Yo' (grand) Mama

Today, I had to go buy some fondant. The only place I know of that sells the kind I like is in Phoenix, so I loaded up the baby and we took a nice 20 minute drive into the city. Since we were in the neighborhood, I decided on a whim to stop my my mom's place since it was only about a mile or two from the cake supply store. Turns out, she was home.

Today was the first time I've seen my mother since December of 2004. That's about 4 1/2 years now.

At first, it was awkward. I never know exactly what to say, or how to act. It's pretty uncomfortable at the beginning. After a while though, I was able to relax and we were able to have a good conversation. I learned some things about our family history (the grandmother I'm named for liked to smack people with her cane) and I was able to tell her some things I had learned (that grandmother married her step dad!!!). Of course, it helped that I had this little guy to keep her in good spirits:

I know I said I didn't want the baby to be around her. I would like to keep their relationship to a minimum, and always supervised, simply because I don't know what to expect. I don't know if she's on drugs anymore. I don't know who her friends are. I don't know what he could learn there if I wasn't around. But at the same time, there's still that sad girl inside who wants to have a normal-ish mother/daughter relationship. I want to be able to hang out with her and do things together.

Has she changed? I don't know. I will say that it was a shock when she opened the door to see how much she's aged. I'm sure it was the same for her when she saw me. She's only 48, which really, isn't all that old for someone with seven grandchildren. At the same time, in my mind I think of her the way she looked when she was just a few years older than my age just because that was the last time I saw her on any kind of regular basis. I guess this will just have to be one of those situations where you go in slowly, feel your way around, and be ready to leave if/when things go south. Until then, I'll just take it as it comes.

I wanted to share this video I made of the baby yesterday. While other parents are showing their babies useful things like how to waye hello and how to walk, this is what we are teaching our child:



Yeah.