rivka

I think some of my friends probably look forward to my lurid stories about Michael's stepmother. She's so awful that, on some level, she's entertaining; we've gotten quite a bit of conversational mileage out of her parenting advice, her decorating sense, her asparagus recipe. (Oh, my God...)

This time I don't have any fun Betty stories. Because she's moved on to direct attacks on Michael for not loving his dead mother enough.

Yeah. See? No entertainment potential there.

She blindsided him one morning in the kitchen, while he was giving Alex breakfast and I was still asleep.

"How come you didn't name her after your mother?"

Michael explained that he wasn't particularly fond of the name Nancy.

"Well, I think that Nancy Alexandra would have been really pretty. Your Dad was really disappointed - he was hoping you'd name her for your mother."

Later on, while we were all together, Michael was telling a sweet little anecdote about his relationship with his grandfather Crabtree, whom he called 'Big Crab.' (His grandfather called him 'Little Crab,' because Crabtree is Michael's middle name.)

Betty interrupted him. "Nancy? You don't call her Mom?"

We all looked at her in complete incomprehension. She spent the next several minutes insisting that Michael had referred to Big Crab as 'Nancy's father' - thereby referring to the woman who'd raised him, and whose deathbed he had faithfully attended, by her first name. Michael and I were united in our equally firm insistence that Michael hadn't said anything of the sort. Michael's father just looked nonplussed.

I can't think of any motive for this, except to try to drive a wedge between Michael and his father by implying that, because Michael is adopted, he doesn't really consider himself to be part of his father's family. (She also kept pushing Michael to talk about his birthmother.) Because Michael's relationship with his father is so loving and so solid, I guess she thought it would work best to tarnish the memory of his relationship with his mother.

So, yeah. No funny stories this time.