“My husband said ‘show me your boobs’ and I had to pull up my skirt… so it was time to get them done!” ~ Dolly Parton

“Mom, what are those?” A little me asked inquisitively one day, while staring at mom’s boobs when she was casually changing her summer blouse. Mom, thinking I meant the little “dots” on her skin, replied “freckles honey”.

ITALIAN LESSON: Boobs = tette (tits) or poppa (breasts)

From that day on, for about a decade or so, I thought boobs were called freckles. I couldn’t understand why some of my friends didn’t know what the word meant — I just figured my mom told me more about that kind of stuff than their moms did. Lucky to be me!

Please say hello to your freckles, and head to the home of madness: Here

“Never hold discussions with the monkey when the organ grinder is in the room.” ~ Winston Churchill

In my post “The Exorcist at the Drive In” I shared my warm memories of the drive-in movie theater, and how I fondly remember those retro intermission ads touting sparkling cold beverages, piping hot coffee, Slim Jims, chocolate bars, candy and cigarettes.

I also mentioned how my little peepers stayed glued to the big screen during the entire showing of The Exorcist, complete with the Ouija board (“Captain Howdy”), pea green priest vomit, and Regan’s infamous crackling head spin. That movie stayed with me so much so that it’s still ranks as my favorite horror flick ever, which I religiously (pun intended) watch at least once a year.

That night, during the showing of the pre-movie movie, mom & dad kept telling me they had a cute little monkey to show me, but I had to be patient. I was so excited and couldn’t wait to see this monkey! Where the heck did mom and dad get a monkey from?” I wondered, so I did my best Ramona the Pest impersonation to get them to show me asap!

Finally, mom said “are you ready to see the monkey?” I told her “YES YES YES!” So … I closed my eyes, and then mom spoke her magic words: “open your eyes!”

DAMN — I was totally gypped!

The “MONKEY” was me! Mom put down the passenger’s side sun visor, so when I opened my eyes I saw my own face in the mirror! Turns out, they thought I was their cute little monkey. I do recall being a bit ticked, but the freakish movie allowed me to snap out of it fairly quickly.

(ITALIAN LESSON: That does not please me = Questo non me calza )

No monkeying around, please leave a comment about your drive-in/movie memories below, and you can head to the madness home page ~ HERE ~

“Death leaves a heartache no one can heal, love leaves a memory no one can steal.”

Not to sound cliché, but this is by far the hardest, most heart-wrenching post I have written so far.  Honestly, if anything else in the next decade comes anywhere near this, immediately find me a stiff new straitjacket, so I can throw myself into a padded room — forever.

Ok, here comes the hard part, words I thought I would not have to write about for at least another decade:  Mom is gone.  My wonderful witty mom passed away in her sleep Thanksgiving morning.  No warning, no illness, no clues, no nothing, no mom. Mom is gone. Mom is gone. I have to repeat myself over and over, because I just cannot believe it’s real. I’m hoping my next post is about the coma I’ve been in for the past week or so — I’ll write about how when I awoke, mom was there with one of her famous QVC jewelry trinkets for me to open, and a pot of her famous spaghetti sauce bubbling away on the stove, so we could all get home and enjoy a  nice Italian dinner in celebration of my new coma-free existence.

Yes, mom is gone.  My house is filled with condolence cards, flowers and such very touching notes from caring family and friends, but somehow it doesn’t seem real. It CAN’T be real.  Mom was SO ALIVE, so funny, always ready with a wise-crack, or words of wisdom.  I loved her advice. She was one of my best friends in the whole world. I see the cards with her photo and a pretty poem, yet I’ll still dial her phone number and expect her to pick up.  I’ll want to call her about who was just told to f*ck off on Hell’s Kitchen, or who we think should have gotten fired on The Apprentice, or the new boots I bought, but then the cold harsh smack of reality hits me right in the face, telling me those days are over.

Mom & I would dish together, watch movies together, shop together, cook dinners (for my hubby and the furkids) together and every so often I’d mix up a couple of whiskey sours and mom would share her humorous and wonderful stories which fill a small notebook of mine.

