Spam from the Great Beyond

So, first of all, you all are awesome and comforty and I'm totally coming to you with my next bad day (like, um, in a few paragraphs). Thanks for your sympathetic words on last week's post. I noted this in the comments, but it occurs to me that it's almost a week old (bad! bad blogger!), and in case people don't check back there: things worked out OK. I called the mom today about something unrelated, and she was all, "Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry I forgot to call last week about the burn!" It was, as I suspected, an accident, and she knew that the kid was going around saying, "Mommy burned me," but she'd forgotten to call me. Neither of us acknowledged the DHS call, but I felt OK about telling her I'd been sure there was an explanation. We have a meeting coming up, and hopefully our relationship can continue intact. I feel like a huge weight's been lifted, because I literally lost sleep over that stupid call. (For now, let's ignore the fact that a colleague had to make a call the next day about a different family, one about which we do have serious concerns, because...well...sigh, you know?)

Hm, let's think of something cheerier to discuss. Hey, who wants to move from talking about child abuse to cybercrime and dead moms? You do? Well, you're in luck...

My mother died three years ago on April 13th. Yesterday, I had planned to post something about the story of what happened. I wanted to write about getting the call, about the surreal plane ride, returning to the house I'd left only a week ago, seeing her slippers still on the floor. Like writing out my birth story, I've had it in my mind that I need to write about this. However, unlike my birth story, I'm not sure why I want to write it all out. I wanted to be able to remember everything about Tankbaby's birth, all the little details and the order in which they fell. I don't really want to remember the little details around Mom's death, I guess, but I feel like...I need to? Maybe because, three years later, it still seems unreal lots of the time. Or maybe because it feels like some sort of honoring ritual or closure (although my suspicion is that Mom herself would brush this off and tell me to go do something cheerful). Or maybe simply to document a horrible, scary thing in case someone else needs to know what one person's experience was like. I don't know. My compulsion to write it is almost equal to my revulsion in thinking about it and I've danced around the possibility for three years now. But I figured, hey, I have a blog and a newly re-affirmed mission to write more boldly and honestly...

...and then I found out that my e-mail address had been hacked and I'd just sent about 200 contacts links to some Canadian sex aid site. Dontcha hate it when that happens?

Anyway, I generally only have the time that Tankbaby naps in the late afternoon/early evening to write, and instead of composing a touching, brutal, memorial post, I spent yesterday's hour cleaning out my inbox, contacting everyone to warn/apologize about the link, changing my password, etc., etc.

Oh, and receiving e-mails from my dead mom.

I'm not sure how this all works, but I'm guessing it's related and that the hacker also got into her account, or from hers to mine or something, but there it was in my inbox: new message from deadmom@aol.com (um, not her real address). On the date of her death. Swell. What's the appropriate phrase for punched-in-the-stomach-but-creepily?

I called my dad to warn him about the link and also to commiserate about the weirdness of the e-mail. It just so happened that my sister, the famous Aunt Benevola, was over for dinner, so I talked to both of them. Benevola wanted to know what the e-mail said. I explained that it also contained a link, but that I didn't click on it. Later on we had this text exchange:

Me: Hmph. Found a few more e-mails from mom in my yahoo acct. Looks like hers might've been hacked, too.

Benevola: Or maybe mom wants you to buy Viagra.

Me: Wow. That's creepy in, like, so many ways.


So, I never got around to writing the post I'd planned. Maybe I still will (because, Goddammit, there's always next year). Or maybe this is Mom's way of telling me to cheer up and focus on the blessings in my life (of which there are plenty, including a Tankbaby who can now find his ears on cue and a MOTH who sent me a text today with a picture of the first spring lilac blossoms and the message, "Your mom sent you something today to cheer you up").

Or maybe Mom really is shilling penile enhancers from the afterlife.