Ilene,

Congrats on making it through the painting process with your sanity intact. The house does look great, but you did pay a high price in frustration. I hope DS learned something too.

We need to paint our house in the next year or so, and I am not looking forward to it. I suppose our best chance of getting it done is for DH to take a week of vacation when it will not be wet or rainy, AND then hope the fire activity is low. Every single time we start doing anything to the house, fire breaks out and we are pulled away from the project so often that we make little if any progress on it.

So far, it is gorgeous here today....almost "too hot" for January.

Dawn

Glad your painting is done.

Not making excuses for your son, but I can't help but wonder how I would treat my mom if she were dogging me over the internet. I would much prefer it was a personal matter no matter what a bum I was.

Different strokes for different folks.

randy

Well, Randy, I'm so sorry to have offended you. However, nobody here knows DS's name, so it's not like anybody's going to be pointing any fingers at him. If I thought anyone here would know who he was, or that he would log on here and see this, of course I would not have shared the experience. This is actually an update to something I posted a little earlier, and it's not as public as it would be had I said something to anyone at our church or in the neighborhood, which I have not.

He talks to his friends at work about his frustrations with me whenever they happen, some of whom know me, and his friends in the neighborhood in which I also live, and I'm sure I got roasted a few times over this, with his version, to people who actually do know me, so I don't think I've overstepped my boundaries in sharing this information here. Sometimes you just need to vent to SOMEONE. In families, even though you love each other there are often times when things like this happen.

Somehow I can't believe you would treat your Mom badly no matter what she did.

I'm not offended at all. Just crazy enough to say what's on my mind. :-)

I guess one does need a safe place to vent. This may be a good a place as any.

Hope I didn't rub you the wrong way too much. :-)

randy

No, Randy, that's OK. I just really don't mean to offend anyone. I just felt safe and among friends here. :)

And you are safe and among friends here! Everyone needs somewhere to vent and this becomes that place to many of us. As far as following Randy's thought about how he'd treat his mother should he find a rant like that, well... I'd also have to consider how I'd treated my mother to earn such a rant in the first place. Granted, we're getting only one side of the story here, but I have a feeling Ilene's stating it pretty closely. It's plain that a deal was struck to work off the mortgage payment rather than paying it in cash. If he had a landlord or bank who were not his parents, would they expect to wait so long to have the work accomplished? Would they have accepted such a deal in the first place? I doubt very seriously that a bank holding his mortgage would have accepted such an arrangement in the first place. Perhaps a landlord may have. But they would not have waited so long. It would have needed to be done in good time.

Keep in mind here, my Mother and I do not have a speaking relationship. I'm sure there were things on my side as well, but the ultimate causes are her fault. Should she ever come across a rant from me regarding our relationship, I would not mind. I have no problem in standing behind anything I say or type. I would hope that her coming across such a rant would perhaps open her eyes to her own behavior, but knowing my Mother, that's doubtful.

I have children as well. Two of my biological children are grown and on their own. Should I ever come across a rant from them regarding me, I'd have to examine my own behavior. Perhaps it would be hurtful, but I'd rather face up to my behavior than not. It would open a conversation between us regarding the why's and how's. I would see it as a chance to make my stance clear and see if there were a compromise we could come to without me being "walked on".

LOL, alright, I'm touchy on Ilene's behalf and I don't mean to rub Randy in it. I know I've ranted about my Mother and having attempted a conversation regarding certain things, only to be told I didn't understand, that my brother was born dead, though perfectly healthy now, and he needs help- though his problems... and most of my parents'.. are his making. I'm not going into those issues again, it serves little purpose.

Ilene, I'm very happy for you that the painting's finished and I'm glad that he finally fulfilled his obligation. I still agree with your stance in the previous thread regarding future accommodations like this. The house looks GREAT, even if you did have to do a lot of it yourself! I want you to know I think you're a wonderful parent for doing this for him and I'm sorry he didn't realize that you were really doing HIM a big favor. You probably could have had the job done sooner and for a better price (considering all those brushes and rollers!!!!!!) by a professional. And as for the extra paint, welll... you've got extra for touchups in the future :) BIG HUGS to you!

Kathy

You can't offend anyone. THEY choose to be offended. Today's politically correct culture thrives by suppressing thoughts and ideas by reason of being "offended." I'm almost offended people get offended.

I don't get offended, I get grumpy. :-)

randy

Yeah, Randy, I generally don't get offended either, but I do get 'hacked off' and then I have to rant. LOL As far as I'm concerned, you and I are still buds, no offense taken.

