Surviving A Visit From Mom

Writing in the Globe and Mail, David Eddie gives advice to a married reader, who's mother has embraced a new philosophy: to never "explain or apologize." Making matters worse, she's popping in for a visit (uninvited) and his wife is not pleased.

Writing in the Globe and Mail, David Eddie gives advice to a married reader, whose mother has embraced a new philosophy: to never "complain, explain or apologize."  Making matters worse, she's also decided to pop in for a visit (uninvited) and his wife is understandably not pleased.

First of all, Damage Control does not endorse this “Never complain, explain, or apologize” philosophy, at all.

Ye gods, if I had a philosophy of “never complain, explain, or apologize,” I wouldn’t have anything to say to anyone – particularly my wife. I would be mute. Complaining, explaining, and apologizing pretty much comprises all the (non-sexual) intercourse I have with her. ...

But listen: It’s hard to grow old gracefully. Life flies by so quickly! (“We give birth astride a grave,” as Samuel Beckett put it. “The light gleams an instant, then it’s gone.”) Suddenly you’re old, and confronting so many things at once: creaking joints, your own mortality, a sudden short supply of “future,” perhaps, and (also perhaps) an overabundance of “past.”

And being alone (sounds like) for 10 years since your father, her husband, died, can’t have helped either. She’s lonely!

Is it any wonder some of us clutch at philosophical straws like “never complain, explain, or apologize” as a way of understanding/dealing with it all?

Click here to read the rest.