Smurfs and Witches

It’s still hot here. We’ve had a bunch of stuff going on and tonight is the Tori Amos concert that I’ve been looking forward to for months. I’m excitedly making lists for what to do/buy in America, do/prepare for my sister’s college experience and preparing a workbook for Markus while I’m gone. No time for a funny story today.

Since he and I have been together, Sparky has never done laundry, watered a plant or made a meal. Because I do not want to come home to dead plants and a pile of laundry, I’m putting together a workbook of how-to and a checklist of what needs to be done before I come home if he wants any of the goodies I’ll be bringing back.

No doubt, Mutti will be over to help with the plants and the laundry. He says no, but I’ll know. She and I fold towels differently. And I don’t really mind anymore as long as she doesn’t re-arrange my underwear again.

The word schlampe loosely means dirty, loose girl, filthy whore in my head. The word Schlumpf means Smurf as in those little blue guys. I always get those words mixed up. I could not understand why Markus' mother thought I was Smurfette. On the other hand, one of the first phrases I learned was alte Hexe which loosely means old witch. I guess we were even.

Markus’ mother, Mutti as I call her, and I have come a long way. She’s gotten over the heartbreak of her son marrying an American and I’ve learned to accept that which I cannot change. And since we moved out of her house, it’s not so tense. The living situation was not a planned event; we lost our sub-let before the construction on our house was done. We had no choice. Believe me, I understand that two women living in the same house can be tricky. A wife and mother-in-law, living together, is impossible. Add language and cultural barriers and it’s a nuclear meltdown.

I have since proven my worth as a Hausfrau. I can keep our home clean. I can cook. Markus is far from starving. I can repair and paint and overall take care of the same things she does. And I haven’t said no to kids.

On the other hand, she hasn’t re-arranged all my stuff, commented on the repair state of my underwear, cried at the thought of our marriage in a long, long time. She has even given up lecturing me on the health risks of my cats. Markus had a tough time in the beginning, balancing the women in his life, but eventually he got there. He was bloodied, but he got there.

So, today, I’ll go do other projects and tomorrow I will tell a Mutti tale.