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There is a long story about how "Dear Ann Landers" made it into the hands of my mother-in-law, the fictional first-person voice of story, and subsequently onto this web site. The story was written from August to October of 1999, during the period that the final chapters were actually unfolding. She had begun to militantly escalate her intolerance, voicing her accusations in harsher words and tone, triggering the actual writing. We kept the paper a complete secret. As the one year anniversary approached, with no effort to subside her claims or to hear even one iota from our perspective, it became obvious that 'something must be done'. It was over one year of us sitting by and listening to escalated diatribe lectures about disrespect, irresponsibility, heartbreak, brainwashing, and murder ('you two are killing me'). In May and June of 2000, Lyn specifically phoned her mother for no less than 20 minutes every day for two full weeks, offering to "answer any question" she might have about our opinions or the meaning of our behavior on any subject. These calls were made almost one full year after the story was secretly written and while it was safely stored away for future publication. Lyn's daily offer was made in response to her mother's often stated claim "I just don't understand you two", and she specifically quoted this often professed accusation during the calls. Of course, her mother didn't actually want to understand us, just have us change to be what she wanted. How very, very sad. So Lyn called her mom every day for two straight weeks, and made the open-ended offer to explain, answer, or describe any question or issue she had with our statements, beliefs or behavior. Her response to Lyn was both bizarre and totally unexpected. First, she obviously asked no questions and listened to no answers while she repeated, again and again and again, that she "did not understand" us. Each time that Lyn asked what she would like to know, she stated another opinion about what specifically was wrong with us and how we should change to be more palatable to her. She had no knowledge that we had written and set aside the very volatile "Dear Ann Landers" story. However, it was as of she had read it. As the two weeks of phone calls progressed, Lyn's mother began to recall and recount episode after episode almost directly from the story, each one spun about to "prove" that we were disrespectful by having our own opinions and wishing to lead our own lives in our own home. It was bizarre! She brought up the birthday party, the trip to Disney World, how we treated her rudely during her trips to visit us in Utah and Florida. The crown jewel was her telling Lyn how we had "ganged up" on her as we sat on the guest room bed ("for no reason"), and how we invented accusations out of thin air "just to hurt my feelings". It was actually quite spooky. |
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At the end of two weeks, with not one question asked (even to this very day) and with each attempt by Lyn to define and identify our life priorities and passions discarded by her mother as being 'wrong', it became obvious that the relationship was doomed, that she would never be able to reconcile herself to a policy of "live and let live" with her grown children. We were both well past 40 years old and, because of the very venomous and very public nature of her escalating attacks, we had quietly placed the requirement that she concretely display a tolerant attitude toward us and our views as a prerequisite for her to visit us again in Florida. Lyn repeatedly used the carrot of 'free plane tickets to Florida' and 'visits from her Grandson' in exchange for the stick of simple 'tolerance' throughout the two weeks of lopsided dead-end conversations. But it was obviously hopeless. So we began to concern ourselves with Lyn's Dad. He had always been so tolerant and agreeable. Many times he agreed with our outlook on a particular subject, but just as many times he disagreed. But he said the words that all parents of grown children should consider to be golden. He said simply, "You kids have your own life, do what you want with it" and "What you do about that is none of my business (but I don't agree with it)". You must understand that this was about the silly stuff (how to slice a roast, how to park a car) that "Gramma" considered not only to be her business, but for which she had followed a "scorched earth policy" with us to the bitter end. Lyn's Dad was always supportive of us and our marriage. His favorite message, given at both the start and end of each and every telephone conversation and visit was simply "do you kids need anything?" and its simple follow-up "you let me know if you ever need anything". That is the simple message of love and support that he provided to us from the very first day of our marriage, then over twenty years previously. So we wanted somehow to let him know that while he was loved and respected by us, we considered it to be inappropriate and hurtful for us to invite him to visit us again with the caveat to 'leave mom home'. We always stopped ourselves from offering that (even though mom thought nothing of having family members 'choose sides'). We would not and still will not do so. We wanted him to know that if mom ever passed away or became incapacitated, he would be welcomed with open arms into our house and our lives. However, until mom could decide to 'live and let live' with us, there would be no 'free tickets' to Florida for her (and unfortunately, therefore, for him). So at the end of the bizarre and disappointing two weeks, where episode after episode was dredged up in response to the open ended question "Is there anything I can tell you about us?", it seemed appropriate to send the "Dear Ann Landers" story not to Lyn's mom (who would learn nothing from it), but to Lyn's dad (who might come to learn and understand us). We told him it would be incendiary. We told him it was written and rewritten over a period of six months and represented the God's honest truth of our experiences. We told him that he may choose to not speak to us after he read it. But we told him he should read it and then toss it into the fireplace and not allow anyone else to view it. |
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Well, needless to say, he read it and was floored. Then he ignored Lyn's advice and passed it onto Lyn's mom who read it and then passed it onto Lyn's elder sister (the one still living at home). The result was delicious. We were lambasted for 'dredging up the past'. We were lectured that to do so was the most hurtful thing anybody could do to another. We were told that, in our family, such things were simply forgotten. When Lyn pointed out that her mother had just spent the previous two weeks doing that exact thing (causing the letter to be mailed in the first place), she explained first that that was "different", then later changed her response to be that she "had done no such thing". How delicious. |
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So with the 40 page story now public, I was free to publish it here on the Internet. I had suppressed it for two interrelated reasons. First, my moral code required that no family member first read this hurtful story by accidentally finding it on a web page. Second, to send it out without a directly linked cause would be to simply pick a fight. I had expected to simply sit on the story for a few years and then quietly publish it after the major characters had passed away. But with the story now public knowledge throughout the family, Lyn spent an additional two weeks on daily telephone calls and e-mails with her mom. Is there any thought, any issue, any story or episode that she would like to discuss or to hear our perspective on the events? "No", that would "only be hurtful", she explained to Lyn. Then, without even taking a breath, Lyn's mom would jump right in and recount various episodes (from the story) and 'explain' how they proved that we were hurtful and disrespectful to her during them. The irony was totally lost upon her. And to her last days she can see no contradiction. But she did find two things to comment upon in the 40 plus pages. And so with delicious irony, I corrected them here. And while her poor relationship with us easily traces to specific events in her own formative years, her hurtful actions still could not be permitted to proceed unchecked in our lives. While one can easily justify her strange opinions and selfish expectations, we could no longer tolerate them. It turns out that she used some of her very last energy not to seek reconciliation, not to pursue the offer of 'free tickets to Florida' in exchange for simple tolerance, but to hand write hurtful messages on Christmas cards she sent to the 40-year-old grown women that had been Lyn's childhood friends. One old friend called out of the blue to lecture Lyn that she should treat her mother with more kindness or she would regret it after her mother was gone. The other one called to laugh out loud with Lyn at the total lack of class in the act of hand writing hurtful accusations against your own daughter in cards sent to her grown childhood friends (to celebrate the Christmas holiday!). Oh well, she was consistent to her very last days. |
Copyright, 2001, All rights reserved |
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First Upload: April 21, 2001 |