Welcome to Hell...?

Strange things recently.  And no, not Stranger Things.  I don't currently have Netflix.  Anyway.  Just... strange things.

I suppose I have to preface with a few things first, so let's do that now, shall we?

I grew up with a mom who was all up into Satanic Panic & therefor just about any music was "evil" & "of the devil."  You name it, she thought it was evil.  Ozzy Osbourne, Judas Priest, Metallica, Iron Maiden, AC/DC.  

My older brother & I were banned from listening to this music.  Did that mean that we didn't?  No.  Did we have to watch some crazy Christian Satanic Panic thing mom had recorded on the evils of this music?  Yes, we did.

As an adult, I get to listen to whatever I want, which mom didn't approve of, but couldn't really say anything, except to say, "Oh..." & suck on lemons when I told her the record I was spinnin' was Ozzy Osbourne.  

There are family friends we've known since the mid 70s, who are very much Catholic.  Mom didn't convert until the end of the decade.  Always goin' to church, everything is the devil.  Tried to give my friend, the girl my age, a tarot card reading just a few years ago & she was extremely hesitant.  That's how much of a Catholic she is.  

The funny thing is that they were new cards & were sticking together, so when she pulled like five, I said, "Well, that's not good...", intending to just shuffle 'em better for her, but she about had a heart attack like I was going to tell her she was going to die.  She laughed, very uneasily, when I told her this & shuffled 'em better & told her to then shuffle & pick.  She picked cards like they were bombs & hated the entire experience.

So, now we're going to fast forward.  Mom used to listen to this musician, Hauser, & found recently that she could find videos of him on YouTube.  Just starting last year she's all, "He's an incredible musician, he even did that song, what is it?  Oh!  Hiiighway to Hellll!!!  Yeah, alright!" while pumping a fist into the air.

Does... does she realize that Highway To Hell is AC/DC & not Bon Jovi?  Because we were allowed to listen to Bon Jovi.  I tried to tell her that it was AC/DC, but she waved the statement away with her hand.

Just two years prior I had gotten an AC/DC T-shirt for Christmas.  She was suckin' lemons on that Christmas morning let me tell you!

So, how come it's cool music if this Hauser guy does it?  Or is it that she really doesn't know the original musicians.  Or does she, but she liked it so much, despite herself, that she simply refuses to acknowledge the truth?

Wore this shirt out recently & some lady coming out of the store laughed, but said, "I like your shirt."

Did she though?  I mean I like AC/DC, well prior to the 90s.  I like this shirt, even though I have since cut the collar & arms off it.  I'm not going to unlike either because some lady laughed... but is there something I'm not getting?  Are we suddenly not supposed to like the band?  Again, this has little bearing on me, but if it's a collective gathering of dislike that would explain something.

Did I not seem like the type of person to wear this shirt?  So it was cool & she wasn't expecting that?  Or is she seeing so many people wear these shirts, but they don't to the band that she's assuming that I'm one of them?  I mean, she can assume all she wants, I don't care, but what is the answer here, because it was a very odd reaction.

So, just two days ago, we exchange Christmas gifts with these family friends.  We went to their house.  The mom is wearing a shirt about "My Horoscope told me to stay in bed.", which is not a bad shirt, but I was thinking this lady thought that horoscopes were the devil.  Mom said she always read her horoscope.  Well, I certainly know that her daughter was never into them & thought they were bad & I was weird for reading them, so instead of wondering how the mom changed, now I'm wondering how the daughter went so... weird.

However, the daughter was sittin' there on the couch with a hoodie on with AC/DC printed on it larger than life.  Her older brothers didn't even really listen to them.  Like, their band seemed to be Judas Priest.  It's not to say they didn't like AC/DC, but it wasn't there's or my brothers favourite or anything.

And when I did get that T-shirt above & she saw me in it or knew that I got Back in Black on vinyl or was saying that Highway To Hell or British Steel (Priest) would be fun to have if she ever came across them used, she was weirded out.  Like she knows someone who likes Devil Music.  

She knows this about me.  Perhaps I've never listened to them in front of her, but our taste in music is not the same.  Never has been.  Ever.  She listens to top 100 countdown music, country music, & Pentatonix for fucks sake.  That's very far removed from my music.

So, I made a joke that I was a bad influence on her.  He eyes got big, but she said, "Maybe, but I think it was ______.", naming this other girl she knows.  Bullshit.  It seemed like backtracking.  That girl talks all the time about ALL the things she LOVES & it's only ever Alice Cooper, Aerosmith, & fucking Disney World.  Not once in the time I was around her did she ever mention other bands besides Alice Cooper.  Not Ozzy, not Priest, not even Whitesnake or Twisted Sister or RATT, or anything.

That was weird.  How are they suddenly not Satan's own band & how is she "into" them?  And I doubt it was this other girl.  

Then I got demons for Christmas gifts.  She helped her mom pick out a plushie of Beetlejuice for me.  I had to hide my utter confusion.  Especially when the daughter said, "Seemed very much like something you would like!"

Now, I did watch the cartoon when I was a kid.  I did like it.  As a kid.  Watched a little again as an adult, & it's not bad, & I could see how I liked it back then, but I'm not gonna sit there & watch it & enjoy it now.  I also don't dig that film.  At all.  I mean I like aspects.  I like Miss Argentina whose in the underworld because she's dead... from suicide.  I like the mom.  I like the dead people haunting the house.  Lydia was kinda cool, but that's it.  

And they (whatever company) may have made a plushie outta him, but he's still a demon.  Though I didn't watch the second film & my sister did & she said that Beetlejuice helps Lydia out.  So, what's my take-away from this?  I'm a helpful demon?  Or I need a helpful demon?

The girl also got me a demon.  A horned figure necklace.  'This HAS to be something from a show...', I was thinking while hiding my reaction of what the fuck.  It is.  It's the amulet that Sam gave to Dean on Supernatural.  But you know what?  As many times as I've watched that show, I thought the amulet was a fucking jug.  I didn't realize that it was a horned figure... until a few days ago.

Though to be fair, one year, recently, she gave me a pentagram necklace.  When I said, "Alright!  A pentagram!", she quickly backtracked, saying, "No!  It's from Supernatural!"  I didn't respond, but pentagrams were all over that show & it is, indeed a pentagram.  Does she not realize?  She seemed horrified by what she gave me.  

It's hard to see, but that is the necklace.  I just added a heart to it as well, so that's the turquoise bit next to the pentagram.  I'd probably still wear it, but as it wasn't real, it looks dirty now that the "silver" has come off.  But I still have it.

Not important.  

But still... really weird.

Should she be more careful what she gives out as gifts?  Just because she jumps on the bandwagon of a show doesn't mean the things are rainbows & kittens.  Does she even realize that Beetlejuice is a demon?  She certainly didn't know that the symbol she gave me was a pentagram.  To her, it was just from Supernatural so it's all good.

But while I can lead a horse to water, I can't make it drink.  Though she now knows it's a pentagram, even if it was in a telly show she likes, I can't convince her that iconographic items aren't always benign.  It's only up to me to do things with my life.  I was raised to say "Thank you" for a gift, even if you don't like it.  Plus, now it's just up to me to figure out if I like the thing or not, what it says about me to them, or what it says about my life in general.  Gaining knowledge for myself, not turning around & trying to re-educate someone else, ya dig?

I'm still not really certain how to unpack any of it.  I'm workin' on it.  Just relaying what happened recently.