My stepmom's family took one look at me, spit in my face, accused me of committing a bunch of crimes, and threw me out.
Other than my mom and her sister and parents, that whole side of the family pretty much spit me out by the time I started school.
The funny thing is, most of them are on the spectrum somewhere, and hide it very carefully with much zeal and shame. My grandpa's sister had one profoundly autistic son; he spent over 30 years locked in a bedroom until one of his brothers "rescued" him. Nice family. We haven't had much to do with any of them since Grandpa died-- they were cruel to him because he stuttered, and foul to Grandma because she's Italian.
My dad's sister and brother-in-law and their kids USED TO make the butt of every joke, and tell me I was too stupid to teach anything to (and then tell me I was useless because I didn't know what they wouldn't teach).
Then I grew up, moved to town, and had a kid. They started being nicer.
THEN I moved away and had a whole bunch of kids. Now it's like they've forgotten the old days. All we talk about (and we talk OFTEN) are fond reminiscences and how we were always very close.
I don't get it. I really don't. I'll take it (though I don't expect it to last if I ever move home), but I really don't understand it.
I guess nobody's perfect??
I have been really, really lucky in family, by and large.
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"Alas, our dried voices when we whisper together are quiet and meaningless, as wind in dry grass, or rats' feet over broken glass in our dry cellar." --TS Eliot, "The Hollow Men"
30 Jul 2014, 12:07 pm
