Posts filed under 'The Black Hole'
I don’t have children, but have already witnessed the surprising results of being an influence in the lives of my stepkids. Although I prefer to base lessons on a child’s unique needs, here are the broad concepts…
This Week: Lessons I Want To Teach My Kids
1. Knowing and accepting who you are is a key to happiness.
2. To keep learning you need to posess an insatiable curiosity.
3. Find out what you’re passionate about and get involved.
4. People do cruel things but you cannot take it personally.
5. Money isn’t as important as our culture makes it seem.
6. Don’t fear growing old. Each phase of life is special.
7. Your parents certainly don’t have all the answers.
8. Expectation kills… Be open and accepting instead.
9. Your eternal spirit longs to be free from physics.
10. Perfect love is the greatest aspiration of all.
August 30th, 2005
Swung by the car wash tonight because my ride was douched with sap by the evil oak tree outside the house. And while waiting, I observed the antics of a few little girls.
As I deciphered, the one in pink was the daughter of the lady sitting next to me, bitching to her husband via cell phone. The other girl (in green) was therefore her daughter’s friend, whom the mom was stuck babysitting.
The third was a little black girl, a bit younger than the others, and not part of their group. The other girls each had an ice cream, which was clearly coveted by this girl without. It was cute watching them make friends to alleviate the boredom of waiting.
Somehow, despite all her yacking on the phone, the self-absorbed mom was paying enough attention to notice when her girls were about to share their ice cream with the black girl, and she piped up…
“Oh no, you can’t share your ice cream! Ummm… She might be allergic.”
The incident made me contemplate the wisdom of Matthew 18:1-5.
August 22nd, 2005
If you’d rather not be brought down by my pathetic family problems, please scoot along down to the previous posts: Nothing to see here! But if you want to feel a little more normal, and realize that in comparison your family isn’t so bad… By all means, read on.
Just finished sobbing to detox following a phone call from my brother, which began with the words, “Mom is kicking me out.” For those of you following the Aurora show, you may wonder “Isn’t he living with you?” The answer is yes, but he’s staying two months with my mom because six people sharing one bathroom is ludicrous.
So anyway, this latest catastrophe was precipitated by my brother’s frequent use of “the Lord’s name in vain” during moments of extreme frustration with mother’s psychotic demands. This is becoming a weekly event. Though I was able to help once again, the monster promises he’s out if he says “JFC” one more time… That’ll be any minute now.
The pressure of having to help them overcome this retarded crisis was more burdensome than I let on. Like the good big sister, I successfully executed my rational techniques, but between you and me: Forty-five minutes into the conversation I had heart palpitations from faking like I wouldn’t slit her throat if I were in his shoes.
In the background I could hear her yelling the whole time. Her song hasn’t changed since we were kids (which I was floored to hear.) My brother gets sucked into her game; I calculate and play to win… But that’s only from the neck up. Somewhere deep down I have a rage that responds involuntarily to her lies and insanity.
Today I heard her screaming at my brother, “You may forget about shitting all over God, but Jesus is writing it all down and He won’t forget, and I won’t allow it in my house!” and honestly, I wanted to be there to forcibly stop her from lying about God to further her selfish agendas.
You know what? — She should hope Jesus isn’t writing this shit down.
Otherwise soon she’ll be reminded of how she broke my brother’s leg with a tennis racquet when he was six, or how her fat ass let us starve while threatening us not to beg for food from our grandparents, who lived a block away. And let’s not forget about how she molested one of her Jr. High students for four years.
Pray for me. I hate that bitch, and as much of a moody pain in the ass my brother can be, I can’t wait to get him out of there. Unfortunately, I can’t take him back until my stepkids head back home to New Mexico in August. Four more weeks, poor kid… Pray for both of us.
July 8th, 2005
Now and again, situations will remind me that I’m still not free from the effects of the abuse I endured as a child. Whenever I’m in the vicinity of a parent behaving badly I bristle, no matter how hard I try to pretend I’m unaffected. Heaven forbid I should ever witness someone harming a child, because I honestly fear I wouldn’t be able to control my rage.
Yesterday I chuckled as I heard the girl next door screaming, as three year olds are apt to do. She’s a cutie regardless. Her “peace-loving” tree-hugging, Prius-driving mom didn’t find it amusing, however, and drove herself into a temper tantrum of her own, shrieking at the top of her lungs, demanding that her daughter stop yelling… Yeah, brilliant.
