The Last Mother

On this, the official Mother’s Day in the year of our Lord 2015, I hereby resign from mothering grown ass people who are incapable of tending to their own basic needs.

In other words: “Buy your own rolls and roll your own.”

That’s rolls, as in toilet paper and cigarettes. How hard is it to comprehend? If you use a toilet, you will need some toilet paper. Ditto for smokers and tobacco products.

All I am saying is, jack it up the list of your personal priorities!

Now there is a difference between someone rolling off the last square a couple days before payday (maybe they had company or an unexpected virus) and someone who refuses to buy their own. It galls me because I have given this man MORE double rolls of good toilet paper out of my last pack than I have used myself. It REALLY galls me because that man just got his Social Security check on the first, blew all his money on God only knows what, and didn’t buy any toilet paper.

So, I did the “Elaine” thing… nope, sorry, can’t spare a square.

Okay. I wanted to say that… but, it came out backwards. I told him that I can spare some squares, but not a whole roll. He declined; said he would ask someone else.

See? That’s the thing. I can QUIT doing this mothering crap and they will find someone else, just as how they hit someone else up before me. It is a never ending saga. People who live by the Bum’s Rule (never buy for yourself what you can get off someone else) are NOT going to change. The only person affected by my resignation is me. They will survive, sink or swim, without me.

By the way, it is NOT just toilet paper, shampoo, razors, laundry soap, coffee, cigs, sandwiches, and other mothering stuff. I am tired of being hit up for petty cash – small loan here, small loan there, hey lady got a dollar? And it is NOT just one or two people hitting me up. I can’t do it anymore, so I am done. This branch of the First National Bank of Mothers is now officially and permanently CLOSED.

So, Happy Mother’s Day!

As for me, I have passed my torch on to my daughter. She’s the mom now… I’m just grandma.

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Hibernation Contemplation

Okay, just thoughts… as wicked winds sweep through the concrete canyons of downtown Youngstown, splitting at the intersection of Market and Boardman Streets to whip flags to fly in different directions, and snow blows when it may, I savor the solitude of winter hibernation.

Cabin Fever is never an issue.  I have more than enough to keep myself busy, mainly photos to snap and dozens of listings to write up and post as I slowly stock the virtual shelves  in my new web store. (That, I write about on my biz blog, YBWorks. This blog is my personal blog… where I can write about anything.) There is always something to do as temps drop bitter cold.

I like being alone, as in solitude is when things get done.

It is also a good time to think. My thoughts wander on their own, sift and sort and draw conclusions free from distractions of social interactions.

I have determined that the only way I can continue to live in this apartment building is by distancing myself from the group home mentality that goes on here. It is “senior housing” for elderly and disabled persons, but it is not an assisted living type facility. It is an apartment building. I rented an apartment in this building, just as I would rent an apartment anywhere else. It is not a “room” as I heard a security guard refer to someone’s apartment, nor am I a “resident” who “stays” here. I am a tenant. I live in a rented apartment. Terms used to describe things are important. Words are important.

This is not my first rental rodeo… I’ve lived in many apartments over the years, had over a dozen different landlords, and never had a landlord’s management staff so involved in their tenant’s lives. Therefore, I must take steps to maintain an appropriate tenant/landlord relationship with the staff here. That means that I cannot participate in activities planned for residents. I know that they are trying to provide social interaction opportunities and helpful services for elderly and disabled people who may otherwise go without, but the line between property management and running an unlicensed facility sometimes gets blurred.  I feel like I’m in a group home with my visitors monitored, that the file the service coordinator wants to update is my client file, so no… I cannot go to bingo or anything else going on here. For my own mental health, I have to pretend that this is a NORMAL apartment building. Otherwise, I will have to exit sooner than planned.

Yes, I have an exit plan.  Management may be happy to read that I plan to move out someday (yes, read… I heard that links were shared after I wrote about the sensor issues.) Family will be happy, as the frequency of fire trucks called to this location (mostly for minor kitchen smoke) makes them worry about me being trapped in a major fire here. But, that is NOT why I am moving. My reasons are personal. I am looking down the barrel at the last twenty years of my life (if I’m lucky to live so long) and making decisions about where and how I want to spend my golden years.

To execute my plan, I have to downsize and raise some serious moving cash. It will take some time… maybe a year or two, but it feels good to have a plan.

Tomorrow will be another frigid day.  I tried to snap a cell photo of how the winds whip flags in different directions back in daylight (yesterday, as it is after midnight) but snow fog obscures the view of flags flying atop the courthouse. Here it is…

No matter how you slice it, the winds flowing through the concrete canyons are COLD!

Thanks for reading!

How to Steal a Light Bulb

A primer for thieves:  Unscrew your burnt out light bulb. Take it with you. Replace the working light bulb you are stealing with your old burnt out light bulb.  Staff will think “it burnt out” and screw in a new one.  They may not even notice that it had been swapped out because, odds are, you had stolen the burnt out bulb, too.

If you steal without replacing the bulb, the crime is too obvious and management responds by not screwing in new ones.  (They tried covering bulbs with protective cages, but dumb criminals stole those, too.) Because of light bulb thefts, our trash rooms are now unlit.  We have to take our trash into small dark, windowless rooms that feel really dank and dirty.  Now our elevators are occasionally dimmed because light bulb thieves have moved on to alternate sources.  This is affecting the quality of life for all tenants, so if you are going to steal light bulbs, do it in a way that brings no harm to anyone else.

 

This public service message is brought to you by tenants who, shockingly, actually buy their own bulbs. Thanks for reading.