The one whodidn’t pay her mortgage?
Well, I’ve pretty successfully stayed out of her money issues. Last month she told me their bankruptcy was discharged, and they still live in that house, so evidently they weathered the stupid storm of their own making.
We’ve gotten together a few times recently, after me keeping some distance. And we talk on the phone now and then. And every time I interact with her, I’m reminded why I tried to cultivate that distance.
First, let me indulge in some general, whiny, mundane pointless venting. Then I’ll tell the entertaining stories. Her kids are nightmares. She says she doesn’t know what to do with them, and agrees that consistency and follow through are needed. Then sits on my couch when it’s time for them to leave, calling, “Come on, put your shoes on . . . or we won’t be able to come back.” Gee, could you vague that up for me? I said, “Shoes on in 10 seconds or you can’t come back for a month,” and got instant results.
She still complains about her husband all. the. time. And he is a butthead, but heck, she picked him! I told her again that she can accept he is the way he is, and stop stressing herself out thinking he should be different, divorce him (she brought it up so I included it), or stay and keep ruminating on how he *should *be more helpful, caring, engaged, etc. and always be angry because he’s not. I think she is choosing option 3. (Our next conversation on this will be me saying it bothers me to hear her talk about their problems and not to do it.)
Now the entertainingly insane stories:
While still in bankruptcy, she started operating an unofficial animal rescue out of her home, taking in strays and pit bulls formerly owned by deadbeats who’d had them taken away by animal control.
Now remember, she’s always super stressed, strapped for money, and doesn’t have enough time and energy to clean house or effectively discipline the kids. But she decided it was a good idea to have two dogs and two cats of her own, a family of rescued pit bulls, and five kittens in the house/yard.
She was really angry that a neighbor had the gall to call the authorities on her for having too many animals on a residential property!
Then she was scared, because they said they were going to send an inspector to look at the state of the house, and it is so junked up* and untidy she was worried CPS would be called.
So she reported to me that she had purged the house, gotten rid of a ton of stuff, and it was really clean. And the inspection went OK, though she did have to get rid of a few dogs.
So when I visited, I naively thought it would look . . . well, different. It didn’t. Still packed to the rafters with STUFF and overall a nightmare.
Corollary story: now that they discharged the bankruptcy, she says she’s going to sell the house. I feel really, really bad for any realtor who takes them on.
*I give her credit, she moves the junk around and keeps things relatively clean, considering the hoard-ish nature of the house.
