Aunt Pearl teaches me how to wipe my bum

I lived with my Aunt Pearl for a few short months during college. I was planning on staying with her longer and try to keep her company and help out with the bills. I was paying for half the grocery bill and almost all the rent. At first things were going great. Then things got...weird. One time at work they were doing a food drive and I grabbed a couple bags of Ramen Noodles and she said

"You can't take those for the poor. We are the poor."

Okay, so I bought some food at the store to take for the food drive. When I got home from work she had a beautiful table set with her best dishes and a steak and shrimp dinner prepared. I was telling her how impressed and excited I was and started to sit down. Suddenly she was ushering me down the hall informing me that she had invited a man friend to dinner and that she would bring me dinner in my room.

I waited.

She brought me a warm baked potato with butter and salt and a nice glass of ice water. Then she started tracking my every phone call, and how long I left my light on in my room, and then.... how much toilet paper I was using.

She was adamant that I was using too much, and that all I really needed to use was one square. She must have looked at my face and noted that one eyebrow was way up there. She braved my challenging eyebrow and showed me exactly how it was to be done.

Now, Aunt Pearl was a prim and proper lady, talented, singer, pianist, artist, and cook. She had a boob job and several face lifts. Her hair and make up were always done just right. That was the Aunt Pearl I knew and loved. But she was transforming before my eyes as she ripped one square of toilet paper off the roll and proceeded to show me how I was too wipe my bum from now on.

"First. Fold the square in half. Then, in half again. Next, rip of the tip of the corner where all the folds meet. Now, you got to save that little piece. Don't just throw it away."

She unfolded the paper and held it up to me so that I could see the tip that she ripped off left a little hole.

My other eyebrow started to rise as she poked her long, freshly polished fingernail and long bony pointer finger through the hole. She looked me straight in the eye as she curled the finger back and forth while saying...

"Then you wipe your bum with your finger."

Both my eyebrows were fully raised now. Using her free hand she demonstrated how to curl the edges of the square up and around the finger and slide it off with a firm grip. The point being to wipe off any poo that by now would be alarmingly on my finger.

She looked around for bit and found the little piece she had ripped off. Once she found it she unfolded it to reveal a small circle and continued to instruct me...

"Just use this little piece to clean out from under your fingernail."

My eyebrows were furrowed. Her eyebrows were both raised with a smile of satisfaction and ingenuity on her face.

I moved out a few days later. Things were obviously not going to work out with me living there. We just had too many differences. I don't think SHE ever wiped her bum like that. I think she just wanted ME to do it.

After I moved out I received a package from Aunt Pearl that contained an ugly pair of red socks and a letter accusing me of stealing her white socks and replacing them with these ugly red socks. She also accused me of wearing her old lady clothes without permission and returning them dirty with stains and so on and so on. I didn't know how to prove my innocence. I felt terrible. Then she started accusing others of similar things. Several years later she was diagnosed with Alzheimer's. I was no longer upset that she accused me of stealing from her. However, I do get a little upset when I picture her manicured finger wagging in front of my face with one square of toilet paper purposefully skirting the base of it.

Wedding Speech

Twice in the last few weeks the story of my wedding speech has come up. Many of you already know this story but for those of you who don't.....
It was the night before our wedding. It was a dinner. Matt and I had dated for such a short time that many people on his side of the family were meeting me for the first time. After a nice dinner, Spencer (Matt's dad) stood up and introduced everyone on Matt's side of the family and said some cool things about Matt. Example: Matt was the youngest kid (5 years old) to hike into Havasupai with his own back pack. Then my Dad stood up and introduced all of us. Then people started chanting "speech, speech, speech." So Matt stood up and thanked everyone for coming and then said some nice things about me and how much he loved me. I was feeling good and smiling. Then they started saying "speech, speech, speech" again. I was not expecting this at all. Matt had said everything I would have said. I stood up behind Matt's chair (he was now sitting in it) and I couldn't think of anything to say. I was completely blank. I started scratching Matt's head with my new acrylic nails. Later Matt told me I kept sticking my fingernails in side his ears. I was still drawing a blank and laughing. Everyone kind of laughed along, thinking I was too emotional to speak. Not so. I was still blank. My mom tried to help out saying "This is the first time we've ever seen her speechless. ha ha ha." I was still blank. Matt is now squirming under my absent minded scratching. I felt the awkward tension rising. I started to get all hot. I thought I might faint. In retrospect that would have been better. Then like a beam of light shinning out of the darkness this memory comes calling out to me. I have no idea how my mind caught hold of this memory. Now let me explain this memory before I proceed.

A couple of weeks before, we had been visiting Gabby and Ben Blaire and Ben had said that in class whenever anybody said "This might sound kinda funny, but... I like ketchup on my ice cream (or something else out of the ordinary), he would like to say "This might sound kinda funny but... cheekita wakeiths blrrrrrritait bludmperding idnaot". (that means make really funny noises). I thought this was so funny when Ben said it. Back to my story. This memory came into my head, shining with hope and glory after a long, cold, dark lapse. I said "This might sound kinda funny but.... cheekita chikeatouena digho erludder ding" and then started laughing again. A few people courtesy laughed. The tension grew. I said "I love Matt and I'm glad he puts up with me" or something along those lines. And sat down. Later I watched the home video (tears streaming down my face thinking don't do it, don't do it). After I had said it you can hear someone say "Was that Chinese? Does she speak Chinese?" Oh how I wish it were Chinese and i was saying something as simple as "Thank you all for coming. I love Matt." I could not talk about this incident for about 3 years after it happened without getting nauseous and a little teary. But now I can laugh about it. Every time I have to speak in church I tell Matt that if I get a blank look and start to say "This might sound funny...." , just take me out! Tackle me if you have to, but don't let me do it ever again!