I've been looking at my family members' profiles and feeling sad. They're friends and vacation together and have each other in their top whatever and call each other. I haven't been close to my family in a long time. A lot of this has to do with distance. They live out in California and as I got older, the chances to visit became fewer and fewer. Inevitably I changed and they changed and we branched off. I got to the point where calling seemed pointless....not because I didn't care but because it seemed like it wouldn't matter or that there wouldn't be anything to talk about. The conversations now are incredibly sporadic. And really, I'm not going to lie, my Uncle and Aunt are incredibly "judgy." Growing up it always felt like this constant competition between my cousin and I. I never understood why they had any reason to compare us because our personalities are so much different. But every time I talked to them it was like i was the failure idiot relative. I got lectures. I got snarky comments. Every time I talked to them it made me feel like i was doing nothing and making all of the wrong choices so I stopped talking to them. Unfortunately, it was the only way I ever kept contact with my cousins and so that communication fell apart too. I really don't have any family. I have a handful of people a hardly ever see or speak to. I have my mom. I have my friends. I love all of my friends but at the same time....dunno....it's that connection you have with your family....the family you get along with or know you can call or lean on. Whatever. I don't have that. I just wish I had that kind of relationship with them that they have with each other...but I don't really see that happening. So. I have my friends. Hm. And I was watering the grass today and thinking about dear old dad and replaying seeing him over and over in my head. I thought of a million things I should have said. I could have said: "Look, you stop jerking me off and I'll stop jerking you off." "You know and I know and your wife is not within an earshot so why don't you answer my questions and you'll never have to hear from me again." "All I want is the real story and I know you have it. Give me what I want and I won't get a court order for your dna." "Didn't you even think about me at all?" "Don't you feel anything for me?" "How can you look me in the face and then go to sleep tonight?" Instead I said: "Sorry. I was mistaken. Thank you for your time." I guess it's just this gnawing feeling. This aching. This sadness. This knowing that the people that are supposed to love you unconditionally don't. Having family that buy you things on the appropriate dates and never ask you to visit. Having a dad that lives less than an hour away that don't care enough to just tell the truth. These things hurt. These things make you feel lonely.
I've been off of my medication now for a little over a month. All in all I have to say that it was worth it. It was necessary for a while, in order to get through the raging hormones and blues, but I feel that ultimately it wasn't something I wanted or needed anymore. I'm not sure if anyone else has experienced this but it was putting my mind in a complete fog. For a while there it was nice, I was agreeable and focused but as time wore on, it only seemed to make things worse. I became a little lethargic and easily annoyed. Touchy. Edgy. BITCHY. So I stopped. I knew that stopping would mean a whole month or so of nasty side effects but I rode it out. Now I feel......more like myself. Less.....dazed. More aware. Creative. Not as robotic. In other news, we've given birth to what will one day be the greatest stunt girl to ever live. Earlier I had the side of the crib down, turned my back for a split second to get a new shirt for her and she'd flipped over the rail and two feet or so onto the floor. She actually managed to avoid landing on her head. All she did was hit the floor on her back and knock the wind out of herself. After a few minutes of screaming she calmed down and went off exploring the house again. Resilient little thing she is. Later in the day she smacked her head off the coffee table and her little play table. I've made a conscious effort not to panic and make a huge deal out of it so she doesn't really make a big production out of it. Of course, once nap time comes around I'm repeatedly checking on her to make sure that she's still breathing and pinching and poking here and there to make certain that there aren't any broken bones. Babies are made of rubber and jello. She's also discovered the wonders of following mommie around the house, eagerly scrambling after me as I go into the kitchen for something or down the hall to play at my feet while I fold laundry. In terms of mobility, it's getting easier. As far as the danger factor, that goes up every other day. Other than that she's a pretty content baby. As long as you give her free reign and don't try to smother her with cuddles, she's happy. Usually she prefers standing at the front window and screaming for no apparent reason. For the most part she's a Daddy's girl who's less interested in Mommie. As soon as Eddie gets home from work she's bouncing up and down at the window squealing. If she's outside she scrambles down the driveway and pulling herself up on his pant leg. No one makes Bebe screech like Dada. Alright. Off to beddy bye. Hopefully I go straight to dreamland instead of become zombified watching reruns of Project Runway.
