So I packed my favorite stuffed animals and sweaters into my Strawberry Shortcake suitcase, strapped on my roller skates and broke the news to my Mom….

…who promptly fixed me a sandwich, patted me on the ass and wished me good luck.

I don’t remember how long I stayed away. I remember finding a place to eat my sandwich and throwing myself a pity party.

Apparently, I go through this every twenty four years.

I’m planning an escape. Just for a few days.

Twenty four years later, I have a much nicer suitcase and a car in lieu of roller skates.

Also, there will be no pity party. Just some general hiding out, picture-taking and writing and maybe some wine drinking. Also, air conditioning.

Anyone wanna make me a sandwich and pat me on the ass? 

When I was five years old, my Mom got pregnant.

On October 25th, 1985, during morning recess, I noticed our next door neighbor walking pointedly towards me.

She told me that the baby was coming, that Mom and Dad were at the hospital. I wanted her to take me there. She explained that there was a problem, Mom was okay, the baby was okay, but I couldn’t go. Because there was a problem.

I found out later that they thought she had spinal meningitis. She was born three weeks early. My sister spent the first few days of her life in an incubator.

When they brought her home, I instantly fell in love.

If she cried in the wee hours of the morning, my Mom would inevitably find me over her bassinet in the living room.

Like any young love affair, mine was short lived.

If memory serves, she was two years old when we started fighting.

Mom would ask me “What do you want me to do, lock her in the basement?”, and at some point I worked up the nerve to give her an honest answer. “Yes. Put her in the storm shelter. I’ll slip pancakes under the door. We can give her a water dish, like the dog.”

(Apparently I cannot blame my sometimes heartless nature on the influence of a hardened world. )

It was around this same time that my parents left us alone together all day over the summer. Sometimes my Dad would be sleeping soundly after working a midnight shift. Sometimes they paid a worthless babysitter to watch me feed her and change her diapers. Sometimes, though, it was just her and I.

On one of those occasions, the neighbors invited me across the street to swim in their pool. She was too young, though, they said. So I found the carrier we used to take our Labrador/German Shepherd mix to the vet. I gave her a water dish and some sticks to play with, crated her ass and parked the carrier under the shade tree in the side yard.

My Mom got home from work before I got home from the pool, and her head exploded. (and rightfully so, but I still wonder if the neighbors knew I was responsible for my two year old sister when they invited me but not her.)

For the next fifteen years, my sister and I waged war against each other. Truces were called for the handling of schoolyard bullies, joining forces against our parents to run a mutually beneficial agenda, or if one of us was sad, sick, or hurt enough to garner the other’s temporary sympathy.

She stabbed me in the shin with a steak knife under the dinner table (I still have a scar). I tied her to an arm chair. She threw a roller skate at my head. I locked her in the pantry. She would hit me and then tell Mom I hit her. I would ask her to play hide and go seek, and then not look for her. She hid fake snakes in my bedroom, or left them outside my door.

Still, when Mom made a habit of working late and calling me after dark in the dead of winter to go get my sister from daycare, I started picking her up on my way home from school. We both hated walking the two blocks in the dark, in the cold, in what felt to us like the wee hours of the night. So I got off the bus in front of her school and took her home with me.

She took care of me too, in her own way. She killed bees, and committed other countless acts of bravery so that I didn’t have to. She was the best and most reliable member of my wedding party, the greatest maid of honor I could ask for, even though Mom pushed me into giving her that title, and we had a huge fight about my refusal to allow her to wear a tiara. When my sweet orange tabby got stuck in a tree, I pulled Dad’s truck underneath that tree and propped a ten foot ladder against its trunk. The lowest branch was a good five feet from the top of the ladder. I was working up the nerve when she came out of the house. She climbed the ladder, pulled herself up onto that branch, shimmied up a little further and sweet talked the cat into her arms. I should note here that the cat always hated her before that- he would hiss and spit if she looked at him the wrong way.

That same year we got into a violent screaming match over a pot of macaroni and cheese.

Some months later, she was in trouble with Dad. They were arguing in the hallway outside of our room. The wasbund and I sat in silence while I listened to my father’s rage build. When that rage hit its tipping point, when I started to squirm in my chair, anticipating the beating she would receive, the wasbund silently stood up, opened the bedroom door and walked out into that hallway, standing between them. He stared my Dad down, and without a word or a movement, forced his retreat.

