It's hard to talk about family stuff, especially on the big wide Internet. I know that once you leave something here, it's done, and it's out "there" forever. At this point, I honestly don't care, and feel like writing it out will help my brain and my heart, all twisted together, immensely.
For the most part, our family gets together very well. We really do. Right now I am annoyed with brother, mostly because I think he's thoughtless, and he made the past two days a thousand times more difficult than they should have been. He has no idea how hard it is to keep a two-year-old entertained on the fly. Still, I love him, and realize that he just doesn't get it. We don't fight, not really, and sometimes I think it's because we don't know how. My relationship with my parents is sincerely good, and I talk to my mother nearly every day - probably six out of seven. We try to be honest with each other, at least Mom and Dad and I do, and we don't keep secrets. The thing we're most honest about is how difficult it is to deal with my grandpa.
Growing up, I adored my Grandpa. He is my father's dad, and going "home" meant time riding on four wheelers with dogs, rounding up cows, checking on the endless details a farm involves...and I pretty much followed Grandpa around as much as I was allowed. I loved it.
Fishing. Picking locust shells off the tree trunks, my most favorite thing to do as a three year old. Sitting in the back of the truck, waiting on whatever Grandpa had to do, talking and singing to the cows. Watching him worm the cows was another favorite thing, so much so that he would wait until I was visiting so I could witness the process. (It sounds gross, but the exciting part was getting the cows into the shoot, a big clampy thing, and then it just a matter of squirting the medicine down the cow's throat.) Sitting down by the pond and watching for water moccasins, which he would shoot with his gun. Riding the four wheeler through the woods, checking on the trees and the land. When I was two and three, Mom and I lived down the road from my grandparents, while my dad was stationed in Korea. Notoriously tenderheaded to this day, I would only allow my Grandpa to brush my hair. He swabbed all my bobos with 'red medicine' (mercurochome). I have endless good memories of those days, and feel blessed that I had such sweet days as a kid.
Still, there were moments. The summer that Christopher and I stayed with my grandparents for a whole month, there was the watermelon incident. All I know is that I didn't like watermelon, and yet every single day, my Grandpa made me eat watermelon. For years afterward I refused to eat it, just because I'd been forced to eat watermelon that summer.
We moved back to Mississippi in time for me to start my freshman year of high school. There was one week or so when Christopher and I stayed with Grandma and Grandpa, I think Mom had gone back to North Carolina to help Daddy move some of our stuff. At this point, I had a boyfriend, and I was a typical teenager - I loved to talk on the phone with my boyfriend. I had the radio going in my room, playing music, and I probably didn't come when I was called, or ignored my Grandma when she asked me to help. I still couldn't tell you what happened, but all I know is that my Grandpa cornered me and gave me a piece of his mind. I have no idea what he said, but it was tremendously hurtful. Nothing was ever the same between us after that. I was so hurt and heartbroken and geniuinely confused as to why he was so angry.
And this is the thing: whatever he says, it sounds so benign when I set it on paper. He has never cursed at me, or hit me, or anything like that. It's just this dreadful meanness and hatefulness that I can't understand. It's one thing when someone says to you that you don't want to hear, but they say it with love. I can handle that, even I with my major defensive issues. But I can't handle cold hatefulness.
My dad and Grandpa have always had their issues. To this day, Grandpa treats him like a child. And over the years, if he could speak to me alone, he would say something mean and hurtful. He would never say anything to me in front of Beaux, or my parents, or certainly not Grandma. He's sneaky. I'll go to hug him, and he'll get in some aside. He thinks that I am useless, romantic, that I have my head in the clouds. He loves to make remarks on how I should be a good wife, take care of my husband. If I ever come for a visit without Beaux, he always wants to know what is Beaux going to do, having to fend for himself. Those sort of things I can laugh off, and chalk up to a different generation.
