My son-in-law thinks my retirement means hosting guests every week: six months later, we had a very direct conversation

“Mom, are we coming on Saturday?” Yulka’s voice was upbeat and matter-of-fact. She wasn’t asking—she was simply letting me know.
I was sorting through a pile of knitwear on the veranda, looking for old t-shirts to cut up for rags, and had the phone wedged between my shoulder and ear.
“Of course, come on over. Yul, just give me a heads up next time so I can bake a pie.”
“Oh, Mom, you know me—I always get ready at the very last moment. And… one more thing. Dima wants to bring his parents along. They haven’t been to the dacha in ages and just want some fresh air. It’ll only be for a couple of hours. You don’t mind, do you?”
I folded an old t-shirt in half and paused. I only saw my own parents three or four times a year, even though we lived in the same city. The in-laws were good people, no doubt, but my dacha isn’t limitless. Four people in a sixty-square-meter house was already cramped. But Yulka asked so sweetly, I couldn’t say no.
“All right,” I said. “For a couple of hours.”
That first Saturday, they really did only stay a short while. They arrived at two, had tea with a buttery sand cake, and sat together on the veranda. Dima’s father, Sergey Ivanovich, shared stories about his cucumber plants, and I showed them my flower beds. Everything went smoothly and pleasantly. They left by six.
A month later, the same thing happened. Then again. Then the “couple of hours” stretched out right to dinner, and Yulka leaned over to me in the kitchen as I was slicing tomatoes for a salad:
“Mom, can they maybe stay overnight? Sergey Ivanovich’s back hurts, it’s hard for him to do both trips in one day.”
I nodded. Back pain is no joke—I know that all too well. Just six months ago my back went out so badly I couldn’t get out of bed for a week, and Yulka was the one bringing me groceries every other day. So, yes, I understood.
They spent the night. I set them up in the back room upstairs, while I slept downstairs.
The next morning, by the time I woke up, the kettle was already heating in the kitchen—Lyudmila Viktorovna, Dima’s mother, was making pancakes.
“Oh, please don’t think anything of it, Anna Stepanovna,” she said, turning to me and waving her spatula. “I just wanted to help. You were still sleeping, and we were already awake, so I figured…”
On the table was a dish piled with golden pancakes, a jar of my black currant jam—which I hadn’t opened—and three cups. My favorite forget-me-not mug had vanished. It turned up half an hour later: Sergey Ivanovich had taken it upstairs because “he needed something to drink tea from up there.”
I didn’t say a word. After all, they are family.
Within half a year, “a couple of hours once a month” became the norm. Every Friday night, Yulka would call:
“Mom, we’ll come tomorrow with Dima’s parents. Lyudmila Viktorovna is craving shashlik, I’ll buy the meat.”
And so I bought potatoes, vegetables, greens, and started dough for bread because Sergey Ivanovich loved homemade bread, and Lyudmila Viktorovna always said, “Anna, yours turns out so light and special.” I got to baking three loaves every weekend, since they’d polish off one right away and take the other two home with them.
Then they started arriving without warning. On Saturday at ten in the morning I’d suddenly hear an engine rumbling behind the gate, glance outside and spot Dima’s car.
“We thought, why sit at home? The weather’s nice, so we decided to come visit Granny Anna.”
Granny Anya. That’s me. I’m sixty years old, and for the last fifteen of those, I worked in a factory accounting office and never once felt like an ‘old woman’. But now, somehow, I do.
I couldn’t keep up with myself. By Friday, after cleaning, I was completely exhausted, and by Sunday evening my house looked like a hotel that just had a change of guests. Four pillowcases, six towels—because Lyudmila Viktorovna liked a separate one for her face and one for her body. I changed the bed linens every week.
One Saturday, I sat on a stool in the corner of the veranda, my hands folded on my knees, watching Lyudmila Viktorovna repotting my geranium.
“It’s too dark here for her, Anya, don’t you think? She should be closer to the light.”
I wanted to say that this geranium has been on that windowsill for nine years and blooms with big clusters of flowers every summer, but I stayed silent. First, I didn’t want a scene in front of my daughter. Second, I felt that old familiar feeling deep down—it’s awkward, you’re the hostess, you need to be hospitable.