When my Dad and the wasbund had their fight, the fight that found me kicked out of my own parents’ house, my Dad roared at my sister in a fit of anger that it was her fault. All her fault. When he wasn’t around, I assured her that it was not her fault, not one bit, and that I didn’t blame her for it.

She and her boyfriend helped the wasbund and I move to Asheville. There was nothing to fight about anymore. No more competing for resources and attention. No more jealousies and resentments. It was then that our friendship blossomed. They were here when we closed on our house. We took a vacation together. We spent holidays together, the four of us.

Then, last spring, “we” became the three of us. The summer was in full swing when “we” became the just the two of us, again.

I picked her up from the airport Tuesday afternoon. She was here for thirty six hours. I bought dinner. She built shelves. I showed her around. She had coffee ready when I got home from work. We shared a bottle of Riesling and ate ice cream straight out of the carton, side by side on the couch, with two spoons.

She said it felt like home. Before the leaves turn, it will be her home.

I haven’t told her yet that for the first time in years, it felt like home to me, too.

A conversation with my Mom (who has nearly reached her pre-chemo insanity levels, if you were wondering) this weekend revolved around my cousin’s reaction to my sister’s impending arrival in my home.

“I heard the girls are moving in together.”

“Yes, they are… <blah, blah, I will spare you because this would probably add 200 words to my post length>”

“Good luck with that.”

I think Mom brought it up because she couldn’t decide whether or not to be offended.

I wasn’t. In the first few months we dated, the wasbund once found it necessary to break up one of our sister fights; pulling me off of her as we both screamed and cried and I beat the tar shit out of her with a tube sock filled with tangerines. In my own defense, I cannot even publish what she said to me to earn that beating. You know if even I won’t put it out there, she got what she deserved.

Anyway. I can’t remember the last time I saw my cousin, but I believe she’s been married twice since then, so since she doesn’t really know either of us as adults, it’s hard to get my feathers ruffled.

What did I take away from this conversation, other than a splitting headache and the urge to cram my Mom in a shoebox and ship her to some third world country?

I think maybe “good luck with that” is the snottiest phrase ever. I know that I employ it frequently when I’m being snarky.

This has been the summer of inescapable wretched mind numbing madness causing heat. The things I’m sure of aren’t happening fast enough, and the uncertainties I’m facing are probably all going to resolve in the same two week span. As a result, I’m crabby.

It’s too hot to eat, too hot to sleep, and there is too much to think about.

So since I feel all crabby and snotty, I figured I’d tell some people “good luck with that“.

Thinking that women with any reasonable amount of self esteem and relationship experience will tolerate your douchebag antics?

Good luck with that.

Screwing with me in terms of my most basic requirements for well being?

Good luck with that.

Acting like you’re kind of a big deal when the only thing you’ve really got is a grandiose sense of self-importance?

Good luck with that.

Continually marrying men even though you know you’re more frigid than a case of Popsicles in a deep freeze?

Good luck with that.

Trying to bully me into solving a problem for you that creates a problem for me?

Good luck with that.

Keeping me in the dark as to your intentions so as to keep me motivated?

Good luck with that.

Bratting the hell out for no good reason and thinking you’re going to escape the requisite calling out I will undoubtedly deliver at the first opportunity?

Good luck with that.

Attempting to capture my attention with the lamest excuse for charm I’ve seen in the past year?

Good luck with that.

Underestimating either of my father’s daughters individually, or unthinkably, both of them united in a common agenda with said father’s backing?

Good luck with that!

Things are sharp again- songs and places and names and feelings have edges that cut me. Not to the quick, not to the bone, a deep paper cut, maybe. Still. I hear some melody of memory, I relive some moment, I remember what I was doing this time last year, and the added knowledge of what I didn’t know as I did it haunts me. Sadly, it seems to have inspired some bitterness, and that sends me on a search for wisdom.

It was fairly easy to find, with a little help from a friend.

This year, now, here in the present, I am waiting. Which is something I have never done well. My uncertainly tolerance could fit in a thimble. With room to spare for my patience.

The waiting is still the hardest part. It always will be, but maybe there is a different way to wait.

