Do not ask if her period is about to start

(Transferred from my old blog on 18 August 2008.)

Mom and I have gotten along famously well for the last several months, but during the first week of March I kind of lost it. I feel badly, and I know you can't really blame your emotions on others, but certain things really set me off. First of all, I needed a stamp pad (remember Rosie?) for the Relief Society fliers that I am in charge of. (I know they assign things like that to get people involved, but I have work on Tuesday nights, so I'm a hypocrite in that I create things telling people to come and I don't even go.) Well, back to what set me off - Mom said she knew exactly where the stamp pads were, but they weren't there, so I looked all over and kept asking her where they were. Then she looked for about a minute and said that she had no idea where they could be. I wouldn't usually care about using a stamp, but Pam Newman had brought one over for me to use, so I felt like I had to use it. So I started looking around, and, . . . well, piles of junk make me angry! I have piles in my room, but they have purpose! Your previous bedroom is full of . . . NOTHING! I started pushing over boxes and digging around in tubs and opening drawers only to discover that we don't need any of that stuff! Wow, the more details I give, the more I realize that my reasons for getting angry are STUPID. Anyway, I finally made watermarks on the papers and discovered that Mom never got the toner on the printer fixed! How am I supposed to make fliers without toner? Bah! I had to print everything in blue! So on Monday, Jeff was watching some stuff he's not supposed to, so I said, "Jeff, you know you're not supposed to watch that," which can be very annoying, I know, but I said it in a nice way and he freaked out at me. I tried to defend myself but then he just made even more fun of me because I said something about "uplifting media" being supported by the prophet. He really hurt my feelings and I felt all mad about that, but I tried to let it go. Instead, I let it out. Then I did the dishes and Mom criticized me for not getting everything off that one pan. I said, "Mom, do you ever thank me? I'm the only one who does the big dishes, and they are usually from Sunday, and I do them without you asking! Maybe you should start thanking before you criticize." Whoops. During family night, they took forever to really have it, so I went and put my clothes in the washer. Except I re-discovered that NO ONE EVER puts their own clothes in the dryer or takes them out, so I had to transfer everything first. (Now, notice here that later on I get mad about her not transferring mine, how is that fair?) So I went back up to family night and they had started and we sewed buttons on material as the lesson/activity. Late that night, after I was already in bed: "Michelle, you put my stuff in the dryer without asking." She was doing her laundry in the middle of the night and decided to wake me up to tell me this. "You could have shrunk something." The next morning, I assumed that because she had been doing laundry last night, she must have moved my stuff into the dryer. Wrong. I didn't realize this until I needed my still-wet clothes. Then, to make matters worse, Mom pulled that stupid line on me that she always uses and NEVER has she been right yet: "Michelle, is your period about to start?" I HATE when she says that, because it just makes me more mad and she's never been right anyway. It always gets me to the point where I want to open my door and strangle the first thing in sight. So, I went upstairs when I was ready (in my damp tights), and dangled the keys while Jeff ate breakfast and Mom played with the stereo. Usually, Mom gets mad at me for being late, but this time it was the other way around. We finally got in the car and dropped off Jeff. When we got to the top of the lane, the bus pulls right by us. Hmmm. I'm sick of chasing buses and feeling like a fool while the bus driver watches me jump out of the van at some stop right ahead of him. Plus, these are drivers I see everyday. They KNOW where I get on. It just makes me feel stupid, so I said, "Just bring me down to the other bus." She tried to chase it instead. I repeated my request, and she turned left and left again, another thing you don't do when you want to catch a bus - backtrack. She got really angry when I mentioned that. Finally she dropped me off at a different stop and left. So, that is why I have been angry this week, and it all seems really stupid, but no, my period is not about to start, and please, never say that to anyone.

Ever since then we have gotten along just fine, but now my frustration has transferred a bit to my brother. I love him. I really do, it just seems like he treats me like I'm in junior high, and that he doesn't care about anyone else. I asked him as nicely as I could not to put towels on the floor because of spider spray and spiders and he just laughed and made fun of me. Guess what was on my towel this week? A dead spider! EEEEW! I could NOT get it off! I almost barfed, so I just left it hanging over the garbage can.