It's An Itch; I Need To Scratch It

[poliphilo]

"I don't think I've told you this before", said my mother-in-law weakly and began a story about how she once ate pasta in a hotel in Malta. Ailz noticed me fidgeting and suggested I take a walk. So I did.

My in-laws like to talk about

(a) Great hotel meals I have eaten
(b) Great conversations I have had with medical personnel
(c) Great relatives I used to have but don't any more because they're mostly dead.

And that's about it.  It's useless trying to discuss anything else with them because they don't listen and once you've said your say my father-in-law will weigh in with, "I'll tell you this..." and switch the conversation back to one of the favoured topics.

(To be fair they also used to talk about how "If I had my way I'd send them all back home" but they've been cured of that.) 

Ailz and I have developed a soothing fiction about how I'm a restless soul and can't sit still- which allows me to get up and leave the room when they start.

Comments

[daisytells.livejournal.com]

It's hard on you, I know. Hard on Ailz, too. I keep you both in my thoughts.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Thank you

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

Hmm. Lis and I have stories about great meals we've eaten, too . . . also, drinks.

Ah, well. I just have to accept that I'm an alta kocker and always have been.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

But perhaps you don't tell them over and over again to the same listeners?

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

. . . I wish that were the case . . .

You know what's bad? When you're telling a story about something that happened to a friend of yours, and you realize that the person you are telling it to is the person who it actually happened to.

You know what's worse? When you realize this is the third time you've told the person that story.

You know what's even worse than that? When you can't stop telling the story after you realize both of those things.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I guard against this sort of thing myself by never telling anyone anything.

[craftyailz.livejournal.com]

You can't sit still. It's not a soothing fiction. Your son Michael is the same. It's one of the things that make you, you.

They've always been food orientated - perhaps that's why we're all fat.

I also don't want people to thing my parents are just bigoted against coloreds - my mother being a Northern Irish Protestant wouldn't let Roman Catholics live here if she had the chance - though she reckons we have to keep the Methodists and Congregationalists - but other than Protestants and them they should all ' go back home'. (RCs to RC countries or failing that the Vatican City) - Ailz - I'm not sure it's going to change to my account

[pondhopper.livejournal.com]

The older people get the more they repeat themselves, I think. It doesn't make it easier and if they've always been like that it just gets more wearing.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

It does. And it doesn't help if the stories were dull first time round.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

A lot of people end up as self-centred bores. It's sad.