Last year, I felt for months what I felt yesterday- confusion, anxiety, anticipation, fear.  When that veil finally lifted, the revelation was earth-shattering. Painful. Ugly. Devastating.

What I’m waiting on, is with all likelihood, positive and certainly less dramatic. Even if it turns out to be unpleasant, it will not be so earth-shattering, and if it is unpleasant, at the very least I will have preserved most of what I have. The casualties will likely be some pride, some hope, some happiness. Which will not be fun, but is certainly easier than knocking the whole house off of the foundation and rebuilding.

My decision making process on the larger issues of life is largely intuitive. That isn’t to say that there isn’t logical thought applied; I have a nasty habit of thinking twenty steps ahead. By the time I’m faced with a decision, I have already painstakingly considered the situation from all angles, and I trust my intuition to place my bets. On the smaller issues of life, I am often incapable of making a decision. Ask me if I’m willing to consider a huge risk, and you’ll have your answer in a shorter period of time than it takes me to pick something off of a menu. Because I anticipate the huge decisions, maybe when I ought to be thinking about what I’d like for dinner.

Not everyone works this way.

It is unfair, I think, to associate the length of the decision making process with the level of intent or conviction with which the decision is made. My decisions certainly lack neither intent nor conviction.

If my decision is made with intent and conviction, I certainly want the same in return.

I’m not waiting for the other shoe to drop. I’m not waiting for pretty words to wilt into broken promises. I’m waiting to avoid exactly those things. However long it takes, whatever the outcome is, a decision made with intent and conviction is worth waiting for.

I deserve nothing less.

Over the past year, my sister has stunned me with her grace, her wisdom, her capacity for coping with her worst nightmare come true. There are good days. There are bad days. There are good weeks and bad weeks. Overall, though, she is doing better than any of us could have hoped she would; she’s growing into an incredible woman.

I hate that in order to develop that grace and wisdom, she had to give up her innocence. I hate that I lost a friend, an almost-brother, a probable addition to our family. I hate that the lives of his brother and sister and nieces and nephew were changed forever.  I hate that none of us know how his story would have turned out.

What I hate most of all is that this all could have been avoided if someone would have bothered to slow down and take a second look.

Still, I couldn’t let the day go by without an acknowledgment of what was, of what is no more, of what will never be. I seriously considered it, particularly in the face of my current circumstances, but I decided that this was an important message and an appropriate day to share it with you.

When we were still just dating  you told me that if things didn’t work out between us, you at least wanted to know that we learned something from each other. That we would both be better people for having shared our time together.

So, today, on our first Unnversary, I would like to tell you that I’m a better person for having known, loved and lost you. Over the last ten years, I’ve learned too much about myself and the world to list here, and you deserve some credit for the woman I’ve become. Thank you.

What do you say when it’s over?
I don’t know if I should say anything at all
One day we’re rollin’ in the clover
Next thing you know we take the fall

Still, I think about the years since I first met you
And the way it might have been without you here
And I don’t know if words from me can still upset you
But I’ve just gotta make this memory stand clear

I know I’m leavin’ here a better man
For knowin’ you this way
Things I couldn’t do before, now I think I can
And I’m leavin here a better man

-clint black, a better man

I’m a little confused.

I like my therapist. He’s good at what he does.

The website was about abused children. It was about a therapeutic method under which adults who were abused and neglected by their parents or primary care givers stop sympathizing and empathizing with their parents and turn that unconditional love and acceptance on themselves. Her premise is that I cannot truly love myself if I forgive my parents, because I’m inherently repressing my rage and sorrow to accommodate a favorable view of them.

Okay, what?

That just blows my mind. It took me a long, long time to view love as coming from a bottomless source, to let go of the concrete idea that love is a limited resource and realize that loving creates more love. It’s magical that way. It also took me a long time to forgive my parents.

The undeniable truth is that I was abused and neglected as a child. Certainly, there are children that have much worse circumstances than I ever did. That doesn’t change the fact that I’ve been hit, kicked, throttled and otherwise physically injured and intimidated. That I didn’t receive critical medical care. That I was often left home alone all day when I was sick, or taken out of school to care for my sister when she was sick. That I endured verbal attacks and public humiliation at the hands of both of my parents. Those things happened, every bit of them, and they hurt. They changed me as a person, and I will never know who I might have been without the influence of abuse and neglect.