Members of my birth family, when I was still a part of it, used to say, "Now, Ilene, don't get your feelings hurt, but ...." and then say something to me that most assuredly would have hurt THEIR feelings had I said the same things to them! Early on, I learned it's pointless to have hurt feelings. If someone is so insensitive as to hurt your feelings, they're not going to notice, and they get defensive when it's pointed out that they have. So it just makes things worse. If you know your own heart, and if you know you're trying to be the best person you can be, then it's hard to get your feelings hurt because someone's opinion of you is just their opinion, and opinions are often fleeting. Then, as in the case of my birth family, there are times when you just get so you don't care WHAT they think, or say they think, because they're so dysfunctional themselves.

I do appreciate the support that several of you have lent me in this situation. Sometimes I can't tell if I'm expecting too much or too little, and exactly where the line between the two is hard for me to find. DS and I are still on speaking terms. We get mad at each other every now and then, but I love him and he knows it, and I know the feeling is mutual. I seriously doubt he would ever see my rant here because he doesn't have a computer and doesn't use one at work or elsewhere. If he did see it, I would certainly stand behind it. I would rather have him be mad at me for a little while than to think he could take advantage of me any time he wanted to. He could've been finished with the job much sooner than this if he had just taken advantage of the time that he had available to him, but he chose not to. And true, if I had hired a contractor and gotten this kind of service, I would've fired him and told all my friends not to hire him.

So, hugs to all of you, and thank you for letting me rant.

Ilene,

You can pick your friends and your nose, but unfortunately family is not an option. And mine is as dysfunctional as the best of them. We get together about 4 times a year. That's about 3 times too many. :-)

randy

LOL. I have known that feeling many times. I used to refer to it as "pasting a smile over the grimace".

It took me 40 years, menopause and a crisis between me and one of my sisters that developed into a family attack headed by my mother, to find God and get the help I needed to separate myself from them. I have known peace ever since.

I saw a plaque in a catalog once that said, "Remember, as far as anyone knows, we are a normal family." That thing wouldn't sell if there weren't a lot of dysfunctional families out there. Families are on a continuum, from totally and completely depraved to only mildly dysfunctional, because there are no perfect families. But love covers a multitude of sins.

Well Ilene, I think your house looks gorgeous and I think you ought to sit down in front of the window and have yourself a big bowl of chocolate blue bunny ice cream with some fudge and pecans sprinkled liberally on it. maybe a little whip cream. Don't stop there, Get a bigger bowl, heck just throw a banana in there. cherry on top. kick back and watch the birds. Yeah....

LOL, Donna! But I think I'd better settle for a nice cup of coffee...

It's amazing what a transformation a coat of paint can make.

Now I can turn my attention to what I'm going to do in the garden, and, once I get all the painting stuff put back where it belongs, I think I'll bake cookies today. It's so cold, seems like a good day to bake. Here's one of my favorite cookie recipes. It came from a Women's Day or Family Circle magazine, back in the late 70's or early 80's. The article was about an Iowa farm woman and included some wonderful recipes. I've made tons of these, over the years. When I give them to someone, they always ask for the recipe.

Pride Of Iowa Cookies
For a change in taste, you can substitute C. peanut butter for half the shortening, and you could add maybe 1/2 C raisins or other dried fruit if you wanted to.

1 C packed brown sugar
1 C sugar
1 C shortening
1 C. flaked coconut
1/2 tsp. salt
3 C rolled oats
1 tsp. vanilla
2 eggs
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. baking powder
2 C flour
1 C chopped walnuts or pecans

Preheat oven to 350º. Grease cookie sheets. Cream together shortening and sugars. Mix in remaining ingredients. Drop by teaspoonfuls onto cookie sheets. Bake for 15 minutes.

Hugs to you, Donna, Dawn, Kathy, Dorothy, Randy and all others who have put up with my rants and waded through my long, long posts all year. I was just thinking what a great tool the Internet has become. I could not have learned the things I have learned this last year or met as many nice people as I have without it. Thanks to all of you for sharing your knowledge and your friendship. --Ilene

Ilene,

You don't have to thank us for "putting up" with your rants and posts.....we all "put up" with each other and no thanks are necessary. The Internet is a great tool for sharing info and ideas and life, and we learn a lot from you too, you know!

I was up early baking muffins for the firefighters because we've had freezing rain and sleet here which often leads to a few fire calls (generally motor vehicle accidents). I made pecan pie muffins and chocolate chip muffins and a huge thermos of coffee. I like being in the kitchen cooking and baking on a cold sleety day. In a little while, I'm going to make chicken and dumplings for dinner. Then, if the temperatures drop and the roads and bridges re-freeze, it is easy to "stretch" the chicken and dumplings to feed a few more firefighters.

I just looked out the window to see if "any" ice was accumulating on my trees, shrubs and powers lines, and surprisingly there is a little. There has been a lot more freezing rain across the river in Gainesville than we've had here today though.

Dawn