Bah Humbug!

Everything turned out great today...EXCEPT the ham. We got a bad ham from Walmart or Kroger or wherever - it was icky, tasted like it had gone bad or something. Luckily, we found out earlier in the afternoon -- hubby took the ham back to where he got it and got a new one. Of course, this one (that was excellent, luckily) had to be cooked, too - that threw in an additional 90 minutes of cooking today. By the time it was done, everyone was already assembled and starving, so I did not have time to bake the brown rice casserole that is ALWAYS served on Christmas Eve, Thus Saith Family Law forever and ever amen. It takes over an hour - nobody wanted to wait another hour to eat, lol. However, by the same token, I heard various grumblings and complainings about Not Having THE RICE. I don't know WHO precisely in the crowd was saying it, but I heard it more than once. Highly pissed off because I spent SO MUCH time baking and cooking and such, I let it be known that if the meal was not acceptable, people were most welcome to eat elsewhere! All grumbling ceased. Score one for me, but hubby was Not Happy With My Uppity-ness. Later, M-I-L was going on about the kids' clothes I had packed for their visit this past week - they don't fit right, they aren't "clean enough" (they don't fit right cuz the kids are in that weird "between sizes" stage); they were JUST WASHED the day before the kids went over there so who knows what she was talking about) and the kids somehow removed and hid their sox and underwear from their backpacks because they had NONE when they got there (funny, there were none laying around the house after they left) and such... I stated that if the clothes the kids had did not meet with their approval, they were certainly welcome to buy them more, since we didn't have the money to do so, with me being out of work. Score another point for me. All griping ceased at that moment, but hubby was Not Happy With My Extreme Uppity-Ness. Rather furious, in fact. But from that point on, all criticism (to my face at least) STOPPED and actually, the rest of the evening was really pleasant. Inlaws were nice and we had good dinner conversations, etc., for the entire rest of the evening. :)

Mayhap I'm truly the Evil, Rude Bitch I've been called for so long - but by God I drew my line in the sand, and all trash-talking/criticizing of me stopped then and there and the rest of the evening was perfect and fun. :)

I'm extraordinarily tired of always being a second-class citizen who can do no right, and tonight, I stood up for myself finally. And it WORKED cuz they STOPPED. At least to my face. Oh, I'll pay dearly for it, no doubt, for a long time to come. But I don't care... I'm tired of Never Being Good Enough. Ever. Take me as I am, or don't. Simple. A friend of mine has a saying -- "Anyone who doesn't have the good sense to like or appreciate me is too stupid for me to worry about!" LOL I kinda like that and just might adopt some variation of it. ;)

Lord help me love my enemies - especially the ones within my own home.

EDITED 12/26 TO ADD: BTW, I was vindicated on Christmas day. One of the things MIL ranted about was that I failed to pack socks and underwear for my son. I did pack sox and underwear - they were in the front pouch of the backpack, and MIL had been told as much. But noooo...they weren't there and they looked "all through" the bag. On xmas day, hubby unzipped the front pouch of the backpack, and pulled out a TON of sox and underwear for my son. "HA!" I said. "Score twenty points for me - it was RIGHT. WHERE. I. SAID. IT. WAS!" Much hemming and hawing on part of inlaws who confessed that THEY hadn't looked themselves, but rather asked the kids to find it, which obviously didn't work well. Looked at hubby and said, "TOLD YOU I was neither stupid nor incompetent!"

"Yeah, well, your definitely not stupid."

grr.