Everything My Mom And I Disagree About
It's not a long list
My mom and I agree on the big things: politics, television, cats. And we agree on most of the small things; I often seek her advice on boys and clothes. We even have mother-daughter tattoos. Yes! We’re so cute!
But over the years, we’ve occasionally disagreed about certain, often random things, revealing our fundamental differences in specific and unexpected ways. As an exercise and because I missed therapy last week, I decided to catalogue them.
(I’m not including minor matters of preference, like how I like the taste of hazelnut and she doesn’t. I’m also not including issues where we previously disagreed, but I came to at least understand her point of view. For instance, in 2001 when we saw the first Harry Potter movie, she called Alan Rickman’s Severus Snape “sexy” and I thought that was insane but of course she’s right and he was, RIP.)
(For the record, the only “close call” we’ve had is when I read a Virginia Woolf book and my mom was of the opinion that if her daughter wasn’t a Woolf fan, she would simply have to disown her. Blessedly, I like Woolf.)
This list is things that we have either fought about or agreed not to talk about because of the potential for the conversation to get heated…
I have said and will continue to stand by my assertion that Joni Mitchell Has No Bops. Not that her music is at all bad, but BOPS? no. My mom says voicing this opinion makes me “sound stupid.”
I do not think the movie Annie Hall is funny. My mom really struggles to accept that I don’t even find the lobster scene funny. It’s not that I don’t get the lobster scene, but all the characters are so obnoxious that I don’t care about anything they do or say. In fairness, I’ve only seen the movie once, and it was a long time ago. But I don’t feel eager to revisit it!
Once every, like, three years, because everyone needs to transgress sometimes for the thrill of it and to know they can and not suffer an identity crisis because they feel they are an automaton, and because I don’t have any actual vices, I will take something from Target or Sephora…without paying for it. My mom thinks this is the second worst thing I have ever done in my life.
Once every, like, three years, because everyone needs to transgress sometimes for the thrill of it and to know they can and not suffer an identity crisis because they feel they are an automaton, and because I don’t have any actual vices, I will smoke a cigarette. My mom thinks this is the first worst thing I have ever done in my life. (Joni Mitchell smokes all the time! But mother won’t tell you that!)
My mom doesn’t like any fantasy or sci-fi, which I respect because I don’t like adult animation and sometimes a genre just isn’t for you, but what I can’t get behind is her not making an exception for The Princess Bride. She doesn’t like The Princess Bride. Everyone likes The Princess Bride!
She thinks I should buy more cocktail dresses to wear on dates, despite me explaining repeatedly that no one in my generation needs multiple cocktail dresses to wear on dates. And this would normally be insignificant, except she brings it up so much it makes me feel like she wasn’t listening last time I explained that I don’t need more cocktail dresses. The truth is that she was listening, she just didn’t remember, but remembering is an important part of listening, hence my frustration.
The first time she watched my movie she didn’t understand what it was about, but when she watched it again she did (or said she did). Not an ongoing disagreement, but it was dicey for a second.
My tweets about my dad perform better than my tweets about my mom (they are divorced, so two-parent tweets are rare). This bothers my mom a lot. I have reminded her that she won’t let me tweet the most ridiculous stuff about her, and maybe if I could, they would go viral, but she won’t budge. A flop of her own making, if you ask me!
My mom once said, “there are no failed marriages, only women who stopped giving blow jobs.” That’s not a disagreement I just think it’s a funny line and wanted to share it.
She wants me to wear makeup during important moments. Job interviews, any time I’m filming myself and putting it on the internet, etc. I don’t disagree but I am too lazy.
She feels it is very important to use the “right” glass at a dinner party. I don’t care about that, to the point that I didn’t think to include it here, but my mom wanted it on the list, so it’s on the list.
One of us likes Jazz and hates Country, the other likes Country and hates Jazz. And one of us always lies but the other always tells the truth!
She won’t watch Ratatouille because it’s about rats — which is true — but Remy isn’t just any rat!
For a while she thought she would become a realtor. That is the number one worst idea she’s ever had in her life.
Agreeably,
Lizzie