Voicelessness and Emotional Survival Message Board
Voicelessness and Emotional Survival => Voicelessness and Emotional Survival Message Board => Topic started by: October on July 01, 2005, 05:11:03 PM
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In a moment of idleness I was reading threads from when I first came here, two years ago. One of them mentioned fantasy, and I thought I would write down my family's version of who we are.
The heart of my family is my mother, who is a very loving, kindly woman, who would do anything for anyone and who has a very soft heart. She cannot bear to see anyone in distress, and is always there with a kind word of advice. She is a little 'highly strung' but that is only to be expected. She loves us all very much, and would do anything for any one of us. She trained as a nurse, and her knowledge of medicine is still extensive, and covers every area you care to mention. My mother lives for her grandchildren, and devotes every moment of her life to caring about them and for them, and taking an interest in their lives.
Second is my very hardworking dad. Retired now, but for all his life he worked immensely hard to support the family, and to make sure that I and my two brothers wanted for nothing. Dad's family prides itself on not having to say soppy stuff, because that is not what matters. Dad says that those who say it don't mean it; only those who don't say it are authentic in their feelings.
My brothers and I only have to hope to emulate these devoted parents, and follow their example in every way.
My grandparents were without exception saintly people, and an example to us all. The maternal grandparents were rather strange, but now they are dead we are too polite to mention that.
The paternal ones were perfect in every way. They taught us the family code of supporting one another, showing a united front to the world, of being strong enough for anything, and never feeling pain. Or anything else much. They taught us how to survive.
And then we all lived happily ever after.
:lol: :lol: :lol:
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...and then you had to wake up. What a stinker that was. :shock: :(
I have to say, what a lovely family you have. Where can I get one for myself? :lol: :lol: :D
Butterfly
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I have to say, what a lovely family you have. Where can I get one for myself? :lol: :lol: :D
Butterfly
Well, I am rather proud of them, I must say. Salt of the earth. :lol: It is fun writing down the unwritten myths.
Meanwhile, just found this song, which I think is very me:
http://www.7secondsoflove.com/winners/
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If we're talking fantasy families, yours is a bit over the top for my tastes! Mine would be less Brady Bunch, more "Roseanne". No offence October!
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If we're talking fantasy families, yours is a bit over the top for my tastes! Mine would be less Brady Bunch, more "Roseanne". No offence October!
Lol!! This is not my own fantasy. It is my family's idea of who 'we' are. Sorry I didn't explain that well enough.
This is the family myth; the story I was sold. The play I step into every time I go home, or to visit my brother and his family. The place I stand and look around and think, can nobody else see that this is not real? That this house is built of paper, and with foundations of sand?
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October,
Our mothers must have been sisters, because I was always told the same story. :shock: Imagine my confusion when I finally saw the reality of the situation.
Sadly, I'm still hoping I can create the dream family I never had before I die. I'm not sure my chances are all that great.
Brigid
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Lol!! This is not my own fantasy. It is my family's idea of who 'we' are. Sorry I didn't explain that well enough.
You did, actually, I am just thick.
Ours was this: divorced self-sacrificing mom devoted to kids. Loves them both equally. They can do anything they devote their minds to but one is lazy. Mother never badmouths dad and loves both kids equally. Would do anything for them (and has). Works fingers to the bone to ensure they have everything.
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Lol!! This is not my own fantasy. It is my family's idea of who 'we' are. Sorry I didn't explain that well enough.
You did, actually, I am just thick.
Ours was this: divorced self-sacrificing mom devoted to kids. Loves them both equally. They can do anything they devote their minds to but one is lazy. Mother never badmouths dad and loves both kids equally. Would do anything for them (and has). Works fingers to the bone to ensure they have everything.
Are we sisters?
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Are we sisters?
Sis! How are ya! I wonder how many other siblings we have out there?
This board is kind if a reunion, isn't it? Scary how many similarities there are. Tolstoy didn't know what he was talking about - not all unhappy families are unhappy in their own way (to mis-quote horribly).