Currently
listening
:
Kind of Blue
By
Miles Davis
Release date: 1997-03-25
I try to get through things by not thinking too hard. If I think too hard, if I let my mind start wandering, I get myself in trouble. Every once in a while I let things touch me and I digest them. Usually, these things make me sick. I'd like to apologize to everyone I've ever hurt, in anger, in jealousy, in stupidity and in one of those smug, self-righteous moments that I tend to have from time to time. I act like i have all of the answers but I don't. Of course I don't, no one does. The older I get the more I realize that this is it. This is what you have. No one's waiting on the other side. No one's gonna hold your hand. You're born alone and you die alone...but what you do with your life, the people you touch and the impact you make is what keeps you alive. That's your immortality. I'm fine with nothingness. I've more or less accepted it because I don't have any other choice. I wish I could believe that there's something else, I wish I could be intensely spiritual or a religious zealot but that's not me. I believe that we're all accountable for our lives, our choices and our destinies. I don't believe that there's a magical place in the sky where someone's playing chess and we're the pieces. I know I'll never see the people I've loved and lost. This is it. And on that note...I'm sorry. I want to say that in case I never have. All I want is to be who I am, without the facades and smoke and mirrors. Me in all of my gushy jelly centered glory.
I look and I look and I peek and it's all very exhausting. I wonder why I even do it. Not that it's part of my life anymore. Not that we even speak to one another. But I do wonder. I guess that's just natural. To keep a nice safe distance, the cobweb, a city or two and a giant brick wall called the past and mistakes and sharp thorny words. Yes. This must be better. But why don't I feel any better? I reunited two best friends and that made me feel really good....and at the same time that made me very.....quiet. I became lost inside of my head, staring and listening and aching. Missing. It made me think about all of the good times and how we ought to be celebrating right now....except perhaps that we can't....because everything took an unexpected turn and it's not the dream we'd conjured and written and painted. Because after so much life experience, you rarely wind up on the same page....and sometimes it's harder to look them in the eye and realize that it's all gone. I don't want it to be all gone. I do these small insignificant things to keep it going, like peeking. I really wished she would've been here for all of this. I really wanted her here for all of this. This triumph was just as much hers as it was mine.
It just hit me hard I guess. You become so engrossed in your own life that you forget just how good you really have it. You forget to be grateful, you pick at the little things and forget to take in the bigger picture. I've always had this horrible habit of trying to put myself in someone's shoes. I can't separate myself. I'll see something or hear something and the first thing I do is slide in and think about how I'd feel or react. I try and think about what it would be like. And this seemed to hit me even harder after meeting Tommie. How would I feel??? I just couldn't imagine it. It hurt to think about. I guess deep down inside I'm just a big ball of flowery hippie dying to get out. I believe that love is essential. If we are loved, we can accomplish anything. We can heal. And to have to live a life where you don't know if that's possible day to day. All I could feel was anger. Anger and the overwhelming need to reach out a hand and touch him. To give him a hug. To do something to show that it shouldn't matter. That people deserve to be LOVED. To have that contact. To form meaningful connections. Without it you just whither away and die. No one deserves to live without that. I've always had this intense need in me to care for people. It may not seem like it, I may not come across as the nurturing type, but I am, through and through. I want to fix and coddle and make it better. It's occurred to me that this is usually some kind of transference. Displacement. If I can just fix them, love them enough. If I can do this for them than that means I'll be alright. If I can make it better for them, I can make it better for myself. I remember when i was a kid I tried to hand out sandwiches to the homeless. I wanted to take all of them home and let them stay with me. I would cry and cry for days over the fact that no one loved them enough to help. I think that's probably why I try to project the opposite, as a sort of defense mechanism...because it affects me too much and people like to exploit that. Dunno. If I had one wish it probably would be world peace....cliche as that is.
"just gotta add, Suzanne, was such a wonderment to talk to, so many things to discuss, random subjects, complete understanding, amazing person she is. its a nice thing to realize that someone else actually isnt phased one bit by someone who has aids, i've become so used to it being an issue of driving people away, that it actually hurt to believe that honesty is worth it, but after last night, she helped to reinforce my belief that it is worth it, even with knowing im going to face so much more criticism, and hatred, whatever, from whomever. its just great to know there are people out there that respect life, and other people."
