• About

Your Mom Was Into Metal

~ fiction, non-fiction and random rants of an aging groupie

Your Mom Was Into Metal

Tag Archives: advice

A Little About Love

14 Tuesday Feb 2017

Posted by Maxwyfe in grief, friendship and support

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

advice, Christianity, Feminism, love, Ozarks, Post-Feminism, romance, women's issues

“Desperado” lyrics courtesy of The Eagles.

It’s said a girl’s first love is her father.  I find that to be true.  A girl’s father sets the stage for every male relationship she will have in her life and mine was no different.  My first memory in fact, is standing on my grandmother’s couch looking out the window at every set of headlights that passed hoping it was my daddy.  It never was.

a-knight-in-shining-armor-tom-shropshire

“Knight in Shining Armor”, acrylic print by Tom Shropshire

 

My parents divorced when I was small and my mother remarried. Their divorce was bitter and that bitterness caused a divide that would not be bridged for more than 30 years.

 

Although absent, my father was none the less a large part of my life.  I lived with the constant hope he would come in and rescue me from what was really a very comfortable childhood.  But that didn’t matter.  My Daddy was out there someplace doing great and amazing things and one day he would come back for me and we would do great and amazing things together.  He was a shadow behind my own shadow; ever present if not involved.  But, like my little toddler self on grandma’s couch, I was waiting for something that would never happen.  His car never pulled into the drive.

We did see him occasionally.  We remained devoted to our grandparents, his family. On rare occasions he would breeze in loaded down with presents and full of love and attention for his estranged children.  Those days were golden.  I don’t hate.  I’m not angry.  I no longer have any resentment regarding that mess.  Certainly, I wish things had been different.  But wishing never did anything except make me cry, so I quit.

Now it seems to me, some fine things have been laid upon your table, but you only want the ones that you can’t get.

When I grew up we reconnected and got to know each other as adults.  He’d been a car salesman, an insurance salesman, an oil rig roustabout and a dozen other things.  Then he was a long-haul truck driver, an independent carrier in keeping with his independent spirit.  He loved drivquixote2.jpging from one end of the country to the other according to his wishes.  He might want to spend the summer in the Northwest, so he’d head for Washington and stay on those rocky beaches until his money ran out.  Then he’d pick up a load headed south and stay there awhile.  He truly loved America and all the beautiful people and places he visited.

Desperado, oh, you ain’t gettin’ no younger.  Your pain and your hunger, they’re drivin’ you home. And freedom, oh freedom well, that’s just some people talkin’.
Your prison is walking through this world all alone. 

Don’t your feet get cold in the winter time?  The sky won’t snow and the sun won’t shine.  It’s hard to tell the night time from the day.  You’re losin’ all your highs and lows.  Ain’t it funny how the feeling goes away?

In some ways, I envy him. I’ve wanted to walk out the door and keep walking.  Hang my responsibilities and just go be somewhere people aren’t making demands on my time and energy. Lie about my name.  Start all over with no messy emotional connections and where my past mistakes don’t matter.  I understand now how he was able to remain absent from his family (families, he remarried 3 times after my mother) for so long.  It isn’t hard to walk out the door.  Walking back in takes a lot more courage and staying sometimes is a real feat of strength.  Sometimes it’s easier to remain separated than to reach out and risk rejection and pain that comes with re-establishing a fractured relationship.  But, in my experience, it’s always worth the effort to remain close to those you love, if not in body then in spirit.

During one of his visits, my father told me a story about a woman knew long ago.  She was a singer at a bar and for him she sang the song, “Desperado” saying it summed up his life.  Now, I don’t know this woman and he may not have known her either, but she was right.  That song does sum up his life and this morning, Valentine’s Day, I heard it on the radio. And of course, I thought about Dad.

Desperado, why don’t you come to your senses?  Come down from your fences, open the gate.  It may be rainin’, but there’s a rainbow above you.  

On the last day of my father’s life, I told my father everything I always wanted to say.  It was July.  He was in a hospital burn unit wrapped in foil and dead but for the machine forcing his lungs to breathe.  But he could hear us, they said.  So, they told us to say our goodbyes and this is what I told him.

