Open Letter to My Family

Dear Secret Blogiary,

Dear Family Member(s),

It has come to my attention that you*

A) still think I am a child
B) think I am an idiot
C) think maybe I was dropped on my head too many times to count
D) require constant supervision
E) have asked repeatedly for your advice
F) make rash emotionally-based decisions

While I didn’t intend for this to be a pop quiz, clearly, I need to ascertain your poor opinion of me before I reply to your increasingly emotional demands on my person.

Please let me begin with a few minor and simple observations:

1) While I may be the youngest, I am by no means a child. If you might recall at last birthday count I was pushing well into my mid-thirties. Plus, if you will kindly remember, I do not live at home.
2) Again, although I am the youngest, I actually have quite a bit of brains at my disposal. In fact, I am pretty sure that at birth, I had the same amount of brains as everyone else.
3) According to family legend, I was not actually the one dropped on my head.
4) I will readily admit, as a child if not supervised I tended to get into things, however, as a grown-up, I have no trouble getting into and then cleaning up my own things.
5) Point in fact, I do not ever ask for advice from family for the simple fact that you are family and therefore emotionally involved and I cannot rely on your advice being objective. This was true as a child and teenager, it is still true now.
6) While I can be emotional I don’t believe I have ever as a teenager or adult made a decision rashly – I may have made emotional decisions (clearly I married Mister W and there was a great deal of emotion in that) but rash? No.

So let’s review, just because I don’t talk to you about my life or major decisions that have no bearing on you or your life whatsoever does not mean that I do not think about my choices before acting on them. In fact, you might want to make a note about this, but I constantly think about my decisions and sort-of obsess over them because I want to look at all options, all sides, in every corner and under every rock before going through with a plan because guess what?

I was fucking raised to think before I act!! To gather all the information so that I could make a fucking well-informed decision.

In addition, I often do not ask you advice, not because I don’t want it, but because having lived my whole life knowing you, I know what you will say. I’ve paid attention through the years, watched the mistakes you’ve made and catalogued them deep in the clutter-filled recesses of my grey matter. I know most of the time you force give your advice because you care. Thank you, but unless I ask, please don't. Since before I can remember, I've tried very hard not to give unsolicited advice. I kept quiet during times when I thought you were doing something wrong. I ask for the same courtesy.

Also, when I walk away, let me go, especially if you are starting to raise your voice and/or cry. Don’t grab my arm and make ultimatums. I am walking away so that you or I don’t say something in an emotionally charged conversation that we will both regret. Remember, I think before I act, but sometimes you forget.

Finally, I don’t claim to not make mistakes. Mistakes and failure happen. I get that. I've made plenty. As a parent, I understand that if I can prevent my child from making a mistake, I should want to. But then how does one learn? I try to live by the philosophy: A smart person learns from their mistakes. A wise person learns from the mistakes of others.

A mistake can be a great motivational factor, a great learning tool and sometimes, a big mistake can result in the best possible consequence. Remember, that time when I got knocked up and according to some I “did it on purpose?” Mistake it might have been, but if we hadn’t made it, Mister W and I would not have our Big Sis!

So, should our choices result in an unforeseen and potentially rotten consequences, we’ll roll with it because that’s how we are. And if I talk about it or not, take comfort that just because I am silent, does not mean my brain is taking the night off.

Please stop trying to make me feel like shit because you dislike that I am not including you in a decision that affects only Mister W, The Girls and me. Stop accusing me of not making an effort to find another way. Just, for fuck’s sake, stop.


Sincerely,

Leigh

* For the remainder of this letter the singular ‘you’ shall refer to the plural ‘you all’ ‘all ya’ll’ or ‘youse guys’

Twisting the Plan Up in Bunches or How My Family Keeps Throwing Me for a Loop

Dear Secret Blogiary,

Is it a reprieve from angst and worry? Or is it a trap cunningly disguised as salvation?

I have written many times about my current position regarding the pit of hell I am living in my house. Just to be clear: we are upside down on the mortgage, live in a neighbor that is unfriendly and reside in a city that is a drug-runners haven. We want out and after speaking to a lawyer made the ultimate decision to walk away from the house and rent for a while.

Eventually the goal would have me at home writing, possibly home schooling Big Sis and Little Sis, and living on Mister W’s salary.

This was the plan. We agreed upon it and took steps to start it.

Now? Oh Boy!

My father, after two long years in litigation regarding my grandmother’s will, is reaching a settlement that will free up his finances. The will was contested and it looks that the judgment will be in my father’s favor.

Well, after hinting and hemming and hawing for the past two years about “wishing” he could “help” us it finally came out that Dad wants to buy a home down here and will be able to plunk a $50,000 dollar down payment on one. Peachy. How does that involve me? Apparently, he wants to buy a 4 or 5 bedroom house and have Mister W and I live there and make the mortgage payment as he has no real income aside from social security. And he would have his own room.

Currently, he travels a lot. But the house would be his and when the time came, he would relocate here permanently and the unspoken arrangement would be that I would become primary caretaker in his elder years.

