Tomorrow, Zoë leaves for what I think is her fourth sleepover at her grandmothers. Not a day too soon. The child is killing me.
Now, correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m pretty sure that PMS symptoms don’t start until there’s actually impending menarche. And even with the frequent onset of early puberty for girls nowadays – damn hormonal meats – I’m thinking it’s still a little early for her to be quite this bitchy. Because this is like Rosie O’Donnell, plus early 90s Susan Powter, plus hmmm… your mother-in-law, combined into a megalodon of bitchiness. Squared.
Mama, I told you you have to...
The kid can’t go 20 minutes without
demanding that I do something of servitude – because apparently all of that tearing that took place when her shoulders popped out
from the inside of me wasn’t enough, now I must commit heinous acts like wiping her butt, preparing food and cleaning up the Play-Doh.
You know, 2 out of 3 of those are fine by me (on a good day), but the fact that her manners have flown out the damn window with her former sweetness and common fucking sense makes me a little resistant.
She bit me today. The first time in over a year and completely unprovoked, bit me. That brought forth the raging inferno of terror called Immediate Time Out, wherein she proceeded to screech like the demon I know is festering within her, kicking walls, throwing punches in the air. Yelling at me – wait, this is my favourite – “I’m not going to care about it!“
Who is this wild child? Have I given her too many choices, and now she’s retaliating by serving me with the ultimate anti-authoritai personality? Does she need more hugs? Drugs? Thugs? Some pugs?
I have no clue why her brain has suddenly decided that the following scenario was how the world should work:
Her: Mama, I told you. You have to give me chips!
Me: Okay, that’s enough. I’ve been listening to this attitude for days now and it’s more than enough. You are three, not fourteen and there is no reason that you need to speak to me like that. And if you choose to, there is no way that I will reward it with a treat like chips. Got it?!
Her: Mama, you’re wrong.
Me: Excuse me?
Her: I’m not three.
Me: Yes, you are. I was there. The day is etched upon my memory. You’re three and in the summer, you’ll be four.
Her: I said I’m not three.
Me: Okay, then.
Her: I’m sixteen. On my birthday, I’ll be seventeen.
Me: {ponders if there is an actual possibility that the whole being-trapped-in-a-child’s-body thing could happen. I mean, if Hollywood can think of it, in so many different ways – Big, 13 Going on Thirty, Freaky Friday – then why couldn’t it actually be happening now, in Vancouver? Decide that even if that’s the case, she’s still being too bitchy.}
Needless to say that when she’s picked up tomorrow, I’ll be waving adieu very excitedly, and getting drunk immediately after slamming the door.
I’ve always been a moviefile. I’ve been the person who can say, “I watch a lot of movies, but I really used to watch a lot when…
… I was caught up in the love-lust of my high school romance, and we’d rent enough movies to conceal the sounds of our hours-long make out sessions in the basement of the rockstar ex’s parent’s basement.
… The Ex was working graveyard shifts and watching movies until I fell asleep was the only way I could get to sleep in our cold, dark, lonely basement suite.
… I used to smoke a lot of pot with The Ex and movie-marathons were about all we were interested in doing.
… I was pregnant, without cable, and too bitchy to allow myself to become a xbox widow.
… Zoë was a newly-born, mewling milk-vampire. We’d rent every movie that we hadn’t seen from the new releases wall of the video store, as well as start watching new series, then in their fifth seasons, from the first episode.
… after Zoë came into her hyper, non-attentive personality – when movies were the only thing that would calm her down.
… when I assessed that the everyday doings were getting in the way of the whole reason I should have been at home with Zoë, instead of working – to spend time with her – and thus, Friday Night Date Night was created.
… when insomnia really came up and bit me in the derriere two years ago, and I found myself up, without much to do, and an obsessive need to watch until I could watch no longer.
So, to sum up my main point: I’ve been a hard-core movie-watcher for over a decade.
I’ve also been some form of an insomniac for nearly two decades, and movies have long-stood as the catalysts to REM. So much so, The Ex has held a habit for many years of flickering his eyes in my direction while a film played on, looking for signs of my sleepiness. If he catches my eyelids lowering, I’m immediately called on it – mocked and ‘you always’ and sarcasmed to near death with ‘You, fall asleep during a movie? Never.’
Hard core example-ology: I saw Reign of Fire twice in the theatre and have rented it twice, but have never seen the entire thing.
It’s a problem when you can’t sleep until the small hours, unless some film you’ve been looking forward to is on, it’s only in your possession for 24 hours, and you have merely three of those potential 24 to afford it attention. It’s a heinous when your ex will always have ammo against you, an equal to one of Nelson from the Simpsons’ ha-ha!s always waiting in the wings. It sucks, because it’s rarely during the movies I’ve watched, the ones I know line by line and weird face by awkward monologue that I lose my ability to remain conscious, it’s always during the new, “hey, this looks cool” ones.
It’s balls, that’s what it is.
Tonight, when Zoë convinced me to rent G-Force because ever-so-sweetly, she said, “Get me the hamster movie, Terra, or I won’t be very happy at you!” and I’m a pushover for manners like that, I also picked up 500 Days of Summer.
I’ve been looking forward to this movie since… well, the summer. Zooey D and that kid from 3rd Rock From the Sun who, much like John Lithgow, owns non-comedic roles, too (check out Manic or Brick for little what’s-his-name and Dexter or Raising Cain for Lithgow?) seem like a match made in HD-heaven. Tracks from the soundtrack have already aurally pleasured me. The costumes have got me right back into that period of my life when instead of just fashion design, I really wanted to do styling.
It’s sitting on top of my DVD player right. this. second.
And I’m terrified to watch it, knowing that I haven’t gotten fuck all for sleep lately – or at least, that’s what the un-made-up luggage under my half-hooded eyes is saying – and that I’ll probably become comatose the moment that the opening credits roll. Good thing I rented it for a week.
What makes you PTFO? Seriously, tell me. I need to not be so alone in the automatic off-switch.
