Thursday, February 1, 2024

Grandma. Publicly perfect. Privately crazy

 Perfect public image

personally insane

My mom's mother

Church every Sunday.. nice cars, new house, new clothes and shoes. Status high. She said high class. Lacked formal education as far as i or anyone knew or knows.

 5 marriages according to some, 3 verified by her own mouth. The first man i dont know his name and she said he was italian she was 19 or so. The guy whipped her with a hairbrush 3 days after they were married. She divorced him. 2nd man Paul Earnest Dringman she bore 3 children with, one being my mother Ruth Louise on May 14, 1939.

Dressed up nice. Put on the perfect angelic image. Socialize, shake hands with the crowd. Smiling, gracious, so nice.

As soon as we get in the car, the DEVIL comes out on her face.

She had this long list of things I should do, shouldn't do and what any other person on this earth needs to do, if they are going to do the right things

Every look on my face she analyzed. Each movement I made she observed, always trying to figure out what I felt, what I was thinking, what I was going to do.

A girl should do this, a boy should do that. A woman, a man have designated duties appearances actions..the things they ought to do and things they actually do.

She actually praised me to her friends, neighbors, family and anyone while I was living with her. Acting all proud of how "smart" she said I was. I did soooo so good in school. She told people that I made straight A's, which I did until I was about 13. 

She abhorred what she deemed lazy, laziness, slacking. So did her husband, my step grandpa, LeRoy. both viewed relaxation and calmy eating and enjoying a meal as pure laziness.

She thought she could buy me something nice, take me somewhere and that was the best way to show me she loved me. Then she felt entitled to lose her temper over the most trivial things, screaming like a banshee over bullshit. Attempting to control my every move. Giving me lists of chores, lots of household work and yard work directed by her and grandfather. Shooting orders at me. One of her favorite times to shoot at order commanding directing me, assaulting me with a nasty tone of voice was during dinnertime, usually when dinner was about over with. 

She shouted "Young lady, YOU ARE going to do the dishes!" As if it were some kind of punishment for some unknown thing I didn't even do. Looking back on it, I suspect it was my youth, my beauty, my good even keel mood, my kind nature, my joy and happiness and fun personality that really pissed her off because she was continually upsetting herself by dwelling on the ass hole actions of other people. Actions and bad things other people did in the past, 30, 40 50 years before hand that aggravated her to the max. 

She coulnd't let go of the shit that other people did. How DARE them to be that way! They had no right to ever say or do anything to tick her off, to hurt her or anyone she cared about, loved, protected and sometimes adored. 

However if she did not like someone then all the worst things that could be imagined should happen to them. They should flat out die, be tortured forever in eternity until their soul was extinguished, never to return to the god/devil energies of the universes.

"You should thank your lucky stars that you have all of this!" she often said. Especially if I felt sad over anything for any reason. I typically cried over the misfortune of others. That ticked her off. If she thought I was crying over my own misfortune that pissed her off as well. 

It was like the little girl in the movie, The Exorcist. 

I observe similar, the same behavior in my husband. I just wonder what she did when she was alone at home.  How would I know since no one was with her? How was she, what did she do when going out to shop or at work or anywhere in public? 

She was religious, a Christian. Methodist. Baptist. I remember going to Longview Methodist church with her and grandpa on sundays when I was a teenager living with them. That church was on the same road of the school grandpa taught junior high school children/kids. For some reason she switched to a Baptist church later. She had to have that image of being godlike, angelic, serving God. She even gave away money to religious organizations that sent soliticitaions through the mail. She thought it was the right thing to do. Maybe it somehow made her feel better by covering up her own sinful thoughts, words, actions and behavior of being such a total royal bitch a lot of the time. 

Dry off areas after cleaning. Very important. She said Make sure you dry it after you wipe it off.

Her house hospital clean. Used alcohol to clean mirrors and glass. Top job cleaner, very strong. Lysol disinfectant. Tide, clorox bleach, comet cleanser,     . Her hands were red drf cracked excema wore rubber or latex gloves. Used hottest water setting on water heater, scalding hot. Wanted to be sure dishes were clean. Washed them and pots pans in kitchen sink first with dish soap then put them into dishwasher so she was certain they were sanitized germ free. Used different varieties of dish soap: joy, ivory, dawn, palmolive. Cleaned all trash garbage cans with hot water and top job or other cleaning agents.

Sos pads steel wool. Spic n span granules.

She smoked cigarettes , Benson & Hedges gold using a tar guard sometimes, until september 7, 1967 the day she quit and told the story of quitting often to many people.

She WAS good at private personal talks with me. She liked talking on the phone to her sister ruth (florence) spainhour, girl friends not many one was jean bisgard in kansas, neighbor next door lavonne hendrix a sweet lady with 4 beautiful daughters and a very clean home and mechanic husband bill william hendrix and less often the lady next door on the other side the west at 527 stacey drive McGrath.





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