That Sunday, they left late. I came out onto the porch to see them off. Yulka gave me a peck on the cheek, Dima nodded, Sergey Ivanovich was loading a three-liter jar of my pickled cucumbers into the trunk—‘you won’t eat all those anyway, Anna Stepanovna.’ I watched as the dust settled down the road behind their car and felt a deep, lingering emptiness inside.
On Monday, I decided enough was enough. I called Yulka.
“Yulya, we need to talk.”
“What’s wrong, Mom?”
“Nothing serious, just… Why don’t you and Dima come whenever you want, you’re my daughter. But his parents—maybe not so often. I get tired. My house isn’t a guesthouse.”
There was silence on the other end of the line. Then Yulka said, sounding artificially cheerful:
“Mom, come on. They love you! Lyudmila Viktorovna is always saying how lucky Dima is to have such a wonderful mother-in-law.”
“A golden mother-in-law,” I repeated. “Except this golden mother-in-law spends Sundays lying flat on her back with such pain that she can barely move. And I’ve got plenty to do during the week—my garden, canning, and the strawberries are coming up again. I’m not a young girl anymore.”
“But we do help!”
“Who helps? You? Yulya, I cook for you, wash your clothes, change your sheets. What help?”
I heard her sigh. Then she said she’d talk to Dima and hung up.
The next evening, Tuesday, they showed up together. Without warning. I was in my work clothes, pulling weeds along the fence. When I saw the car, my heart sank: again? But no, it was just Yulka and Dima who got out.
We sat on the veranda. I didn’t offer any tea.
Dima got straight to the point. He sat back in the wicker chair, looking at me calmly and confidently.
“Anna Stepanovna, Yulya told me. I want to understand. You say you’re tired. But what does that mean, ‘I’m tired’? You’re retired. You have your house, your land, you’re your own boss all day. Is it really a big deal for you to host some older people once a week so they can get some fresh air?”
I looked at him and couldn’t recognize the person in front of me. Was this really the same Dima who, seven years ago, asked my permission to marry Yulka? The one I helped pick out seedlings for his very first balcony? Now he was talking to me more like a boss scolding an employee who’d done something wrong.
“Dima,” I said quietly, “I never said they weren’t allowed to visit. I just asked to limit the visits. Once a month isn’t a punishment. That’s exactly what we agreed upon from the very beginning.”
“But they don’t bother you!” he exclaimed, throwing his hands up. “By the way, Lyudmila Viktorovna even cleaned the kitchen floor last time. Did you see that?”
“I didn’t ask her to clean the floors. I never ask anyone to wash my floors. All I ask is that people respect my way of doing things in my home.”
Dima smirked—not angrily, but with a sense of condescension.
“Anna Stepanovna, please try to understand, family is about sharing. You have this large space, a whole house, fresh air. My parents still live in a cramped two-room apartment on the fifth floor with no elevator, and Sergey Ivanovich with his bad knee can hardly manage the stairs. They need a break. Is it really so hard for you to put up with just one day a week?”
“One day,” I echoed. “But who’s keeping track of these days? You? I am. And I’ve counted—almost every weekend for the last six months. And it’s not ‘one day,’ it’s Friday evening, the whole of Saturday, and Sunday until lunchtime. That’s two and a half days. Every single week.”
He exchanged a glance with Yulka. My daughter just sat there in silence, staring down at the table. Her silence hurt more than anything Dima had said.
“Do you know what this is called?” Dima leaned forward, planting his elbows on his knees. “It’s called selfishness. You don’t have a heart, Anna Stepanovna. I really thought you were a different person. But it turns out you’re just… a selfish woman who clings to her dacha and keeps tabs on everyone’s visits.”
Selfish. Heartless.
I looked at Yulka. She lifted her eyes to mine, only to look away again almost immediately. Her face was pale and she stayed quiet. Her husband had just called her mother a heartless egotist—and she said nothing.
It felt like the last string inside me snapped.
I stood up. My legs felt weak, but I forced myself to remain upright.
“Dima, I’ve lived sixty years. I worked thirty-five of them in the same place. I was married for almost thirty years, and never once did my husband call me selfish. You joined my family seven years ago. I accepted you as a son. And now you tell me I have no soul. Fine. Let’s go with that. This dacha is mine. I bought it with my own money fifteen years ago, when you were still in college. I have every right to decide who comes here and when.”