I love my Dad. I do. But he is very hard to deal with. So I made a pro-con list:

PRO:

1. house troubles = fixed
2. Mister W loves his job and wants to stay in the state
3. With such a large down payment, the mortgage will be less and I’ll be able to be a stay at home mom as I have been longing to do
          a. If I am stay-at-home then I can leave-the-home at will to go camping and kayaking
                  i. Not that I have a kayak yet…but I really want one
                 ii. And going camping during the week? How cool and less crowded would that be?
4. A single family home means that I can let the Psycho Dog outside and get chickens

CON:
1. Dad is a hoarder and as much as I love to stockpile Jell-O and craft supplies, I am not willing to live with a true should-be-on-Hoarders hoarder
2. I do not really want to be a caretaker, especially for my Dad...that just seems skeevy.
3. I would never feel like the house was my home...we might pay the mortgage, but we'd only be able to do so because Dad dropped that much money on it
4. Dad took care of my grandmother for over 15 years (she lived until 96)
5. I had the girls on the young side and by the time I am 45, they will both be out of the house…do I really want to be tied to house taking care of my Dad
          a. Oh Geez! How selfish is that?!?! It’s like I only think about myself!
6. I do not want to live in Florida for the rest of my life - seriously, I told them I was moving back up north and what do they do? They all follow me down here!
7. I hate being obligated to people – even family

I am not sure that this covers everything that I have been thinking about since my Dad offered this as an option…except that it wasn’t really phrased as an option; it was more like an expectation. Like when the finances cleared up, Dad would put the money down and Mister W and I would pay the mortgage.

Mister W is all for it. And by "all for it" I mean that he is willing to go with this "plan" because it solves a great many problems. The biggest one on his list? He doesn’t want to leave Florida. He likes it here amazing as that is. He doesn’t want to leave his job. He loves it and is quite good at it. I can respect that especially considering that in Florida we can live comfortably on his salary alone.

And if I don’t take up this offer, how do I tell Dad? “Sorry Pops, can’t be bothered with thinking about you in your old age, I am just going to put you into a nursing home?”

Ouch. I can’t do that. But I also have to be able to live with my choice. So how do I choose between a sharp pointy rock and a bigger jagged blood-stained boulder?

Dear Mom

Dear Secret Blogiary,

I had an interesting encounter while I was visiting my mother tonight. And it was bugging me something fierce...not enough to talk to her about it (because as I might have mentioned, I am really not fond of confrontation), but I was bothered enough that I wrote a letter to her, one that she will probably never read. It did accomplish its mission though, for once I wrote it, I felt better.

Dear Mom,

Just because I don’t like something you do, doesn’t mean I’m being contrary.

I don’t like the movies you do. I’m sorry. I haven’t been into mainstream Hollywood for a really long time. When? You ask. Well, around the time that Hollywood just kept recycling garbage and actors like Jim Carey and Adam Sandler became popular. Movies like Wild Hogs destroy my faith in humanity. I am tired of actors thinking that because they are famous they can behave any way they want and get away with it. They have a moral obligation to society to model exemplary behavior because so many of our youth look up to them. Therefore, I boycott a great many movies. I will not give my money to see a movie starring, produced or directed by such people.

And yes, as I have told you before, I am anti-CGI, so please stop asking me to watch Avatar or any other movie with excessive amounts of CGI. George Lucas killed it for me. Too many have misused the technology just because they could, not because it would enhance the movie. And please I won’t even discuss the rash outbreak of 3-D movies that have no right to be 3-D. And let’s clarify another point: just because I don’t like sappy WE T.V. movies does not mean I am not in touch with my emotions it just means I have no tolerance for “women are victims” movies.

Mom, don’t get mad, but I also don’t watch T.V. all that much either and certainly not ghost hunters or UFO hunters or any other paranormal show nor do I appreciate you letting Little Sis watch shows like that, especially since she then comes home and has nightmares about ghosts taking her away.

T.V. comedies are not funny to me.

Reality T.V. is anything but.

Fox News has no concept of “fair and balanced.”

Mom, please keep in mind that I don’t ever get pissy at you when I suggest a movie that you are uninterested in, or a book or a TV show for that matter. I say “okay” and move on with it. But when I say I am not interested in something you like you go out of your way to inform me that I am being contrary, difficult and elitist.

And you’re absolutely right about how I don’t like going to your house. Think about that though, I have never been to your house when the TV wasn’t on. And there isn’t really anything for me to do there. When I try to bring something to do, I get scolded for not socializing and being grumpy, but it is hard to socialize over Glenn Beck.

Here’s what I like to do: I like to read books. I like to work on craft projects with the girls. I like to play board games. I like to spend time with my girls looking at them, not at a T.V. screen. If that makes me elitist and difficult, well, I will just have to accept that label.

Think back, Mom, way back, did I ever once beg you to watch a movie with me? If I did I can’t recall it, but I can recall all the times I begged you to play a game with me or read me a story and I was put off with the claim that you were too tired. I don’t blame you for that, I know you were working, I know money was tight, but the age difference between my siblings often left me by myself so I made do.

I guess the point I am trying to make, Mom, is that I like things you don’t and you like things I don’t. And that’s okay. Just because were different does not mean I love you less or that I am deliberately trying to hurt your feelings. Please stop being so sensitive. I know that you have always yearned to have with me the type of relationship that you had with Grandmother. But you have to admit, we have never had that type of relationship. You and Grandmother were closer in age and liked the exact same things. With only 17 years separating you and your mom you were able to be friends. You could talk to Grandmother in a way that I cannot talk to you. We have over thirty years between us and I have never felt anything but a mother-daughter relationship with you.

I am just me.

You should be proud of me for my moral convictions especially since you were the one who helped  instill them. You should rejoice that I am not mindlessly brainwashed by technology or messages about women that contradict how you raised me. You should be thrilled that I demand more from my entertainment than contrived drivel. And you should be overjoyed that I don’t just believe what I see and hear on the news, that I look for my own answers. You should love that I am raising my children as you raised me: with morals, honesty, and integrity.