I have had some thinking to do. It's rather annoying. On top of that, I have caught a cold for the first time in many years.
So many interesting discoveries about my family last week. What my parents told me about the appearance of the Unknown Grandson was completely different from what my brother told me.
(long story, I'll save it for a separate post).
Also, while I was putting my parents at a distance, they were shutting me out altogether! They never dropped me a line about the death of my Aunt Virginia, or my Uncle Alton. Never thought to mention that my Aunt Diane had adopted 8 children.
My father has mellowed out a lot, and is no longer frightening. My mom is correspondingly less anxious. I could probably have a reasonably healthy relationship with them now. I just don't know if I care to. I have never turned to my mother for support or advice, and I still wouldn't.
One of this weeks revelations has convinced me that she is a total idiot.
All these years, I thought of my mother as a moral weakling who shirked her responsibilities as a parent. It turns out, she has just been an idiot all along. She didn't protect by brother and I from our father's outbursts of anger. I now suspect it was because she didn't think there was anything wrong with the situation.
That's a big difference.
"Mom, why didn't you stand up for us?" hurts more than "Uh, mom... this is not how it is supposed to go."
What was the thing that convinced me, you wonder? I'll tell you. It was a photograph of my brother and I, in 1968, ready to go to our new elementary school in rural East Texas... wearing school uniforms from the Catholic school we went to the year before in New England.
Yeah. My mom had no clue.
so... I can forgive her for being an idiot.