Loss of any kind is a real tough pill to swallow,  and when you lose a mom and a best friend, you feel like your heart is literally ripping apart. With that said, I think I’ll mix up two whiskey sours, leaving one on the coffee table in mom’s honor.   I just hope I don’t water them down with all of my tears.

Love you & miss you forever Mom

xo Your daughter

Please head home to the madness home page here: www.MadnessMomandMe.com

“Dogs smoke in France”  ~ Ozzy Osbourne

Mom’s back at her apartment still recovering from that nasty cold which left her temporarily deaf and brought her (almost kicking and screaming) to the hospital last weekend (fully documented here www.madnessmomandme.com/2010/10/the-impatient-patient of course).

“Ma, how are you feeling?”  I asked mom today when she picked up the phone.  “I just want to be back to my old lazy self” was her quick reply.  Since mom’s official doctor is WebMD, she’ll remain as stubborn as she usually is, and just wait it out until she feels well enough to be her “lazy ol’ self”.

Hmm… nothing a cigarette a day won’t cure, right?

WILLPOWER MOM, WILLPOWER!

(Italian Lesson: to give up smoking = smettere di fumare)

Just a quickie today, so head back home here www.MadnessMomandMe.com

“A child is a curly dimpled lunatic.”  ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

Most parents have a ridiculous threat they keep in their pocket to throw out when they want to keep their kids in line.   My mom had one which shut me up pretty quickly, because the thought of being away from my quirky family (insanity and all) made my knees knock together in terror.  Also, how the heck could I ever live without mom’s lasagna?

Her threat?   HELGA MUNSON!

This is the beaut I pictured playing the role of Helga.  Mom’s actual threat was that schoolmistress Helga Munson would come to our house to collect me, and take my sorry little talking-back ass to Camp Marymount reform school!

(ITALIAN LESSON:  Threaten (speak threats) = minacciare a voce)

Of course, Helga and Camp Marymount are fictional, but this trick of mom’s worked like a charm (I think she even had my dad involved in her Marymount scam a couple times).

Word to the wise:  if you have kids, be sure think up a few reusable threats today. This way, you’ll be ready to toss one out to your brats at a moment’s notice!

 HELGA SAYS: “Get back to the home of madness now at www.MadnessMomandMe.com !”

(Italian Lesson: cigar smoker = fumatore di sigari)

Don’t make me get the cigar! Please go back to the home of Madness at www.madnessmomandme.com
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St. Margaret's Madness

St. Margaret’s Catholic School, Morristown, NJ – Second grade:  my foray into the Catholic school system.  Jesus, how I hated those wretched uniforms  – come on, who can look halfway decent in those ridiculous plaid accordion-pleated skirts and dowdy white buttoned-up blouses? And that stupid little crisscross tie thing in front of your neck – what the hell was that about?   Where was my favorite little black velvet dress now???

A St. Margaret’s education was OK I guess, but the little me did not leave that school without a couple  “incidents” which got me in a bit of trouble — expelled for a day actually, but more about that in a bit.  This post is all about the mean and utterly terrifying Sister Urselena.  YIKES — even typing out her name makes me tremble to this day!

(Italian Lesson: meschino = mean)

Sister Urselena was one of those nuns who would hit kids acting up in class, and God forbid if you were chewing

Sister Urselena wishes she looked this good

gum, because you’d end up wearing it on your nose and stand in front of the class for an hour with your chewed up gum on the end of your nose.  Yup, this was one frightening nun!  A nun who wouldn’t know a smile if one crawled up her habit and bit her on her ass.  Urselena never smiled at all — maybe it was because she had a mouth like a puppet —a real wooden puppet.  You know, one of those with the deep lines next to her lips, in fact, her mouth opened and closed like a Charlie McCarthy doll.

After seeing Urselena hit a fellow student with a ruler one day, I told my mom about it.  Mom advised me to leave the school if they ever tried to touch me.  So, the next day, I walked to school with my head held high, went straight up to Ursulena and told her that if she, or any nun ever touches me, my mother gave me permission to bolt outta there immediately.  Urselena promptly called my mother to verify this, and mom basically told her “damn straight, sister”! Unfortunately, this was not the last time Sister Ursulena called my mother at home — stay tuned for the “pencil incident” post.