If I posessed any sanity when it comes to the protection of innocents, maybe I could have laughed it off as some of the stupidest parenting ever, but when I heard that baby scream back, “OW! OW! MOMMY, OW!” after I heard a CRACK sound, I just about lost my f-ing mind.
Have you ever been in an auto accident? You know that moment where you realize there’s nothing you can do to stop the crash, and your mind does a million calculations at once? Picture that happening to me emotionally… Except in my case, my weak little mind goes TILT!
These rationalizations happen consciously: It’s not about your neighbor, it’s about your Mom… It’s not your concern… Shut up and mind your own business… You’re probably misinterpreting what you heard… That lady already hates you - Don’t make it worse… Your husband will be upset if you get involved… Blah, blah, blah.
Meanwhile, on a subconscious level, I’m on overload. None of my self-talk was really working… Rage was swelling up. Although I try my best to stay in control of my anger, when I think parents are abusing their children I have a really hard time. In the end, I opened my big, fat mouth and joined the chorus yelling back…
WHERE DO YOU THINK SHE LEARNED IT FROM?
YOU F***ING C***
…And for a moment I feel great, until the tsunami of regret pounds down on me. My family wonders what the hell is going on because they were on the other end of the house and didn’t hear the fiasco going on next door. I shuffle out to explain myself and submit to their lectures, already feeling like crap for what I’d said.
Maybe some day I’ll learn to butt out.
June 1st, 2005
Well, a good friend of mine was reading my post yesterday, and indicated that there was a falacy in it. He said that the crack on my literary skills was unfounded. Whether that’s true or not, I’m not gonna debate at this point, but it got me thinking. I make cracks like that about myself very often. I tend to call myself a moron, or an idiot, and that’s on the good days. I actually enjoy telling people that I’m dumber than a sack of rocks. And sometimes, I wonder why.
Now, it’s not like I don’t know when this started. I know because I started conciously doing it. I was quite unpopular through most of grade school and high school. Yeah, wah wah, I’m not the only one, I know. But it still sucked to have almost everyone else call me a loser pretty much every day.
Of course, I got advice on how to deal with them. My dad told me to beat them up. Yeah, I was a scrawny weakling who had no concept of how to fight. Growing up with 3 sisters meant I didn’t employ fisticuffs in the house very often. If I’d tried to hurt any of the guys who teased me, I would have ended up eating dirt. My mom told me to ignore them. New flash, this does not work. Bullies can tell when you’re specifically ignoring them. They know they’re having an effect just because you’re so obviously ignoring them and will keep bullying you harder until you can’t ignore them any more.
So I came up with a defense of my own, which I called Self-Degredation. If they called me an idiot, I happily agreed with them. If they asked why I was doing something, I’d reply with “Because I’m a moron!” with a big grin on my face and go on my way. I confused the heck outta them, and they stopped bugging me because you really can’t get any joy out of teasing someone who’s taking joy in the abuse. Basically, I beat them to the punch.
Nowadays, I’m a lot happier. I have my friends, I have a good job, I actually like my family, and people tend not to tease me anymore. My life is nothing spectacular, but it’s still pretty darn good.
And yet, I still compare myself with intoxicated long-tailed primates, and tell people that I have all the cognitive abilities of a sack of rocks. This self-degredation has become my security blanket. Kinda funny how something so negative can be taken as a positive, isn’t it?
May 19th, 2005
Fess up… I can’t be the only one dreading Mother’s Day
A few times each year I suck it up and do something nice for my good old Tormentor, but Mother’s Day is the most difficult. The hypocracy of pretending to be happy that she’s my mother makes me want to retch. Being “nice” is such an insipid goal when compared to being honest.
Yet the thought of her moping around at church on Sunday - crying about how her children are so mean, receiving sympathy from people unfamiliar with the horrors she committed - for years made me angry enough to break my standards of personal integrity…
But this year I’ll tell her, “I don’t know of any child who can avoid loving their mother, but I don’t have to celebrate being born to my abuser. I can accept it, but the only things worth celebrating are the victories my brother and I have achieved despite your best efforts to destroy us.”
