Rude call prompts self-evaluation

By Mother-in-law

The loud ringing of my cell phone at 7am last Sunday rudely interrupted my sleep. I usually sleep in on Sunday mornings and wake up at 9am so I can attend the 10.30am church service. I am a creature of habit so that unwelcome jolt into wakefulness really disoriented me.

It was Mark’s (ex?)wife. Apparently she had got wind that I was happy she had left.

"Hello?" I ventured.

"You evil interfering witch!" she began her tirade.

"I am not a conniving gold-digger! I make my own money. Your son is a loser and impossible to live with," she continued.

"What? What are you talking about?" I feigned ignorance.

She burst into laughter.

"Well, since you are happy to be free of the ‘loser’ and I am ecstatic he has escaped from your claws, what is the problem? We are both happy," I said.

"I resent you soiling my name. You are evil and self-centred and one day this will catch up with you. Anyway, you are so old, you don’t have much longer to live. The whole world will heave a sigh of relief when you die. I will certainly dance on your grave," she said.

I hang up. I was trembling. No one had ever spoken to me like that before.

She had obviously interrupted my sleep. So I woke up and made myself a cup of tea and thought long and hard.

Self-evaluation

"Dance on my grave?" I pondered. Do other people, notably my other children-in-law, feel the same way. I decided to forgo church and evaluate my performance as a mother-in-law. Here is my assessment in chronological order of the age of their spouses:

Mrs Matthew: A nice girl whom I actually love like my own daughter. An excellent mother for my grandchildren. We have a good relationship, although the last time we met I gave her a piece of my mind about her decision not to work, yet her family is obviously struggling financially. I hope she does not see my concern and action plan– getting her a job at the bank where I used to work –– as interference.

Mr Naomi: Technically, DJ Ill Money is not Naomi’s husband. He must go. But in the meantime I am civil to him and he goes out of his way to help me — he drove me to Ann’s farm. He is a nice person, but I am suspicious of his motives for dating Naomi who is older, more educated and much wealthier than he is. He is completely unsuitable for her but I tolerate him because I am a nice person.