WADERS

Got back yesterday from visiting my dysfunctional family in Astoria.  My mother, her current husband and her former husband live together in an old house filled with Mom's junk to the point where it is difficult to move.  I gave my sister a ride from Portland to the horrible house on Harrison Street in A town.  We both feel obligated to help out our 80 something parents but there isn't a lot they will allow.  I was helping my step dad (Mom's former husband) building a ground floor bedroom to compensate for Mom's decreased mobility.  She is going in for hip replacement surgery before too long and may have trouble ascending the stairs to the upstairs bedroom.  The house could make the cut for the TV show Hoarders.  All it needs is a few dead animals and tons of kitchen garbage.  Step dad is constantly dropping everything to do things for his new adoptive family.  I am guessing that this is some sort of redemption event as a father as everything sort of went to crap when he and Mom divorced.  I coined the term WADERS (Weird Awkward Dysfuntional Embarrassing Ridiculous Slovenly) to describe the entire situation.  A few days is all Sis or I can manage of the place.  Our brother actually lives there when he isn't off in Central America.  Anyway, it won't be long until Mom is due for surgery.  Her current husband is no longer up to driving to Portland and back so I guess I will fill the gap until our bro is back in June.  Sis and I filled the back of my small car with boxes of magazines from the 70s and 80s to recycle.  We finally worked through all the boxes of 50s newspapers.  Nature abhors a vacuum, and removing crap from the horrible house is sort of like shooting holes in the ocean.  I watered all of Mom's plants.  She and her current husband sleep in alternate shifts.  Mom stays up all night and goes to bed when current husband gets up.  I assume this is a way of avoiding each other.  Step dad comes home from a day of babysitting his SO's kids and sleeps in a horrible closet in the back of the house.  The whole thing is too weird (WADERS) for words.  I guess all you can do is focus on the Serenity Prayer.  N