Earlier on Saturday, my mother and i got into an argument, which was actually a continuation of an argument we had the night before. You see, 2 weeks ago, my mother offered me a chance to get a DVR box with much more recording space on it, and viewing it as a good idea at the time, i accepted. However, after i realized that this choice meant swapping out and returning the box that i had, i spent the next few days getting all of my DVR recordings off the box and onto discs. After many days of recording and downloading what i could, the recordings on my personal DVR box were all saved and i was feeling quite satisfied. Particularly because i believed that it was only my box that was getting swapped. As such, i felt that since our living room also had a recording DVR box, i could use it as a safety net for certain recordings. However, it was just last night that i realized that we were swapping all of the boxes in the house and that meant i’d have to record off all of my stuff on the Living Room box as well.
This, naturally, made me nervous and that soon turned into frustration, which I would then vent to my mother in an e-mail, written in an, admittedly, blaming sort of way. As i said, i was very upset, so much so, that in addition to sending her this e-mail, i also muttered and complained to myself which she overheard. Becoming upset herself, my mother started yelling at me and we stopped talking for the rest of the night. The next morning, in an attempt to find out if we were still swapping out the boxes, i wrote a note for my mother to read. However, since we weren’t exactly on speaking terms, i was hoping to simply drop the note in the chair next to my mother’s room door opening and keep on going. That way, i could give her the note without further escalating conflict. Unfortunately, she mistook my intention as me just throwing the note in her room and took that as a sign of disrespect. This led to a lecture from her about how i’ve done nothing to deserve respect, how i am not her equal due to being her son, and how i’m not as smart as i think i am and all that rot. Initially, i paid most of this lecture no mind, since i was in no mood to listen to one of my mother’s lectures. But looking back, some of the things she said were kind of hurtful, especially since she said that she wasn’t just venting her aggression, she meant all the things she said.
Later on, i wrote a note that i had hoped would help put an end to the feud for now, but it was not easy to write. As my Chinese Zodiac sign says: i’m a free-spirit and really, really proud, authority is not something i’m good with and admitting that i’m wrong (which was not really something i did in the note, but still) is even worse for me.
Bottom line, my mother and i have next to nothing going for us in terms of common ground. We don’t even have complimenting personalities, we’re like water and oil. What can a guy do?