There’s an old Jabba story that Mother likes to tell.  I’m going to share it with you all now, as it speaks volumes about the kind of person Jabba is, was and always will be:

Thanksgiving 1995:  Jabba and I had only been together for a few weeks.  This was in fact our first “couple” holiday. Jabba wanted to bring some kind of dish to my parent’s house for Thanksgiving dinner, as is the custom – particularly when formally having dinner in a stranger’s home for the first time.   She decided to pick up a pie from the local Kroger (a regional grocery chain).  No big deal.  When Mother and my grandmother sliced up the pie to pass it around, they complimented Jabba on it.  It wasn’t anything real specific.  The exact wording escapes me, but it was something general, along the lines of “this pie is really good, Jabba.”  It may have even been more direct and included a “Where did you get it?”  Rather than simply saying “thank you” or telling how she found it at Kroger, Jabba took this as an opportunity to distort, twist and re-shape the truth to suit her own ego.  “Oh, I made it myself” she explained.   

It was blatantly obvious to anyone who saw this pie, or the package it came in that it was store-bought.  It came packed in one of those clear deli-style boxes and included a Kroger label, complete with a list of the contents, ingredients, a UPC code and all. Instinctively, I called her out on this. 

I looked at her incredulously.  “No you didn’t.  You bought this at the store.”  I even asked her about it later in the day. “Why would you tell my family you made that pie?  They don’t care that you didn’t make it fresh”.  This was the first, stark example I would have with Jabba and her affinity for bullshit.

Mother and my grandmother saw right through it from day one.  But like the rest of my immediate family and friends would do for the duration of our marriage, they looked past it.  Not because they thought so highly of Jabba; but because they loved me.

It wasn’t a big deal; just a little white lie.  But it served as a precursor of what would come in the months and years ahead. Jabba and bullshit is a love affair that continues to this day, with my last entry being the most recent example.

If that last post feels like I didn’t finish it, it’s because I probably didn’t. Frankly, even thinking about last Thursday’s conversation gets me riled up.  I had my freak-out period, calmed down and returned to my two initial conclusions:

Assuming that Jabba is telling the truth: This would mean that The Kid has been seeing a child psychiatrist for a comment he made upwards of four months ago.  Furthermore, it would mean that Jabba knowingly allowed The Kid into a situation that she knew would make him uncomfortable – namely seeing me and even the possibility of seeing me with The Auteur.  Also, it would mean she put him into this situation without saying one word of it to me.  Finally, it would mean that she has footing the bill for the psychiatrist herself, despite the fact that she has been hounding me about starting child support payments and medical reimbursements.  If this is the case, then shame on her.

Or the other, more likely scenario: Jabba is lying.  The Kid hasn’t seen any psychiatrist and she is that desperate to get a rise out of me or to try to undermine my new life.  Were she as concerned about The Kid as she claims, she would have told me immediately about what he said.  She would have temporarily ignored her personal beef with me and we would have just talked about him.  Alas, she had to fall back on her typical, petty mud-slinging and screaming. Such a level of out-right lying and fabricating facts takes a level of depravity and desperation that I would have – at one time – thought to be beneath even her. If this is the case – as I believe it to be – then shame on her.

This is a pretty black-and-white issue.  She is either telling the truth, or she is lying.  Shame on her, in either case.  Furthermore, if she feels she has lost control and is sinking to such levels of desperation, then I fear what she may try to say, do or accuse me – or one of my loved ones – of doing in the future. My concern now is how and where to go from here.  I have some thoughts on that – but nothing I am willing to commit to HTML.  Yet.