Enter the Harpy

Quiet, peaceful day.

Well, until about 4pm, when Lonz called me to let me know how things were back east. He told me that Ma had told him that Jan was not doing well, and might die soon. (Wow, she was actually able to retain that information??? And convey it??? Good day for Ma!) I confirmed that sad information, and Lonz was sympathetic, as well as resigned to God's will. He's seen a sister and a couple of his brothers die from cancers. Lonz knows well how iffy our life in this world is.

But Lonz's surprise news was that he stopped to visit Ma, and happened to arrive just as Ma's caseworker was leaving. Lonz told me that as soon as the woman was out the door, my mother flipped her off. He was shocked; I was not. I've heard her venom poured out about the people who are trying to help her; all he's heard is the venom poured out about me.

Ma told him she was going to get the station wagon (which still sits in her garage -- I THINK I was able to snag all the keys to it) started again. "No, you can't," Lonz told her. "There's something wrong with it. And besides, you don't have a license any more."

"That's right," she said to him, "Sand had the sheriff take my license from me."

"No, it was the State," he reminded her. "The State took it away."

"Oh, no, my friend Mona told me that Sand[y] went down there and told them to take away my license."

Yep, good old Mona (pronounced "MONNA" for whatever reason -- I've always pronounced her name correctly out of the barest shred of respect I've ever hand for her as a person, though she could never get it through her stupid duck brain that I'm not 'Sandy' but Sand) has been coaching Ma and helping her revise her perceptions of reality.

I was in the room when Mona (who is a friend because she is married to the man who was Dad's best friend when he was growing up) called my mother to tell her that Ma didn't have Alzheimer's (Mona being a medical specialist, of course), that no one had a right to sell her truck (Ma should call the Sheriff, the State Police, the dealership, et al), and that 'Sandy' was behind it all because I was after Ma's money. I heard this because the harridan was screaming it into the phone so loudly that my mother held the receiver away from her ear. "Don't you trust her!"

My mother put the phone to her ear again and said, "I'm sorry. Who is this again?"

That was actually funny, in a Joke About Alzheimer's kind of way, but Mona didn't bat an eye (or if she batted, there was no indication of it in the levels of her screeching voice), just went on with her diatribe.

Well, darling Mona (visualize a harpy on acid) has been visiting with Ma and filling her head with all kinds of poison about me. Lovely. Just what we all needed.

Bernie has given me permission to use any and all foul language if that old nutso skag calls my cell phone. She began berating me when I answered my mother's phone one morning (so that my mother would finish her breakfast and not be distracted from eating) and my response was to hang up on her. That memory still gives me a warm and fuzzy feeling.

I have loathed this woman from my earliest memory, when I was still a toddler. She was shrill, and stupid, and annoying, unable to grasp that I understood every word she was saying and despised them all.

Nothing has changed, and apparently, the antipathy was mutual.

Mona Jury, for the record, is a total nutcase asshole, and is fucking with my mother's last times.

May God judge her justly.

Which is not to say that I'm upset about her poisoning Ma's mind -- she is at least one more pair of gimlet eyes on Ma to make sure she's okay. But that care does NOT offset the damage she is doing. I wish that she and I were the same age. I think I'd beat the shit out of her.

Hmm. She reminds me of the guy with the stainless steel teeth in that old James Bond movie, only not so coherent or good-looking.