(no subject)
My mother is about to come home from her one week hiatus, and suddenly the urge to drink heavily is almost overwhelming. I made a near-gormet dinner for her to have when she gets back, but I just checked her flight status and it has been delayed. So the creamy farfalle with sauteed mushrooms and asparagus with melted mascarpone cheese is sitting in a pot with the lid on in some dull effort to keep it warm until her flight comes in. I bet the walnuts are getting soggy. I made brownies too.
I will secretly blame her if dinner is ruined. I secretly blame people for lots of things, and when I teach myself to stop doing that, I will be able to forgive even myself.
Alex and I talked a lot about family today. The conversation started out with me taking a few humorously sarcastic stabs at my ridiculous family, him doing likewise. We were laughing until I realized how much everything had changed for me, and how profoundly not funny it was.
I had to squint to keep my eyes on the road and off of bridges when I realized that my relationship with my father is the only one that hasn't gotten worse over the past year. I tried to pinpoint when exactly it was I became so easily exhausted by my mother and sister. When I was in high school and heather was living on campus we got along really well. I even missed her from time to time. Now, if I see her or hear her voice more than once a week I feel nothing but contempt. My mother and I were near inseparable up until second semester sophomore year. I wonder if the changes I've noticed in her sanity are her actually going downhill or if I'm just more apt to see her as a human being and not the demi-goddess idol of my childhood.
I'm not sure. I'm sure this is contributing to my desire to drink myself into neutrality on the subject.
Even my dad, no one really wants to spend anything close to the amount of time with him that it would require to get to know him- Alex included. I find this saddest of all. He's not a bad person by any means at all. He's a wonderful man, he's very honest and genuine. He has always loved my sister and I, and in his own way, showed it as often as he could. It's the few scattered times that he lapses into such deeply distorted (disturbing) thoughts that creates distance between us. Believing that the world would be better off with a Catholic monarch instead of democracy, that the public school system should be abandoned and all formal education should be headed by the church... that vaccines should stop being administered to children because of the mercury levels in them. (what? I have no idea.)
I still love him, if for nothing else than for the things that he has taught me without knowing it. The importance of charity, of genuine hard work, fearlessness in tackling new skills/information, the confidence that I can do/learn/create anything, the importance of the enrichment of the arts, the mystery of opera and classical music... that list goes on.
It just hurts that no one close to me will probably ever spend more than (if even) 5 minutes with him, yet alone understand or help me understand the strange person he is and the strange role that he play(s/ed) in my life.
None of them are perfect. None of them are what I would want them to be, and I'm starting to think that this is what has caused my disenchantment with all of them. I want my mom to stop smoking, to eat healthy foods, to generally stop killing herself. I want Heather to quit her job at Fidelity, move out of NH, and get a job in a lab or in a school doing something she loves that makes her feel alive. I want my dad to be able to emote and be curious about who I am as a person.
And me? would it be fair to end this without turning that relentless sharpness on myself? what do I wish for me?
More fearlessness. More genuine bravery. A deeper capacity to do good without an alternative motive. An unwavering disregard for image. More gaping voids, more curiosity, less of a desire to patch everything up. For my life to more resemble the raw bleeding sight of a freshly cut lawn than a meadow that grows tall spikey grass to hide the fact that the ground can't sustain anything else. Less mask, more blood. Less judgement, more love.
When I have finally finished my work within these bones, I'll be able to use them to their fullest potential.
I will secretly blame her if dinner is ruined. I secretly blame people for lots of things, and when I teach myself to stop doing that, I will be able to forgive even myself.
Alex and I talked a lot about family today. The conversation started out with me taking a few humorously sarcastic stabs at my ridiculous family, him doing likewise. We were laughing until I realized how much everything had changed for me, and how profoundly not funny it was.
I had to squint to keep my eyes on the road and off of bridges when I realized that my relationship with my father is the only one that hasn't gotten worse over the past year. I tried to pinpoint when exactly it was I became so easily exhausted by my mother and sister. When I was in high school and heather was living on campus we got along really well. I even missed her from time to time. Now, if I see her or hear her voice more than once a week I feel nothing but contempt. My mother and I were near inseparable up until second semester sophomore year. I wonder if the changes I've noticed in her sanity are her actually going downhill or if I'm just more apt to see her as a human being and not the demi-goddess idol of my childhood.
I'm not sure. I'm sure this is contributing to my desire to drink myself into neutrality on the subject.
Even my dad, no one really wants to spend anything close to the amount of time with him that it would require to get to know him- Alex included. I find this saddest of all. He's not a bad person by any means at all. He's a wonderful man, he's very honest and genuine. He has always loved my sister and I, and in his own way, showed it as often as he could. It's the few scattered times that he lapses into such deeply distorted (disturbing) thoughts that creates distance between us. Believing that the world would be better off with a Catholic monarch instead of democracy, that the public school system should be abandoned and all formal education should be headed by the church... that vaccines should stop being administered to children because of the mercury levels in them. (what? I have no idea.)
I still love him, if for nothing else than for the things that he has taught me without knowing it. The importance of charity, of genuine hard work, fearlessness in tackling new skills/information, the confidence that I can do/learn/create anything, the importance of the enrichment of the arts, the mystery of opera and classical music... that list goes on.
It just hurts that no one close to me will probably ever spend more than (if even) 5 minutes with him, yet alone understand or help me understand the strange person he is and the strange role that he play(s/ed) in my life.
None of them are perfect. None of them are what I would want them to be, and I'm starting to think that this is what has caused my disenchantment with all of them. I want my mom to stop smoking, to eat healthy foods, to generally stop killing herself. I want Heather to quit her job at Fidelity, move out of NH, and get a job in a lab or in a school doing something she loves that makes her feel alive. I want my dad to be able to emote and be curious about who I am as a person.
And me? would it be fair to end this without turning that relentless sharpness on myself? what do I wish for me?
More fearlessness. More genuine bravery. A deeper capacity to do good without an alternative motive. An unwavering disregard for image. More gaping voids, more curiosity, less of a desire to patch everything up. For my life to more resemble the raw bleeding sight of a freshly cut lawn than a meadow that grows tall spikey grass to hide the fact that the ground can't sustain anything else. Less mask, more blood. Less judgement, more love.
When I have finally finished my work within these bones, I'll be able to use them to their fullest potential.