My e-silence has been deafening. And the bony fingers of Mother Guilt have been clutching at my shoulder, poking me to action. She rasps in my ear, "It has been a month, and you have blogged of neither cabbages nor kings." Her breath smells of old burnt coffee and cigarettes, which is probably why her voice sounds so much like Harvey Fierstein's.
I try to explain, I've been pulled in a number of different directions lately. Some of them good, like trying to promote my book while writing the next one. And some of them not-so-Cabbage-worthy. Like trying to wrap up my Dad's estate, a place from which humor posts do not easily come unless you enjoy laughing at a woman who wakes up at 2am freaking out that she forgot to submit some paperwork on the paperwork.
I am hanging in there. I am clinging on.
But Mother Guilt says to stop making excuses, my lack of productivity has forced her to come all this way, she's not getting any younger, and if I cared at all, I would get my posterior in gearior and write a damn blog post.
Mother Guilt is a taskmaster.
So I explain to her how I thought I was on the cusp of a post idea the other day. See, I keep getting these spam emails that make me wonder how many times they've been used as evidence in divorce court.
They're usually from a name like "Amber" or "Tracy" and they begin with "Hey, babe-- how come you don't answer my texts anymore?" They go on to tell an elaborate tale of how I, apparently, blocked this chick on Facebook, but we used to do a lot of flirting and now she's single again and going to be moving to my town, and she doesn't know anyone else here, and she would like to pick up where we left off.
My being neither male nor gay, I didn't find myself scouring my memories for some one-night-stand named Amber. But I keep thinking if I were a not-so-web-savvy wife and I noticed this in my husband's email box, I might have a pang of concern. And a print-out for the poor dude when he'd come home.
Mother Guilt took a drag of her cigarette over this and said this wasn't enough for an actually funny blog post; it had no real resolution or any exaggeration potential for true comedic value, and I agreed. It's good to agree with Mother Guilt now and then; the element of surprise gets her off my back for a minute or two.
So Ma Mere Guilt is apparently still ruminating about where to apply the bony finger of shame next. That's why I thought I'd intercept her and let you all know I'm alive and haven't forgotten about you, that I've just been stretched as thin as filo dough on a Greek grandmother's kitchen table.
The Greek grandmother is probably pretty good with the guilt, too. But at least with her, there would be flaky, flaky pastry.
