My mother makes me feel like this.
Does yours?
Here are how too many parts of our conversations – mostly, via e-mail, these days – tend to run:
Me: <insert less than perfectly pleasant, but unfortunately necessary thing to say, as in: I am NOT on crack cocaine, and have no intention to distribute such to minors – put as delicately as possible.>
Mom: I love you.
Me: reiterating same, again, struggling for the gossamer-like delicacies of phrasing.
Mom: Did I mention how much I love you?
Me: Love you, too, Mom. Just so you know, though, by the way, just thought I’d mention — in passing — just in case such a thing might cross your mind? I’m NOT on crack. Or anything. Like, you know, CRACK.
Mom: Hope all your projects are going well.
Me: Everything’s doing great, Mom, listen: I’m hearing through the grapevine that you’re telling people I’m a CRACKHEAD, any truth to that little SCUTTLEBUTT?
Mom: I hope you make a ZILLION dollars! You know how much I love you, and you DESERVE it.
Me: Yeah, yeah, thank you, Mom, but wait – oh, hang on, Mom, the kids are screaming…
Mom: (in the background, but unfortunately, doing sort of deaf): What did I tell you?
Me: MOM! She just fell off her bike, that’s all. Mom? I’m an artist, not a drug addict, okay? There actually IS a difference…
Mom: I love you.
Me: Doh! AAAAAAH! Mom, I love you. I gotta run.
Me: (Trying to call my sister. Line is ringing, ringing, finally picks up.)
Sister: Hello? Listen – can I call you back? Are you okay? Mom’s on the other line – I have to call you back. Are you feeling all right?
Me: (seething) I’m fine. Tell Mom I love her.
(photo source: http://images.allposters.com/images/pic/GBEU/FP1334~The-Simpsons-Posters.jpg
But the original link was from, oddly, a site called “Art of Europe” – so they stole it first.)
Everything you read on this blog is actually true. As in, this is a genuine, non-fiction blog. Generally, I don't name names when the parties concerned are (a) related to me and/or (b) under the age of majority, and therefore no matter how funny they are, unable to give their informed consent to have their hilarious but true commentary on the ridiculousness of life publicized globally. I do, however, skirt the issue of crediting them by admitting it was not ME who came up with their jokes, but "some kid." (Works for most of us.)
look - no, really, look 
Funny. As a mother of a grown daughter I can relate…guiltily. I get that the crack is an extreme symbol for your mother not knowing who you are, and thinking if she loves you everything should be okay. Again, guilty as charged. Sometimes.
Actually, she really does wonder if I’m “taking” crack. A journalist, I was researching a book on drug addiction; in the process, I had a friend — now drug-free, but wasn’t at the time — who got me in to the “inner sanctum” of several crack houses, a surprisingly exclusive “sanctum” (if you DON’T smoke it, which I don’t, and never have. Mom, you listening?)
But you’re right: I used it here to illustrate the very point you nailed. Thanks. Nice to hear someone “gets it.”
-elizabeth williams bushey
Oh, by the way? I read this entry to my own, actual living mother. She thought it was funny. At least, I think she thought it was funny, because she kept laughing in all the appropriate spots.
But all she said at the end was: “I love you.”
-ewb
I laughed… I cried… I loved it! This is so-0-o real for me! Though I have never used Crack, my mother assumed that I was on crack. I’d lost a tremendous amount of weight, due to exercise (running/weight training). It’s great to hear that I’m not the only one to have dealt with this predicament! LOL!
OMG! I’m SO very glad you wrote! I’m as heartily reassured as you are, believe me, that someone else’s mom – however “loving” – would seriously contemplate one is dabbling in crack cocaine.
[Humor-Free Note: Although, truth be told – and if our moms knew anything, our moms would KNOW we couldn’t possibly BE on crack – no one “dabbles” in crack. Doing interviews for research on crack addiction, I met mothers who’d actually given up several of their children – casually telling me this, while resting their paraphernalia on newly pregnant bellies – so they’d be freer to smoke more crack. One doesn’t dabble; one dives in full throttle.]