I could tell you the tragic stories of my parents’ own childhoods, I could show you the hands they were dealt while I came of age. I could tell you that they are, at heart, good people with good intentions. I could remind you, and myself that they love me to the ends of this Earth and would do just about anything for me. I could make a list of all of the wonderful things they’ve given me, taught me, shared with me, created for me. That would all be true.

Perhaps my issue with this woman’s premise is that it is so very black and white.

I didn’t deserve what I endured as child. No child does. That my parents did the best that they were capable of, given their own states of mental health and their own experiences growing up does not excuse or minimize my suffering. What they were capable of, what they were willing to justify and settle for is pathetic and disgusting. There simply is no excuse for it.

For my future children, for my adult life, I’ve chosen another path. I’ve decided that the crazy stops here, that I want to understand and overcome the influence of abuse and neglect on my own mental and emotional processes, so that I don’t unwittingly pass them to my children, or unthinkably, cause them to suffer as I have suffered. A critical part of that journey has been making peace with my parents.

They are who they are, and their ability to admit the truth without justifying or minimizing it is very limited. If they were capable of seeing things through my eyes, they never would have been capable of treating me the way they did. I have decided, consciously, to love them in spite of their flaws, in spite of their mistakes. Because they gave me life, because my blood is their blood, because they do love me so very, very much, and because I love them immensely.

As a grown woman, I’m still vulnerable to their special brand of hurt. The very minute my father begins to stumble around my home and slur intelligibly during our conversations, I cease being a thirty year old woman, through some kind of Alice in Wonderland type transformation, I fall down the rabbit hole until I am eight again. Anxious and unsettled by my father’s antics, hyper-vigilant, as well as resigned to falling asleep to the lullaby of my childhood: my father retching violently in the bathroom nearby. Trying to will myself to sleep and hoping that I sleep deeply enough to avoid a repeat performance as a morning revelry.  That old, tired dance inspires a rage and sorrow that still leaves me exhausted and anxious.

The difference is, my Dad knows how I feel about it now, and we don’t talk much about it, and I don’t make it an issue (as that would only serve to drive a wedge between us and not foster any change in behavior on his part), and he is sheepish and offers the same olive branches he offered that poor little eight year old girl: breakfast out, spending money, compliments, and casual apologies or denials. Another important difference- he leaves town, he goes home, and as his plane soars above the ridgelines, I pop up out of the rabbit hole and start to resume life as a functional, independent adult.

Maybe this woman would say that I’m still punishing myself by allowing my father to drink in my house, by allowing him such a large space in my heart, by choosing to love and adore the lovable and adorable parts of him. I don’t buy that. The decision for me was to learn to take my parents as they come or be a voluntary orphan. To have the best and closest relationships with them that I could, or to excommunicate myself from them. I will grant her, this forgiveness comes from a place of superiority to an extent- I have to look upon those parts of them that caused my suffering from a place beyond my natural perspective.

I had to come to understand those horrible parts of them as symptoms of their own suffering, and I had to accept and understand that they are not willing to break the trance of their delusions and demons in order to overcome them. So I did. Because I love them. Because they love me. Because I hope that my children will do the same thing, as much as I hope that I give them less to forgive me for.

“A mature person is one who does not think only in absolutes, who is able to be objective even when deeply stirred emotionally, who has learned that there is both good and bad in all people and all things, and who walks humbly and deals charitably with the circumstances of life, knowing that in this world no one is all-knowing and therefore all of us need both love and charity.”  Eleanor Roosevelt

My father’s sister (the Other Aunt), posted the following response:

“Cath, you were brought up being nice, you can’t change because your to nice anyway.”

In the moment I read that, my general malaise tipped over into white hot rage.

I’ve said this here before, but I will say it again. Whenever I was mean or nasty, whenever I argued or dissented or allowed my legendary sharp tongue to get me in trouble as a little girl, my mother would utter one of her favored parenting phrases:

“My job is to raise you for others to love.“  Sometimes it was prefaced with “I don’t care if you hate me“, but there it is.

She raised me for others to love.

Not to love myself. Not for me to love others. Not to be happy, healthy or productive.

I was raised for others to love.

So guess what? So guess what that message turns into? That earning the approval of others is more important than honoring your own feelings, that winning the game by winning their love is more important than anything else.

