Something Personal
It’s been a very long time since I last wrote an entry on my blog and I’ve never written one so personal. Yet other things haven’t changed at all. I should be studying right now, but instead I do this. My HD does not suffice, I feel this one needs to be put out there. So here goes.
My parents died nine years ago. I was twenty at the time. My parents were young when they died and my mother suffered through 18 months of cancer. Life is unfair that way. I accept that. I console myself thinking that at least they were the best parents a kid could wish for. I was always loved, unconditionally and wholly, fiercly and just as much as my sister. We had everything we needed and more, including manners. We respected our parents. They sacrificed for us. Sure they were flawed too, as human beings, but as parents, they pretty much aced the thing.
Nine years have gone by. Over 3285 days so far. Not one went by that I didn’t think of them. Not every second, but every day. I am a productive, healthy human being. I love, I enjoy life, I laugh fullheartedly. We can talk about them, about them dying, about your parents and anything else, and I will be fine. Not just on the surface. I’ll actually be fine.
Then, there are days like today. Someone mentioned that someone else would be spending Christmas with their parents and grandparents. That someone is over 40 years old. That someone is not the only person I know of who still has grandparents while being over 40. Some of them get along with their families, others do not. Usually such a random sentence does not rattle my cage. Today I cannot stop the tears.
There is no rhyme or reason to it that I can see and that pisses me off even more than my parents deaths. WHY? Why the Hell am I crying, why am I jealous, why do I miss them more today than if you had told me yesterday? I just don’t understand. Sure there are some factors like my period, stress, grey skies, the approaching Horror some people call Christmas, but I have been in all of these states, even combined and not had a day like today. Why today? When will I stop being the sad girl with the dead parents? Why won’t the tears stop flowing?
I hate pity. I don’t want pity. My parents were awesome people and I am glad and lucky to have been their child. I don’t want to be sad that they’re gone. I want to rejoice in my memories. I sometimes invite them in. I think: Oh they would’ve liked that. Or: Oh, they would’ve been proud of me. And I smile and I feel warm and loved and the day is more beautiful for it. Why does that change?
Why does it feel today as if they had died yesterday? And what is more, days like this are the reason I am worried about positive life events. Because for me, they also carry the possibility of being days like today. All my life I have dreamt of my wedding day. When I would find a woman so special, so wonderful I want to spend the rest of my life with her. A woman so extraordinary she thinks of me the same way. And when that day comes, I wonder, will I be smiling or crying?
I mean obviously there will be both. But which one will dominate my day? What mood will I be in? Will I be jealous of her? What kind of a fear is that? To be worried you might be jealous of your bride on your wedding day. How fucked up is that?
Just last month a friend of mine graduated from college. Her father was there for the graduation ceremony, the mother was on vacation. (Let’s put this little cheery note aside, for a moment). I was happy for her. Through and through. Yet there was this tinsy little part of me who died of envy. Not just because it is taking me forever to graduate myself, but mostly because my father did not and will not sit in on any graduation of mine. As far as he knows, I made it all the way through high school.
He worked all his life to give his daughters a class A education, to ensure that they could choose jobs that would allow them to be self-sufficient, independent of men. So they would be free. He wanted us to be who we wanted to be and so he worked and worked and worked and then he died. He never got to see what became of his gifts to us.
He doesn’t know my sister graduated and stepped in his footsteps. That she held it together and was the heir he always dreamed of. He doesn’t know that I will spend my life trying to make people’s lives a little bit brighter. I’d like to think he would be proud of that. I’d like to think a lot of things and they are probably true, but there is no guarantee. I cannot walk up to him and ask what he thinks.
Sure others might fight with their parents. I had my fair share of fights with them too. I didn’t want to be a doctor, which didn’t go over well, I can tell you that. I never told my father I am gay, even though I knew. I was waiting for the right moment. Do I think he would’ve loved me anyway? Yes, I do. But I THINK, I do not KNOW. When you are sad because your parents are pissed at your life’s choices, at least you KNOW. And you have time to talk it over with them. As long as you can talk everything is possible.
