11. I have now written more than ten thousand words about not writing about my mother’s death
Subjects yet uncovered:
- The death certificate, and what the note “body found decomposing” meant
- Whether or not her fifth husband, a schizophrenic, gave me an accurate timeline of her death
- How shitty I am for referring to him as “a schizophrenic” every five seconds
- Anger is not an excuse for ableism
- It’s okay for me to be angry that my mother and her fifth husband were mentally ill
- It’s not okay for me to be angry at my mother and her fifth husband for being mentally ill
- I’m going to keep being angry at them though
- I’m angry at myself for being a fucking monster, so at least I’m consistent
- Robin, my current therapist, would correct “a fucking monster” to “temporarily emotionally dysregulated”
- But she never had to deal with me throwing a fit at the dry cleaner
- Whenever I think of something shitty I said to my husband, even if it was twelve years ago, I bring it up and apologize
- It doesn’t matter if he downplays it or says he doesn’t remember, I need to have it on the record that I’m sorry
- It’s selfish and probably annoying but the remorse is genuine
- The akashic record, according to Wikipedia, is “a compendium of all universal events, thoughts, words, emotions, and intent ever to have occurred in the past, present, or future in terms of all entities and life forms, not just human”
- The akashic record knows the entire truth and has all the evidence of what an asshole I am
- That’s the record I want it on
- And Google, I want it on Google
- Her last name in the article “Local Woman Dies in Squalor” was her fifth husband’s name
- Nobody who previously knew her could’ve found her under that name
- She used her third husband’s name for most of her life, long after they divorced, for professional reasons, and also because at a certain point you kind of have to pick one and stick with it
- But when you Google “Janice Erlbaum’s mother,” which you are not likely to do, I want you to find this
- It’s just as bad as the article, if not worse
- You’d never have known that I was the daughter of Local Woman who Dies in Squalor
- (Dies, repeatedly, every time she comes to mind, she is alive for a moment and then dies again)
- Occasionally she shows up in a dream and it’s not bad at all, she can walk, she looks okay, and I don’t mind seeing her
- But I don’t want to mention that she’s dead, it would be like pointing out food in the corner of her mouth
- (Which you should ALWAYS do to me, ALWAYS tell me I have food on my face, and ALWAYS tell me I’m dead when I show up posthumously in your dream)
- If I wasn’t so intent on telling everybody, you’d never know it was me, Local Daughter of Local Woman Who Keeps Dying in Squalor, and who may well keep doing so ad infinitum, depending which religion turns out to be right
- I just can’t shut up shutting up
- I won’t stop claiming the body
- The paramedics refused to enter the home without hazmat suits
- And I refuse to let it go