That you’re nobody till somebody loves you.

That’s why I’m upset. Not because I miss David. Not because it’s awfully lonely to go from even a miserable marriage to the endless string of worthless evenings that are a part of the single life. Not because I’m not strong enough, or not EVEN because I’m ready for love again and can’t find it. (I’m not.)

I’m miserable because a part of me still believes that rotten, awful trash.

I’m nobody till somebody loves me.

Oh, goddamn it. I’m thirty years old. I own a home. I’m pursuing an education. I have a promising career. I have the most incredible friends one can ever hope to find. My life is full. I am whole.

But that little girl, the girl in her ruffled panties and polished Mary Janes who just wants to do what she wants to do, and reacts with rage when her wishes and needs aren’t met?

She wonders what is wrong with her.

She wonders why a boy who could not grow up, who left her for someone else when things got hard, didn’t love her enough to make it work- she wonders what is wrong with her.

That little girl thinks that if only that boy loved her enough, he would have been able to grow up and be a man. She thinks that him not loving her enough is a reflection on her, on something broken and disgusting and untouchable about her.

The grown up me has a hard time chasing that thought away, because he knew me better than anyone else ever has, and maybe ever will. That knowledge inspired him to throw me away like yesterday’s trash, turning our thirteen years together into a consolation prize and a sham. Or at least that’s what he told her.

I know, I know. His problems are his problems, and I am neither the cause nor the solution. But his voice, his voice. Her voice. “I didn’t love you enough to do these things for you” “My job is to raise you for others to love”. It’s maddening, and there is a part of me that just wants to do anything and everything to drown out those voices.

I am somebody. The love of others is only a part of why I am somebody- I am somebody in my own right. Whether I ever find love again.

I’m sitting here in my cozy little farmhouse, in a southwestern-facing cove at 2900 feet, working on budget reports for the senior management team, having just finished my homework for the next week. I won’t be in my private office complete with mini-fridge and bow-front desk for another two weeks, because when I’m done with jury duty, I’m spending a week in the corporate office to meet with the corporate controller and his senior accountants.

When you found me, I was running a switchboard and surfing the internet. That was only seven years ago. Those two vapid executive assistants were crimping my style. I had no education, nothing but administrative experience, and my future was a dim shadow. You saw something in me, despite the fact that I bratted out on you whenever the opportunity presented itself.

I know that I’ve created and earned my success. I understand that I was the one who did the work. That doesn’t change the fact that you were the first person to see my potential, to see beyond my smartass mouth and youthful exuberance and find the talent and drive that brought me to this place. You’re not the only person to have helped me become what I am, but you were absolutely the first.

The opportunity you fought so hard to give me- and I know what you must have gone through- the patience you showed me, and the interest you took in my education and career- there are times I weep with gratitude when I really stop to think about it.

You’ve always been an incredible friend; a shoulder to cry on, a great source of trusted advice, someone who cared enough to raise my ire if I really needed to hear an unpleasant truth. You are everything a mentor could ever be, and what makes it too precious for words is this simple: all you ever wanted in return was my respect and affection. You have both in spades, sir.

Your sage words of advice; about dying inside, about the work being the bottom line, about dealing with idiots and assholes- I hear these phrases as I am resisting the urge to throw my office phone through the wall. You prepared me for corporate life in a very real and important way. I’m so very proud to tell you that when it comes to office politics, I am now 100% dead inside. It’s a strange and wonderful empty feeling- to know what to say and do to circumnavigate people and problems without really caring much about any of it. I’ve never done heroin, but perhaps this compares.  I throw the elephant as a parlor trick now, and you laid the foundation for it.

We’ve kept in touch, and that means the world to me. I miss working with you still, after all these years.

I take great comfort in knowing that you’ve found a wonderful woman to share your life with, and that you’ve brought an incredible child into the world. For a human being to miss out on the chance to have you as a father would be a bigger tragedy than I could swallow. You’ve been a father figure to me, and I’m a much better person for your interest in my mind, my heart, and even and especially, my soul.

The wind was bitter and the cold damp air reminded me more of winter than fall. The color was incredible, though the pictures don’t do it justice because it was so dark. Adicus and I played fetch and took pictures all afternoon. Cruising down the parkway, with the dog in the back seat, familiar music on the radio. Except I’m in the driver’s seat now. It feels good, stopping when I want for however long I want, and heavy with responsibility.

