Nothing got done the way I wanted it to yesterday. I Google Mapped the location of the self storage place that was advertising in the paper and I even looked at the satellite images it had for the address. I felt it was odd that there were no images of storage units there but the photos were taken in 2011. So I thought that the units must have been added after that. So Scholar Owl and I spent OVER AN HOUR looking for this damn place.

It’s not marked. The joys of living in the sticks. Literally. We live that rural out here. I shit you not. I ended up hunting for the damned mail box to find it. When I do all I find is an old farm house and a barn with a pottery sign on it and horses fenced outside with a herd of cats everywhere. Not one soul anywhere. Not a single sign of a storage unit anywhere either unless they’re inside the great big long barn somewhere. Which for what I need to store is probably not a good idea to put any of it there. If what I planned to store was equipment and gear, fine but we’re talking books and things.

But we were there and so I figured I would at least try to talk to them and check out the units. I knocked on the door of the house. Nothing. I knocked on the door of the barn under the pottery sign. Nothing. It’s like the place is a ghost town and it’s after 10:30 in the morning. Okay so my thought is at this point why advertise your business if you’re not going to be there to do business?

So we go back home and my mother weirds on me. SHE FUCKING PRINTS OUT THE DAMN GOOGLE MAP SHOWING HOW TO GET TO THE PLACE FROM OUR HOUSE. Really? We were just there. I’m not stupid. I clicked on the photo image and asked my son what the photo looked like. Yup. We were just there and no one was home. He told her there were 5 cats on the porch and 2 horses past the fence. Oh and the boat was no longer in front of the barn. My mother was like, “Oh.” And then Dad cracks out the phone book and flips through the yellow pages. All they had was the first place I tried, the place on the main drag, and some other small business out of the way just out of the other town on the other side of us. And of course he wants me to try the small out of the way place.

You know what? Why don’t you guys just take over and do it for me. I feel like I’m in the way here with all the fucking hovering you’re doing. I can’t get anything done with all this obstructive micromanagement. Clearly you can do it better so just fucking do it.

And this morning Mom tags me with, “Do you want us to take that mini fridge out of your closet so you have a place to hang your clothes?”

I know she wants and doing that isn’t going to fix the problem. You can’t fit four people’s laundry into a 2×3 closet when your father already told you the shelving in there that contains the oil lamp collection isn’t going anywhere. Besides, that mini fridge is MINE and is was put there in the first place so they could use this room as a living room to begin with. And then they let it mold. I still need to clean it. Dad and I already talked about this.

So I told her that Dad and I already talked about leaving it there so I could have my coffee pot up there. Nope. Not letting her rearrange this room AGAIN to derail getting the other room finished. Because sure as shit we would have spent the entire day redoing that damn closet today and there’s no place else to put that fridge. Bad enough she told Dad yesterday that it didn’t need to be painted yet. So it didn’t get done. Yes I have laundry every where. You know how we can fix that? We get that that damn room done and bring the dressers over so we can fold and put away the laundry.

BUT NO… FOR WHATEVER REASON IT MAKES MORE SENSE TO PLAY GAMES WITH A FUCKING CLOSET THAT WON’T WORK IN THE FIRST PLACE.

“Well I didn’t think anybody asked you what you wanted in the first place.”

Believe it or not, Dad asked me a lot before anything got put into this room. All of the rearrangements he suggested – annoying as they were – were in the mind of saving me space and I couldn’t argue with him because damn it, he was right. Every space saving suggestion he gave me did make the room feel bigger and made so we could get more stuff in here. We even have plans for what to do when I get a dresser involving the old comfy chair – where it might go depending on how big the dresser turns out.

Honestly I think this might be a case, yet again, that Mom is upset that Dad and I have a better communication bridge. But we both have worked hard for it. Yea we still fight and lock horns about a lot of shit but we make an effort. Mom… most of the time I feel like she isn’t there and then when she does talk to me I feel like she is cornering me. And then she gets upset if I don’t agree or if I have proof that she is incorrect.

Like this morning with the fridge. I sensed this was about the laundry but she never came out and said that. If it was Dad, he would have shot that right out there from the hip. “The laundry is in the fucking way. Do something with it before I [insert whatever ridiculous threat] with/to it.” Now if I have an immediate solution, fine I fix it. If not, chances are a fight/debate/brainstorm breaks out. Depends on the mood of us both. That’s where things get dicey. Even if we explode at first eventually the brainstorming will come. Solutions will be made.

Just like with the room he’s working on now. Originally he wanted to put four beds in there just in case we had guests. I countered the idea because there isn’t room. It triggered an explosion and a mini fight. We’ve had several mini brainstorming sessions since then. This is part of the reason I’m looking for a storage unit that’s big enough to hold the things in my apartment that won’t fit in the house, plus what I already have stored at the house. It should free up the bedroom that’s currently being used as storage space. That room got painted a few years back. Even if it only frees up half the room it would give us space for extra guest beds.

Dad is happy with the idea because after working in the room the two older boys will be moving into, he can see what I’m talking about. You put two twin beds in there and you won’t have room for any more beds. As it is he’s gotten creative has to how we’ll fit the boys’ desks in there. And yea, he hadn’t even spackled the room yet and he’s spoken to me several times about this already. About the closets, where the beds will need to go, where dressers will need to be, the desks – all of it so everything will fit. My dad does have an incredible eye for this sort of thing and he knows I’m like him, once it’s set up I don’t want it changed so it needs to be right the first time.

So yea, my room is set up until we are ready for the boys’ rooms to be set up and here is my mother wanting to spend this morning rearranging this room again? And then she wonders why I get pissed. This is something about me that has NEVER changed.

This is why I HATE moving. I HATE my stuff being shuffled around. I HATE people touching my things like it belongs to them and they can just do whatever they want with it. And what I hate even more is hearing my mother think how most of what I have is trash without having any idea of where it came from or who gave it to me or what it means. How would she feel if someone genuinely said that to her about her ceramic dog collection? Or her oil paintings? Or the First Nation mementos she has?

Fuck you to all the people who say that without ever understanding that you just drove a knife in someone’s heart.

I’m not a fucking hoarder. I just have a life with no place or home to put it.