Get back to the home of Madness here www.madnessmomandme.comor I’ll tell Sister Urselena!

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I just told Mom it’s good for your health to get fresh air daily.  She said “I get fresh air a few times a day – every time I go outside for a cigarette!”  Nice one, ma!

Yum, smoking is healthy!

"It's just dad and his ding-a-ling, mom!"

On good days (luckily for me, there were plenty of those) Mom and I spent a lot of time shopping “downtown”. Downtown as in Dover, a cool old town known for its variety of diners, pizzerias, record shops and retail stores like J.C. Penney, Woolworth’s, JJ Newberry and Sears (actual stand-alone department stores, as these were the days long before malls took over the shopping scene).   A frequent spot Mom and I would visit was the historical Dover Public Library, a place I always found so intimidating (this old brick building seemed so large to me –  it housed dark wooden staircases, creaky banisters and always had a slightly musty mixture of sour and stale smells.  Plus, those never smiling oh-so-serious women who worked there, who always wanted us kids to be quiet – geesh!) 

Our library had 45 minutes set aside each week for the moms to browse books on the “mystery” floor, and the children would have story and coloring time downstairs in the “kiddie” area.  I remember I couldn’t wait to be grown up, so I could go upstairs and browse all of those alluring adult novels.  So there I was with the other kiddies sketching away — a pretty simple concept, until it came time for me to show my inner Degas I just unleased. 

(Italian Lesson:  Library = biblioteca)

You see, a day or two earlier, I happened to see my Dad in his birthday suit, when I just happened to be strolling by their bedroom while dad was getting dressed for work that morning — oops! I asked my mom what that “thing” was that Dad had kind-of hanging there, and she promptly told me “oh, that’s his ‘ding-a-ling’”.  Aha- that Chuck Berry song! Now I know what Chuck was singing about!

Well, you can imagine what our storytime librarian did when a proud little me handed in my drawing of a naked man with his dangling ding-a-ling.  My mother was immediately found and pulled aside by the staff to see what was going on in our family.  All was explained, and mom told me it may be best to keep my new ding-a-ling findings to myself.

OK, Ding-a-ling talk is now over, hope you enjoyed. Now please go back to the home of Madness:  www.madnessmomandme.com.

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 “I try to take one day at a time,  but sometimes several days attack me at once.”  
~ Jennifer Unlimited

I’ll get straight to the point of the dark side of being a young mom…my young mom.  Looking back (fondly), I now believe mom had undiagnosed issues like today’s classic panic attacks sprinkled with generalized anxiety disorder.  Maybe Mom felt a bit trapped in the reality of her world — maybe she was just a bit nuts.  She may have just craved more attention, and perhaps she relished the drama just for drama’s sake (I definitely think mom loved drama, but it was most likely a combination of all of these gems). 

A bad day for mom would usually mean the oven goes on.  You could always smell when our gas range was on, so I’d wander down to the kitchen and see what mom was cooking up for dad and me.  On my way,  I’d wonder  “will mom be baking my favorite treat today? Maybe chocolate fudgy brownies – or a creamy chocolate Betty Crocker cake? Lemon cupcakes with colorful sprinkles on top? Would I be able to lick the batter off the spoon?”.  Licking the batter – mmmmm, one of the best yet simplest pleasures life has to offer a kid.  Well, unfortunately, this was not about cakes, cupcakes or my delicious chocolately cake batter….damn!

(Italian Lesson: gas stove = cucina a gas)

No, this was all about our gas oven, a prime prop for my mother’s drama.  Mom would turn on the oven, open the door – gas aflame – that “funny” gassy scent filling up our tiny kitchen.  At times she threatened to stick her head in the oven and end it all, leaving me a motherless kid.  Sometimes she said we were ALL doomed, and our trusty little gas oven would take us all out. 

I was just a kid, so I believed her (not knowing that just lighting an oven with a working pilot light wouldn’t kill a freaking moth).  However, for some strange reason I never panicked when the range of death went on.  Yeah, I thought it was peculiar, but perhaps it was the frequency of this nut-job behavior that it became an in home show – a performance put on by a mom for her daughter.  Masterpiece Theatre in my own kitchen.  Bellissimo, Bellissimo!

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