Watching this F. Scott Fitzgerald movie just makes me want to write
I have been told many things; I should be a lawyer because I was good at Model Judiciary. I should be a doctor because I was good at Chemistry and for some reason loved watching the surgical videos on some cable network we had at the beach house. I should be a writer because I was great at advanced literature and composition....and I have journaled my entire life which I do believe is interesting but not necessarily for the public consumption. So good, that people cheated off of me and scored a perfect score and received college credit like I did and entered a semester ahead. The idea that I should be a musician or artist were never mentioned, despite excelling at those fields and winning state and national awards. I have always been taught to value education and achievement and despite always being between the top 95-98th percentile in standardized testing for some stupid reason I feel annoyed at not having some certificate stating I am a member of MENSA.
Perhaps I could be, I just took the practice test after a half bottle of tequila and scored in the 95th percentile range when I was angry about something my mother said. They require the 98th percentile, which I think I could probably manage if there isn't too much math. I will try again while sober, but these kids and family are really messing with my potential to be myself. I was publishing and doing things; now I wash bottles while desperately clinging to clients I work well with and make good money.....fuck the gender stereotype I still feel bound by. Despite being better than many people at math, early experiences of being forced into advanced placement where the instruction was inadequate, make me feel I am stupid and doomed to only understanding basic things like statistics, but I know I am able to do more. I am, a Psychologist. I am happy here and it suits my personality but there are other things I want to do and writing falls into that category. So, as my recent journaling begins, let's just talk. Let's talk about my recent family trip. Grab some snacks and a drink because we're in for a ride.
In the week that we spend at the beach, people outside of our tribe would say "Oh that is so great, you are at the beach, how fun." Under normal circumstances I would agree that this is an amazing escape with a lot of opportunity for enjoyment. These are statements that a person would say who does not know anyone in our family or how our several families interact. To be quite honest, I both love and HATE this trip, especially the fact that it has somehow become an obligatory yearly trip. I love parts of our family and have deep rooted disregard for other parts. It is a struggle.
My son and daughter are both amazingly beautiful sentiments of what we offer as parents. Sure, I yell and scream and they drive me nuts but I am not unreasonable and my kids are great and sweet and no one will argue with that. Enter the room, my brother and sister in law. They have three kids. All of which are probably totally fine.....but we all know kids are subject to their environment. So I am at a loss, but my sane family with good bedtime, behavior and nutrition routines is subjected to total chaos with poor parenting choices, awful nutrition and the end result is shit. That pretty much sums it up, I suppose I could stop here, but that would not do justice to what I have to endure.
So we live for a week with people who are inherently just wrong, in every way, about how to discipline and feed kids. I literally escape to our balcony to endure the time between dinner and 830 pm which is the time when no children will be present. Even then I still have to subject my introverted yet totally reasonable self to the conversational habits of a vapid human with nothing much to offer. That is when I pretend I am tired and remove myself to play video games or just go for a walk with my hubby,
This morning it all let loose. I purposefully choose to avoid the 7-9am block when everyone is awake but nothing is actually happening. I know my kids are awake, against their will, I can hear what is going on, it's a bunch of yelling about sunscreen and who is eating what. It is total shit. No one needs to be there. They all enjoy calling me out on sleeping in or just not being there but no reasonable person would desire to participate in that chaos. I was rejected on buying eggs two days ago, but being on the keto diet that's kinda my thing. So I walk downstairs with these monsters and no eggs and I just decided for the first time on our "vacation" FU ALL and went out to get my keto friendly diet and iced tea. Unsurprisingly, nothing really changed in that time I was gone.
I was asked by my mother in law if we would like to take another trip in August to a lake house. Honestly I hate this shit. I lose my dog, I spend couple hundred boarding him, lose a couple thousand boarding me with no clients, and my children are subjected to conditions I hate. What to do...