Philip Roth

A good quote from Philip Roth that pretty much sums up my trip to see my mother and my life in general.

"A Jewish man with parents alive is a fifteen-year-old boy, and will remain a fifteen-year-old boy till they die"

Betting Man

For the last few months, Sybil has been hounding me to visit. Since there was no good way to spin a trip to the 25 Taylor Street pain cave, I decided the best approach would be to piggy back a vacation my brother planned back east to Sag Harbor. Something about him renting a house, having a car service pick up Sybil, blah, blah, blah. In theory it sounded like a great way to visit without really visiting.  There would be enough distractions and people that I could possibly avoid talking to Sybil the entire time.  My daughter could play with my brother's daughter and I more importantly could hide while other people dealt with Sybil requesting her tomato be sliced extra thin.  "No, that isn't thin enough. Do it again."

When I told Sybil the glorious plan she immediately said no.  She needed to see me and my brother and our collective children separately. I would like to say this had to do with her being lonely and wanting to spread out people visiting, but I think it had more to do with her driving home that my brother and I should be close but not that close. I responded by saying well I guess I'm not coming then because that's the only free time I have.

SO THEN DON'T COME!

That was the end of it until I realized I had two days off Memorial Day weekend. Hmmmm, four days off.  That's nice. What should I do? Let me think about that for a bit. Mid-day Tuesday before the weekend in question I called Sybil and told her about my four days off and if I only knew sooner I would have come for a visit.  If I had stopped there I would have been free, but I added the following, "Well, I know it's short notice but if you want to pay for the tickets, I will come visit."

I thought the empty gesture was the equivalent of me standing in an OTB with the sports almanac from Back to the Future in one hand and a dozen tickets for American Pharoah in the other. I thought I had a sure thing!

Sybil: How much are the tickets?
Barry: Let me look... $2600 plus tax on United.
Sybil: Call me in a bit and I will give you a credit card.
Barry (quietly): okay

I sat there for a moment wondering if she was serious. Would she really spend the money? A few minutes later I got a confirmation email from United. She booked the trip for me.

I truly gambled and lost.

More on the trip later.

Upon further research I see the almanac only goes up to 2000.  Clearly I can't gamble for shit.

I wish I married someone like you

I called Sybil the other day and she started the conversation with, "I wish I married someone like you." I don't know if it was meant as insult to my dead father or that she felt I was good with my kid or that she recently looked at my bank statement.  Odds are it wasn't a compliment.  After that she proceeded to ramble the following:

I had a bagel this morning and it was terrible, the Guatemalan who fixed the steps did a good job,  the guy who runs the agency who provides my aide came over with his son who has downs, I mean is autistic, and he played with himself, I told him him you don't do that in polite company, my back hurts, when are you coming again, It rained today.

Which led to the following exchange:

Barry: Hold up.  Did you just say someone played with themself in your home? How are you glossing over that? How old was he?

Sybil: He was 16 or 17.

Barry: Did he take out his penis?

Sybil: No he stuck his hands down his pants and played with it?

Barry: What did his dad say?

Sybil: Nothing.

Barry: Okay then. I'm at work. Talk to you later.

At that point Sybil just hung up with no good bye, but I know she was thinking "I love you."

Sorry for the delay in posts.  I was pretending I cared about work, life, etc.  There will be a post a day going forward until I sell this and there is a movie.

Birthday Flowers

It never gets old:

My real estate agent sent me flowers for my birthday. They were left out in the rain by UPS. By the time I opened the door, they were frozen. I called that company and they are sending me new ones.

I feel bad for Sybil. She has the worst luck with flowers. They always seem to come damaged. The replacements seem to come damaged too. By the third set, the florist catches on though.

Old Bitch

Seventy seven years and nine months ago, my grandmother went to a back alley abortion doctor behind Moisha's Bakery on 2nd Avenue in NYC. I don't care how many hamantaschen that plumber claimed to have stuck up there, he clearly didn't go to medical school because on January 13th, 1938, Sybil began her reign of terror.

Here's to another seventy seven!

Your kids are not your friends

Sybil had this massive problem when I was little of talking to me like I was adult or worse her friend. Mostly it was typical stuff like your father's a bum, I have a weird discharge from my left breast, etc, etc. I remember this one time when my mother's friend confided in her that her husband got a blow job from a prostitute at a bachelor party. I'm not sure why, but Sybil felt it necessary to tell me and my brother the story. Maybe she was telling my dad, who I'm sure was jealous, but she had no regard for whether or not her ten year old child was in ear shot.  The best part of the story was the fact that I was friends with the son of the blow job recipient. You can imagine what happened next.

"Hey Jason, I heard your dad got a blow job from a prostitute in front of your uncle at a bachelor party. Want to play with our G.I.Joes? Why are you crying? Knowing is half the battle!"

Soon after Jason's parents divorced. I would like to blame the blow job, but it's more enjoyable to blame Sybil's big mouth.

I just wanted to wish you a happy new year

I know I'm a terrible self hating Jew, but I didn't realize yesterday was Rosh Hashanah until Sybil left me a few messages.

Message 1:

I just wanted to wish you a healthy........and happy.......new year. Call me back.

Message 2:

Why haven't you called me back? You know it's the Jewish new year. You could be a little nicer.

On that note, Sybil wishes you all a happy new year. That is unless you have more money than her, or your children are nice. In that case you don't want to know what she wishes.