Monday, June 2, 2008

Venting and Photoshop Therapy

When I'm stressed or frustrated about something, I find it cathartic to do some Photoshop therapy. Warning - high levels of sarcasm to follow. Recently my mom had to travel to South America due to a death in the family. My stepdad couldn't go, which made things much easier for her, since he's given to anxiety and overreacting. To give you an idea, this is a man who knows that my mom usually gets home at 5:15 and calls at around that time (he works nights). If she isn't home by 5:30 and isn't answering her cell phone, by 7 he starts calling friends asking if they know where she is. My mom HATES this and gets pissed every time. God forbid she go to a friend's for dinner and forget to turn on her cell phone - Dad pratically puts out an APB.

We all use Skype, which makes calling much cheaper, and of course we've been calling to see how my mom is doing, as well as other family members. My step dad tried to call several times on Saturday and again on Sunday. He called me asking if I had talked to her. I said no, I had called a few times but nobody had picked up. I kept telling him not to freak out, that she was fine, she grew up there, speaks the language perfectly, she's with family, and she knows a lot of people there. She's fine. Of course, he keeps calling me to let me know he hasn't been able to get a hold of her.

Finally today he leaves a message on my cell phone saying that last night he couldn't stand it and called one of my aunts to see if she knew where my mom was. My aunt said everything was fine, the phones weren't working in part of the city, hopefully it would be fixed today. He admitted he had been freaking out. Well, at least now I don't have to worry about calming him down. But I had to do some Photoshop therapy to vent my frustrations.

click to enlarge

And here is the hotel my mom is staying at. As you can see, they have excellentclick to enlarge security. I don't know why my dad was worrying so much!

3 comments:

Rachael said...

Excellent! Photoshop therapy...I never thought of that. I have a feeling it would work for me too!

www.illusivejoy.wordpress.com

firefly said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
firefly said...

I can totally relate. A couple years ago my mom was invited to a friend's house for the weekend of her birthday. As an adult she didn't feel she had to inform us kids. Mom is 82 and I call every couple of weeks to make sure she is ok.

So I call to wish her happy birthday. No answer. Call again. No answer. Call, call, call. No answer. Call bro and sis. Nobody knows where she is. We all live in different states so nobody can drive over there to find out if she's okay. Call some more. No answer. White knuckle panic. Call the manager's office of apartments where she lives. Answering machine. Finally take a deep breath and find the number of the local cops. I'm totally worried about her.

So Mom gets home from her weekend just as the cops are unlocking her door to search for her body.

Happy 80th birthday, Mom!