Dima leaned back. His face turned hard.
“I see,” he said, getting to his feet. “So, the dacha is yours. And we’re just guests. Fine. Yulya, let’s go.”
He turned and walked toward the gate. Yulka hesitated, grabbed her light jacket from the chair, and threw me a quick, confused look.
“Mom, why are you doing this…”
“Doing what exactly?”
“We’re a family, aren’t we…”
“A family is when everyone’s together, Yulya. But when some just show up to relax and eat and leave piles of laundry and dirty dishes behind, while others work non-stop—well, that’s called exploitation. And as for Dima calling me selfish—you allowed him to say that. Right in front of you. And you didn’t stand up for me.”
She bit her lip. There was something in her eyes—tears, maybe, or possibly hurt. But she said nothing. She shrugged her shoulder, turned around, and followed her husband.
The car drove away.
I sat alone on the veranda. Three empty cups stood on the table—mine, Yulia’s, and Dima’s. As I looked at them, I wondered: what has really changed? I spoke the truth. For the first time in six months, I actually said what I thought, and I was called selfish. Not for anything I did—but simply because I refused to be convenient.
My phone was silent for three days. I tried calling Yulia—she kept rejecting the calls. On the fourth day, I dialed again, without much hope, but this time she answered. Her voice was dry, distant.
“Hi, Mom. Sorry, I couldn’t talk. Listen, Dima says we won’t come again until you apologize to his parents.”
“What am I supposed to apologize for?”
“For basically kicking them out.”
“I didn’t kick them out. I just asked them to visit less often. And that conversation wasn’t even with them—it was with you and Dima.”
“For him, it’s the same thing. He thinks you insulted his family. Lyudmila Viktorovna cried when she found out.”
I closed my eyes. Lyudmila Viktorovna cried. I wonder, what exactly did they tell her? That I’m a cold old woman who begrudged them a piece of bread and a breath of air?
“Yulia, what do you think yourself?” I asked quietly.
“I don’t know, Mom. I’m stuck between you all.”
“You’re not in between. You’re his wife. But you’re also my daughter. And when he calls me selfish, that isn’t just about me. It concerns you, too. Because you are my daughter. And if I’m selfish, then what does that make you?”
There was silence on the line. I could hear her breathing—quick and uneven.
“I’ll call you back,” she said, and hung up.
No one came on Friday. For the first time in a long while.
I woke up at seven, cooked myself some porridge, and ate it on the veranda while watching the currant bushes wet with dew. Suddenly I realized—I didn’t have to rush anywhere. No need to start dough, no need to change sheets in the guest room, no need to worry whether the fridge would magically expand, or that my favorite tea would run out again because Lyudmila Viktorovna brews four teapots a day. Silence. Birds. A bumblebee in the peonies.
I grabbed the watering can and went to the garden. An hour later, my neighbor called asking for some dill for pickling. We stood by the gate, chatting, and I suddenly realized how long it had been since I felt so peaceful.
On Sunday evening, Yulia called. Her voice sounded tired, but not hostile.
“Mom, can we come next weekend? Just me, Dima, and the kids. No Dima’s parents.”
I paused for a moment.
“Come on over. But Yulia, if I hear anything like ‘selfish’ again, the conversation will be short. You know me.”
“I understand, Mom.”
“No, you don’t understand. You think it’s about being hurt. But it’s not about offense. It’s about being tired of always being convenient. I’m sixty years old, and you know what, I’ve finally realized—it’s better to be ‘selfish’ than a silent servant in your own home. Tell Dima exactly that. Word for word.”
She let out a breath into the phone.
“Alright, Mom. I’ll tell him.”
I hung up the phone and walked over to the stove. There was a kettle full of water ready for evening tea. I turned on the heat and, while waiting for the water to boil, went to the fridge where I kept a piece of frozen shortcrust pastry on the bottom shelf—the kind I always prepare in advance. I took it out and set it on the table. If Yulka comes by, there will be pie. If not, I’ll just eat it myself with some jam, sitting on the veranda in the quiet, watching the sun set behind the old linden trees.
Either way, I was happy with how things would turn out.