So i finally got up the courage to knock on his door. Jan and I decided that now was better than never and after a few days of trying to talk myself out of it, found myself hesitantly walking up to his front door. The blood in my ears was deafening and I was afraid to take a pull on my cigarette because my hands were shaking so bad. To make a boring story short, his bitchy wife answered the door and he came outside to talk to me. I basically reiterated what I'd already written in my letter and said to him on the phone, looked him dead in the eye and asked "so there's no possible way you'd EVER met my mother." Reply: no. It was amazing to me that even with the similarities he'd still be able to stick to his story. For an instant I wondered if being covered in tattoos made any difference. You know, bumpkins and some "city" girl. Dunno. Whatever. I didn't really have any expectations. I'm sure that since I was little I had some idea of what I THOUGHT he looked like and that I'd over done it a bit. I was certain that he'd be anything but ORDINARY. But there he was in all of his bifocal-wearing, dirty hat, pot bellied glory. I think my mom gave him more credit than he deserved because my very first thought upon seeing him was "he looks like he smells stale." My second thought was that he reminded me of my mom's annoying neighbor. And I had always thought that if I looked him in the eye there'd be some sort of familiarity even though we'd never met but nope.....a stranger's a stranger even if you share DNA. Nothing in me recognized anything in him and it was exactly like walking up to anyone you don't know and starting a conversation. Although, I noticed that he had brown eyes that were a tad lighter than mine, we were the same height, had the same flat ass, oddly proportioned body and broad shoulders. Jan noticed that we had the same nose. We had the same chin. I could see meeting him and seeing some black guy and going "alright, I know I'm not half black" and that'd be that. But looking into some face that somewhat mirrors yours, having that name and birthday and everything else match up and saying Nope not me....well.....apparently that's what he wants. At least I had the option of hearing it myself and having him look me in the eye when he said it. That's all I really wanted. I just wanted him to look at me and acknowledge me in some way. Even if it was denial or rejection. At least I know what his face looks like. And I can die knowing that he knows what my face looks like. And maybe that'll haunt him.
That sort of personality that finally lashes out in a rage over small annoyances that have built up to sky high. Emotionally childish. Frantic. Introverted. Taking it all in and not letting any of that out. It's hard because there are more excuses to keep quiet than to open one's mouth. Just not the aggressive type anymore, preferring instead, quiet, complacency and the bare minimum of drama. I'm not sure where I'm at. I'm at that "I'm a mom now" stage but I don't know what that means. Not really. I know it means I have to do what's in her best interests. I know that baby comes first. That there are some things that I just cannot do anymore. And I'm fine with that. But now I've got to figure out what to do instead. I'm just in that no-bullshit stage. I've surpassed the need for the breakneck pitch and chaos. I'm over the ping-pong relationships and friendships. Give me something real. Give me real people with real feelings and brutal honesty. Give me forward momentum. I'm sick of the back peddling. I'm sick of being understanding. Tomorrow morning Jan and I are going for a little adventure into no-man's land in search of the illusive "bio-dad." It's one last ditch effort to settle all of this once and for all. To tie up any loose ends. And if I'm wrong, well, I'll just get slapped with a PPO and escorted off the property. But in my heart of hearts I know I'm not wrong and that's what bothers me. But sometimes I sit and chew it over and wonder if I'm not just incredibly delusional, wanting it so bad that I've put all of the closest thing I've got at the moment. No. That's no good. I'm thinking that although I'm going into it without any great expectations, there is still room for a little hurt. There is the possibility of being disappointed in some way. Chances are we'll pull up and no one will be home. Chances are his wife will answer and I'll chicken out. And then i find myself worried about his feelings and how it's going to affect his life. Because obviously he lost a lot of sleep over that with me. Ha. I'm one of those people that won't let it go. In all appearance it may seem like I've put it to bed but I haven't. I'm just quietly turning it over and over in my hand trying to find the best possible way to approach it. So that I don't get hurt. So that I'm not whipping up a shit storm. If she were to find out she might divorce him and take him for everything he has. I'd like to say he deserves that but I can't. I don't know him. I don't know the circumstances. I don't know enough to feel that entitled to destroying someone's life like that. And maybe that's why I'm going. T better gauge it. So i can make that decision. To see his face. To be acknowledged in some small way. Even if it's only to have him look me in the eye and tell me I've got the wrong guy. Even if that's a total lie. Because I deserve that, at the very least. It's having that option. If you've ever known your parent, even for the briefest amount of time, you're not going to get it. You could have the parent that's absent the majority of your life but if you've ever even once looked them in the face, you won't understand. It's this constant hollow. This nagging question that never goes away. I just want to finish it once and for all, good or bad and be done with it.