“I love you Daddy.  I’ve always loved you.  You are my hero, my knight in shining armor, you are my first love and best love and I will love you always. Let go and be with God.  Be at peace. I’ve always loved you and believed in you and I will see you again.”

You better let somebody love you before it’s too late

Advertisements

My First Good Deed Does Not Go Unpunished

04 Wednesday Jan 2017

Posted by Maxwyfe in Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

advice, Christianity, Customer Service, First world problem, friendship, Missouri, OnStar, Ozarks, women's issues

I did a really nice and really dumb thing yesterday.  My goal for 2017 is to be kind and more Christ-like.  So when a client, who I know to be practically homeless and car-less, came to the office with a sad story about needing a ride to replace a car battery, I loaned him my car.

Now, this guy isn’t a stranger.  He’s a client and for the past few months while we handle his PI case, I’ve been helping him in his time of crisis.  I gave him food, small amount of money and I even gave him our son’s old junker car when he said he could fix it up and get it running.

My car is your basic mom-sedan.  A Chevy: 4 doors, sunroof, OnStar.  No real thrills.  And I have plenty of insurance, so I wasn’t worried about accidents.  It’s just parked there uselessly between nine and five, after all.  And he only needed it to make a short run to Walmart to exchange a car battery so his own car could get up and running.

I figured to help him out and so gave him my car key. Wisely, I kept my house and work keys on my key ring.

An hour passes.  Then another.  Then it’s 5:30 p.m. and my car is nowhere in sight.

I began to panic.  Not so much about the car, but what I would tell my husband.  He was about to be righteously pissed off.  Reluctantly, I called my husband and told him what I’d done.  I loaned my car to someone and they took off with it.  He was predictably furious, but kept his cool saying only one, “I told you so.”  I made a police report to two very kind officers and they helped me notify OnStar.  OnStar, God bless them, located the car in minutes and in less than an hour, the highway patrol had it pulled over.

I wish I could say the car was recovered with no harm done after a hilarious series of misunderstandings, but it wasn’t.  That little fucker stole my car and was halfway to Oklahoma before the Missouri State Highway Patrol and OnStar located it and disabled the ignition.  Oh, and he was driving drunk.  I’m lucky he didn’t mow down a row of nuns on his way out of town with my car and the last of my good will.

“How stupid!” you say.  “Who loans their car to a practical stranger?!”  Well, he wasn’t a practical stranger.  I talked to him nearly every day and was doing my level best to get him a settlement for a motor vehicle accident.  I felt as if I knew this person.  Clearly, I did not.

I’ve always been a soft touch.  I believe in people and I believe in doing good deeds and giving to people less fortunate.  Now, that good will has been thrown in my face and rewarded with an extraordinary tow and storage bill.

I don’t think I have words for how stupid I feel.  I trusted someone and took them at their word and got burned badly.  I don’t want to be the kind of person who hardens their heart and never helps anyone ever again.  I don’t want to be jaded and cold toward people in need.  And I probably won’t be, it’s just difficult to process this kick in the teeth.

So now, the thief is in jail.  My car is parked in a tow lot 100 miles away.  I am thankful it wasn’t damaged, but I really don’t care about the car.  It’s just a car.  It’s a thing and easily replaced.  What is really damaged is my faith in people.  And my faith in myself.  I trusted God to take care of me and now this happens?  Why did this happen to me when I was just trying to help someone out?  The urge to slam the door of my heart to the world last night was very, very strong.

Despite this crisis, my faith remains strong.  I will remain faithful to God and not curse the car thief or rage at my own stupidity.  My intentions were pure, although my discernment was lacking.  My faith tells me this is God’s way of removing this toxic person from my life.  God is in control and like I said;  I’m only out a car for a few days.  I’m inconvenienced.  Darren the car thief is going to be in jail for a while, but at least he’ll have 3 hots and a cot which is more than he was getting on his own.

So there’s my story for the first week of 2017.  My first good deed of the year is immediately punished.  It can only get better from here.

 

Advertisements

Subscribe

  • Entries (RSS)
  • Comments (RSS)

Archives

  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • October 2016

Categories

  • grief, friendship and support
  • politics
  • Uncategorized

Meta

  • Register
  • Log in

Create a free website or blog at WordPress.com.

Cancel