Once the talking stops. Everything stops.
Except tears. Today.
My parents died nine years ago. I was twenty at the time. My parents were young when they died and my mother suffered through 18 months of cancer. Life is unfair that way. I accept that. I console myself thinking that at least they were the best parents a kid could wish for. I was always loved, unconditionally and wholly, fiercly and just as much as my sister. We had everything we needed and more, including manners. We respected our parents. They sacrificed for us. Sure they were flawed too, as human beings, but as parents, they pretty much aced the thing.
Nine years have gone by. Over 3285 days so far. Not one went by that I didn’t think of them. Not every second, but every day. I am a productive, healthy human being. I love, I enjoy life, I laugh fullheartedly. We can talk about them, about them dying, about your parents and anything else, and I will be fine. Not just on the surface. I’ll actually be fine.
Then, there are days like today. Someone mentioned that someone else would be spending Christmas with their parents and grandparents. That someone is over 40 years old. That someone is not the only person I know of who still has grandparents while being over 40. Some of them get along with their families, others do not. Usually such a random sentence does not rattle my cage. Today I cannot stop the tears.
There is no rhyme or reason to it that I can see and that pisses me off even more than my parents deaths. WHY? Why the Hell am I crying, why am I jealous, why do I miss them more today than if you had told me yesterday? I just don’t understand. Sure there are some factors like my period, stress, grey skies, the approaching Horror some people call Christmas, but I have been in all of these states, even combined and not had a day like today. Why today? When will I stop being the sad girl with the dead parents? Why won’t the tears stop flowing?
I hate pity. I don’t want pity. My parents were awesome people and I am glad and lucky to have been their child. I don’t want to be sad that they’re gone. I want to rejoice in my memories. I sometimes invite them in. I think: Oh they would’ve liked that. Or: Oh, they would’ve been proud of me. And I smile and I feel warm and loved and the day is more beautiful for it. Why does that change?
Why does it feel today as if they had died yesterday? And what is more, days like this are the reason I am worried about positive life events. Because for me, they also carry the possibility of being days like today. All my life I have dreamt of my wedding day. When I would find a woman so special, so wonderful I want to spend the rest of my life with her. A woman so extraordinary she thinks of me the same way. And when that day comes, I wonder, will I be smiling or crying?
I mean obviously there will be both. But which one will dominate my day? What mood will I be in? Will I be jealous of her? What kind of a fear is that? To be worried you might be jealous of your bride on your wedding day. How fucked up is that?
Just last month a friend of mine graduated from college. Her father was there for the graduation ceremony, the mother was on vacation. (Let’s put this little cheery note aside, for a moment). I was happy for her. Through and through. Yet there was this tinsy little part of me who died of envy. Not just because it is taking me forever to graduate myself, but mostly because my father did not and will not sit in on any graduation of mine. As far as he knows, I made it all the way through high school.
He worked all his life to give his daughters a class A education, to ensure that they could choose jobs that would allow them to be self-sufficient, independent of men. So they would be free. He wanted us to be who we wanted to be and so he worked and worked and worked and then he died. He never got to see what became of his gifts to us.
He doesn’t know my sister graduated and stepped in his footsteps. That she held it together and was the heir he always dreamed of. He doesn’t know that I will spend my life trying to make people’s lives a little bit brighter. I’d like to think he would be proud of that. I’d like to think a lot of things and they are probably true, but there is no guarantee. I cannot walk up to him and ask what he thinks.
Sure others might fight with their parents. I had my fair share of fights with them too. I didn’t want to be a doctor, which didn’t go over well, I can tell you that. I never told my father I am gay, even though I knew. I was waiting for the right moment. Do I think he would’ve loved me anyway? Yes, I do. But I THINK, I do not KNOW. When you are sad because your parents are pissed at your life’s choices, at least you KNOW. And you have time to talk it over with them. As long as you can talk everything is possible.
Once the talking stops. Everything stops.
Except tears. Today.