of earshot. I don't know why some people (mom) brings up some subjects. Just talk about the weather. That should be safe.

I guess earlier in the day, I kind of opened myself up to something. I was telling about someone at church who got married at the JP on Friday. I saw it via Facebook and was telling my mom (in front of Grandmother). I said that this woman finally caught her someone. After a 18 year aggressive chase that I had been witness to since I was in high school. (This person is a few years older than I am, and her first marriage just lasted a few months. We've been witnessing this chase before and after that.) She was very obvious in her pursuits (including several of my guy friends post my college years).

I think Grandmother bit her tongue at this point asking if I had been doing any chasing.

Later in the evening, I was making cookies in the kitchen while Mom, Grandmother and her sister were in the dining room. They were talking about some friends of my parents, and their adult, very confirmed bachelor sons. Where they lived, what they did, the fact they weren't married, etc. Then my grandmother says, "are either of these available for Audra?"

Oh my word, is she seriously trying to find someone suitable for me? No one does that anymore. I think it's been a few years since my mom has said anything along these lines, and no one else ever says this.

I've spent significant time with the mother of these men, and it's certainly not come up in conversation for whatever reason(s).

Anyway, my mom says, "not really" or something to that tune.

WARNING: My thoughts at this point go in at least 3 different directions right here, so hang with me here. 

The next part, I found interesting.

"******** and I decided that Audra and **** are a lot alike, but they're both too set in their ways."

I want to interject here that it's what happens when a person has lived alone for 15 years like I have.

I answered, "and he's like 11 or 12 years older than I am."

Grandmother says, "so, better 11 years older than 11 years younger, don't you think."

UMMMMM... 48 vs. 24. Pros and cons to both. My answer was, "hmmm... I don't know.

What I really want to know is if our moms have had this conversation more than once and been comparing notes. What does my mom say about me when I'm not around? This has me really curious, but not curious enough to bring up the subject again at the risk of sounding interested when I'm really not. I never knew this had come up before. I never knew about said similarities. And have our dads been a part of these conversations? What have they had to say about all this.

I would like to call up this guy sometimes and ask, "really? you thought it was a good idea living next door to your parents in a house that your mom keeps saying she bought? And really, I have to know out of curiosity... Your parents call you more than mine call me. Do you need to be that connected to them or do they need to be that connect to you?"

The only guy crazy enough to ever ask me out was a confirmed Mama's boy, and I have real issues with the thought of adult men that connected to their mamas.

Another thought is, obviously my mother has given up all hope since I'm too set in my ways. But I guess I already knew that a couple of years ago when she brought up buying 3 cemetery plots for her, dad and me. That had me speechless, but that's another story.

And back to Grandmother... is she still looking for me? She didn't ask if the guy was equally fat (one of her previous things she looked for), have the right blood type, and oh, what was the other thing on her list of qualifiers? I was telling Paige about the fat thing earlier. That qualifier was one she brought up about a guy she wanted me to meet back 15 years ago. Paige found that quite rude.

Now, I need to go call my mom and see how the trip taking Grandmother home went. I'm sure I'll hear an earful.