Since I was a teenager I ' m almost thirty now , sketching out little scenes like this has helped me get and keep a grip on the fact that she ' s inherently selfcontradictory . For example , we used to drive past a certain church regularly on our way home , and one day their sign lamented the deaths of countless innocents to abortion . That ' s so stupid , she said , sneering horribly . Those were never really babies . Most abortions happen before they could ever survive . This was the first I ' d ever considered the topic I didn ' t even fully know what the word abortion meant in that context so I didn ' t reply . Instead I filed her remark away , as one does , so that I ' d know the proper thing to say if it ever came up again . And then it did ! The very next trip , she again read the sign and had something to say about it Those poor precious little ones . They did nothing to deserve being ripped from their mothers ' bellies , and now they can ' t even be buried properly . If you ' re ever pregnant , you ' ll have that baby , or I ' ll kill you and raise it myself . My cousins , who living with us at the time , would get confused and doubt their memories of such things , but me , I almost always knew . So it ' s really not as if I lack material . The trouble is , there ' s no real plot besides awful nmother is awful .