To those of you who grew up in homes with even marginally attentive mothers, I’m sure that sounds cruel. To those of you who understand, I’m sorry if you shared in any of these: physical & emotional abuse, neglect, and worse yet, the inevitable denials that any of it happened.
On Mother’s Day I’ll be celebrating the lives of mothers out there doing right by their children. I’ll lift you up in my heart for doing what should come naturally - Loving your kids. I live on the other side, painfully aware of the grave importance of what you do.
May 6th, 2005
There’s nothing as heartwarming as coming home to a family argument. I would rather gouge my eyes out with rusty forks like that guy on the Scorpions Blackout album cover. But oh well, it was time for the geyser (formerly known as my brother) to blow off some steam…
This poor kid lives with me, works with me, and generally can’t get rid of me because I’m helping him get through college. Familiarity breeds contempt, so I expect these occasional flare-ups. What I never expect is how totally inept he is at managing conflict.
So I offered him this wonderful piece of advice that was passed on to me some time ago, and has worked wonderfully ever since: Rather than attacking a person about their behavior, which only shuts them off from listening, focus instead on your own response to their actions.
When you do X, it makes me feel Y.
Keep the X concise and elaborate on the Y. It’s all about sidestepping the power struggle, avoiding defense mechanisms, communicating how you feel, and hopefully being understood. Try it… it works!
March 15th, 2005
Spent so much of my life feeling horribly inadequate that I’m only just now discovering who I might actually be. It’s all in the process of being revealed… And I find myself as surprised as anyone.
March 1st, 2005
February is almost over. I figure those of you who are gonna flake out on your New Year’s resolutions have already done so, and those of you staying the course have made some decent progress.
Those of you with weight-loss resolutions: How goes it?
When I look back on the decision to leave the land of “pushing size 14″ what stands out in my mind are the fears I had. Of course, the fear of failure. Not knowing whether diet and exercise would pay off or become fruitless torture. But there were other fears too…
People perceive you differently when you’re wearing insulation. For all the bitching people do about how poorly we treat overweight people, having been on both sides I must tell you - The shy girl in me preferred the life of a chubster.
What made me comfortable with the extra pounds was that I enjoyed that certain level of invisibility. Despite my unfounded narcissism, I liked the reduced attention, especially with regard to the opposite sex. I’m told it’s common among rape survivors. Stealth is security.
It’s freaky how things change as the fat melts away. People treat you differently. I promise you’ll notice the changes. Jealousy becomes an everyday reality as well. Though I must say, somehow you can get away with being less nice when you’re thinner… Bizarre.
Other mixed blessings: That store where you always found flattering outfits despite your former weight… Bad news. Everything they sell will look dowdy or matronly on your thinner body. You’ll end up cruising the mall searching out new favorites. As problems go, not too rough.
Maintenance… That’s another fun game. After working your ass off you finally get to level out, but figuring out what it takes to stay at your goal weight must require a degree in biochemistry. I’m still trying to get the hang of it, and I hit the mark a year ago.
Hope this helps. Preparing mentally may arm you to overcome some potential obstacles. For those of you still on the wagon, I’m rooting for you, and working right alongside as we gear up for…
B A T H I N G S U I T S E A S O N
February 24th, 2005
They’re all around us… Rapists, molesters, abusers, murderers. Often the last people you’d suspect, they appear innocent and harmless. Do you ever take a good look at the people around you and wonder? I do.
I wonder about Donnie and the others who violated me. They destroy a slice of who you are and then eventually disappear… Where do they run and how do they hide from the guilt? Do they even feel it?
Where is he today? Does he have a wife? Children? Daughters perhaps? Have they become his victims too - Or does he love them and live in constant fear that they could be hurt by someone just like him?
Or does he simply live through lies?
Fresh memories bring fresh pain. The pain passes and I develop a slew of questions… How would my life be different without these scarring experiences? Who would I have become? Would my loved ones be freed from the emotional intimacy problems that plague me?
As embarassing as this is, I’ve fantasized about finding Donnie and holding him captive until he owns the truth about what he did. He should know that I blamed myself, “If only I hadn’t ditched school, and if only I didn’t drink” and spent years feeling dirty and used.
I want him to feel remorse, to know that he robbed me of so many good things. If only there were some way to force him to accept what he has done. Healing will come for me regardless - but what about him? It must be miserable walking around with those dark secrets.
January 31st, 2005
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