One

This is the nth time that my mother and I have a blowout. As usual, it started as an innocuous as telling my mother about a photobooth from the party she recently attended. 

I forgot how negative she can be at everything I say on anything I planned to do (unless it's about working as a nurse abroad) that I blurted out in amazement, “Geez, this photobooth company is really going all out with their photobooth equipment.” She asked why I was curious. I told her that I had planned on putting up a photobooth business before.

As usual (and I should've expected) she began berating me to stop thinking about putting up a business, focus on what my goal was, to not lose sight of my plan on getting to UK. 

“You should stop planning on having businesses because look at what happened to your foodcart!” The tirade started even though I wasn’t even finished telling her that putting up a photobooth was my plan before but I didn’t pursue it because I don’t think there will be enough market for it in Butuan.

The reason why I am so fed up with my mother’s negativity is I just want an open communication between us. 

Me- sharing about my plans and dreams, and she will listen attentively and not react in a knee-jerk manner which is, "Stop doing what it is you're doing. What you're doing is wrong wrong wrong wrong. Don’t hike Puting Bato, don’t put up a photobooth business, don’t climb Mt. Mayapay, stop getting interested in making computer games, don’t complain about the pedestrians or anything while you're driving, don’t fast."

What really gets my goat is, my mother is a very good listener to other people. If the people she respects shares their traffic woes, she'll be all wide-eyed and attentive. But if it's coming from me all I get from her is nag nag nag nag. "You are wrong, stop getting angry while you're driving." Blah blah blah." She will really get heated telling me I shouldn't get mad at motorcycles cutting in front of me or for not following traffic rules (this part of our communication is better now). 

Coz of course, I'm always wrong for complaining.

But one day, it's almost expected, she'll regale me with stories about a daughter's friend getting horrified at the awful way people drive in Butuan. If it's me- I am a horrid person for complaining. If its someone else- she'd be all sympathetic and shit.

I keep forgetting that this person is just someone who wants me to be an idea she has of her daughter. She has zero plans of getting to know me. She doesn't hear me unless its something she wants to hear.

Is it really too much to ask to have a mother who listens to you? Or wants to get to know you?   

Or should I just suck it up and stop being so sensitive and melodramatic.

This is what I get for not preparing for a contingency- for not buying a house when I still could. Grrr. 

We are meant to just enjoy each other's presence in small doses.