At one point, he called me to say that he and Grandma were so hurt that they'd never been invited to my home. (This was before Thomas.) First of all, if you're family, just get over it. There is no formal invitation, come when you want. It just didn't occur to me that they would want to come. Also, hospitality is not my gift, and I am just now getting to the point where I like having people in my living space. So, we ended up having his family birthday celebration at our place, and made fried chicken. I think we all had to sit on couches because all of our chairs were dicey antiques and had a bad habit of breaking unexpectedly. Still, all this time I have tried to still honor him, because he's my only grandfather, because of all the good memories I have of him.
It sometime around this time, though, that I told him to stop calling me, that I knew what he was up to. I called him out on it, for waiting until Grandma wasn't around - he liked to call me from her cell phone while she was in doctor's appointments. I told him he was being ugly and if called again, I would hang up or hand the phone to my husband. He respects my husband, so he stopped doing that.
The odd thing is, he's generous. He prides himself on "being good" to his family, like his father was to his mother. But taking his gifts comes with a price. I have no doubt that I could ask them tomorrow for money for a down payment for a house, and they would write me a check. (Except that Grandpa would insist on going to the bank and depositing it himself.) Obviously, I have not wanted to be obligated to them for anything like that.
Things have gotten worse as he grows older, especially with his macular degeneration. We all understand how frightening it must be to lose his sight. He's had diabetes for years, and is now so very thin. My dad is fairly sure he's now suffering from dementia. My grandfather's dad had dementia and it changed him in all sorts of ways. He was very mean, as well, and especially hurtful to my grandma. Yet, I know this doesn't all have to do with bad health, since the meanness started years ago, and he's always been a controlling, selfish person.
Still, this past year has been the worst so far. There was one time I was home with Thomas, and Grandpa was truly ugly to him. He treated him like a dog, and slapped his hand when Thomas didn't do something to his liking. I was so angry. I was so mad at myself, most of all, for thinking I could trust him to be kind to his own great-grandchild. That day, I made my anger known, and refused to go back down to their house for supper. The hard part is that I can't be with my Grandma, because Grandpa is always there. I love to talk with her, and help her in the kitchen, but I simply cannot take Thomas to their house without my mom or some other adult to keep an eye on Thomas. It doesn't help that their house is a childproofing nightmare. Grandma knows how hard it is for me to be around Grandpa, and Lord knows it's difficult for her...she is stuck with his demands everyday.
He was rude to me during the rehearsal dinner at Christopher's wedding, and asked me when I was going to teach my son "children should be seen and not heard." Infuriating. I would like to meet the person who COULD make a two-year-old be seen and not heard on command. And then, the cherry on top of all this: yesterday, as I was driving up to Hattiesburg for my mom's surgery, I called my grandparents. I just wanted to let them know I'd see them later in the day, since I knew we were all coming back for a family birthday supper. Grandpa answered the phone, and when I said that I'd be back later for supper, he said, "Well, there you go, depending on Grandma to do everything for you." I told him that I would be glad to come help her, if she needed help. The day was just wonky and I didn't end up coming back in time to help. And still - I couldn't go there, just me and Thomas. There was no way in hell I would ever, ever leave Thomas alone with him. Last night, as I was leaving, he loaded me up with a huge bag of satsumas. He even tried to give me a ham, and I told him, no, just bring it next week when you come for Thanksgiving. Everyone else had gone ahead to Mom and Dad's, and I was walking to my car, he said, "You're a fine dandy, running over all the place when you should be helping your mama."
That was it. I was so angry, and I am still angry. Mostly because he has no idea. He has no clue that of course I have offered to help, and am on standby to relieve my dad at any point. It's hurtful because it's not true. It's hurtful because he just seems to hate me, and I can't figure out why. I think it's because I'm all grown up, and I don't worship him any more. I am beyond his control. Last night I told my brother and new sister-in-law - "Y'all enjoy him, because I'm through with him. I don't care if the next time I see him is at his funeral." I wish I had the guts to uninvite him to Thanksgiving, even. But I am through being nice, and respectful, and that may be the last time I speak to him. I came home last night, and sobbed on the couch with Beaux. It's a horrible, awful thing to wish that you could simply be done with a family member. I wish it wasn't this way. I just don't know what to do anymore, but I am done. So very done with all his bullshit.