When I stop at the Linn Cove Viaduct, I’m greeted with light snow. It occurs to me that going over Mount Mitchell on the Parkway may not be the safest way to get to Asheville. I debate as I drive. When I got to NC 80, the Park Service was just shutting the gates.  We came into Old Fort, got on I-40 and drove back to Haywood County, bringing a cold rain with us.

Despite the weather, it was a wonderful trip, and it gave me back my sense of wonder and brought me that sense of deep comfort, of fitting into my miniscule place in the world. As I sat in my cozy house that night, with the dog in my lap, the dull ache of accomplishment filled me from the toes up.

Sunday was bitter cold, and I spent most of the day dutifully holding the couch down. I settled in for a nap some time around three. At five, someone honked their car horn from my driveway, softly, tentatively, and the honking and subsequent barking and jumping around woke me out of a dead drooling sleep.

Still dressed in my pjs, I answered the door. I had bedhead and sleep lines. It was not a pretty sight, I’m sure.

My very sweet, very pretty, very well kept housewife neighbor was standing at my porch door. She had a big pile of silver shiny things. I blinked and rubbed my eyes. I smiled at her and resisted the urge to stretch. She was talking. Something about honking the horn to keep from startling me?

They were having a birthday party for her daughter. She thought I might like a plate. She knows how hard it is to cook for one. She’s been there. She’s been thinking of me. I should come up for coffee sometime. I am smiling and nodding and saying thank you, and saying something about always cooking too much food, when I bother. She is noticing my hair and my decision not to dress for the day and she’s still smiling and she’s handing me the plates, covered in foil, and I’m thanking her and agreeing with her about the coffee, and she’s talking about getting back to her company, and I’m smiling and waving as she gets back in her car.

Adicus and I come into the house and I put the plates on the kitchen counter. I stretch and fix my hair, and Adicus wants to go outside, so I let him out. I sit for a minute on the porch and try to process what has just occured, but I’m not sharp enough yet. My stomach growls, so I go into the kitchen and warm up the first plate in the microwave for a minute or two, and I sit down on the couch with a glass of juice and this plate. A few pieces of honey baked ham, corn and green beans, and a yeast roll. I’m eating, and as I start to eat, I start to cry. I’m still very disorientated at this moment, and I put the plate down for a minute and cry harder, then wipe my eyes and blow my nose and look bewildered at this ham and wonder why the fuck I’m crying because Noelle brought me a plate?

As I start to eat again, I realize. I realize that the last time I had honey baked ham was when the neighbor ladies came to my sister’s house after Mark’s service. I remember them piling a plate high for both of us, and insisting that my sister have seconds. I remember hating this for my sister, the death ham, so sweet, and we were starving, but it’s death food, every bit of it, brought by kind souls who think of you in concern and pity and know that you need to eat but are unable to oversee such a simple part of daily living because your life is a total shitstorm because you lost someone.

I realize that though no one has died, I have lost someone, and my neighbor lady, a very sweet and kind lady who has a master’s degree and the nice house on the hill and a husband and a little girl and two dogs and she stays at home, has thought of me, with concern and pity, and she brought me divorce ham. I’m touched and everything is good, and I finish it all, including the dessert plate, except I let Adicus have the pumpkin pie, because he asked for it, but I hate her for it too. I hate her, and I feel guilty for hating her, and I will go up the hill one day to have coffee, because I’ve always liked her well enough, and she asked me to, and she’s very sweet, but I hate her and I hate myself for hating her.

When I finish with dinner, I head straight into the office. Into the room where the ex stayed after we split but before he left. That moment is frozen in time in this room, with clothes piled on the floor next to a makeshift bed and the smell of dust and dead dreams. He had agreed to let me pack up his things. So I started. I cleaned and packed and sorted and cleaned and packed and sorted some more. There is more to do, there are more boxes to pack, and more cleaning and rearranging to be done, but it’s okay.

As I slip into bed Sunday night, I feel more like the girl who took the dog for an adventure on the Parkway and less like the girl who ate pity ham in her pj’s at six o clock on a Sunday afternoon.

Now I just have to find the time and the courage to go up the hill for coffee.