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Ours was this: divorced self-sacrificing mom devoted to kids. Loves them both equally. They can do anything they devote their minds to but one is lazy. Mother never badmouths dad and loves both kids equally. Would do anything for them (and has). Works fingers to the bone to ensure they have everything.
<Sigh> If only that were true for you, Plucky. Sharing your grief at what never was. :(
I am certain that it is the tension between this fairy story world we are meant to believe and the reality we face which causes us to lose our way. One of my earliest posts says something like those who can see the reality cannot speak. Only those who can deny the reality and believe the fantasy have a voice, and the voices tell lies.
To expand this further, if the voices which speak tell lies, and subvert every word, every nuance, to their lies, how can the voices which do not speak find a language of their own? This is the problem. Not that we cannot speak, but that we have no language which does not lie.
Hence we become Cassandra. Doomed to speak the truth, and to prophecy the future, but never ever to be believed. And that way madness lies.
Btw, you are not thick. :lol: Communication is as much the responsibility of the sender as of the receiver. If you don't 'get' what I say, it is not your fault; it is shared. But neither you nor I are thick; just struggling to use (tainted) words to express pain.
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October,
Our mothers must have been sisters, because I was always told the same story. :shock: Imagine my confusion when I finally saw the reality of the situation.
Sadly, I'm still hoping I can create the dream family I never had before I die. I'm not sure my chances are all that great.
Brigid
Your chances are a thousand times greater than if you didn't know the difference between an ok family and a not ok family. :)
I am interested in the way you say 'finally'. I am not sure this is a finally kind of thing. I think there is always an element of dissonance, even in the baby and the child, an awareness that something does not fit, even if full realisation takes many years to accomplish. Does this make any sense to you? It is very difficult to be sure, looking back, because there were years when I do seem to have believed everything, and thought that the above description fitted my reality, but when in spite of that belief I was not happy, the only answer was to blame myself for that. I would like to know what others think of this.
I think our siblings had the same dissonance, but for some reason they chose to go the easy way; the broad path that leads to destruction, rather than the much more difficult road of finding what is real.
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October,
I think there is always an element of dissonance, even in the baby and the child, an awareness that something does not fit, even if full realisation takes many years to accomplish. Does this make any sense to you?
Yes, it makes perfect sense. I always knew I was searching for something more, but I really did not start seeing how dysfunctional my family situation was until I became a parent myself. Over time, I realized that I was so much more in love and interested in my children than my parents had ever been with me. I didn't criticize my kids or belittle them, nor did I ever want to. I was so proud of all their big and little accomplishments and my life revolved around them.
It was when my parents started saying that my children were spoiled brats (absolutely untrue) and that I gave them too much attention, etc., etc. that I walked away and didn't go back. That was the one thing they were never going to get away with criticizing me for because I KNEW I was doing a good job and my kids were great.
My only sibling--a brother, 10 years younger--has no friends and has only had one relationship with a girl, 24 years ago that lasted maybe 6 months. His response was just to check out of developing relationships and being around other people except when he has to. We might as well have been born on different planets, as we could not be more different from each other.
Brigid
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To expand this further, if the voices which speak tell lies, and subvert every word, every nuance, to their lies, how can the voices which do not speak find a language of their own? This is the problem. Not that we cannot speak, but that we have no language which does not lie.
October, this is so powerful it made me literally gasp when I read it.
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I really did not start seeing how dysfunctional my family situation was until I became a parent myself. Over time, I realized that I was so much more in love and interested in my children than my parents had ever been with me. I didn't criticize my kids or belittle them, nor did I ever want to. I was so proud of all their big and little accomplishments and my life revolved around them.
It was when my parents started saying that my children were spoiled brats (absolutely untrue) and that I gave them too much attention, etc., etc. that I walked away and didn't go back. That was the one thing they were never going to get away with criticizing me for because I KNEW I was doing a good job and my kids were great.
Yes! This is the experience I had. My children are showing me the way I ought to have been parented. I now have a chance to correct my childhood by making theirs what it should be.
This board is so full of important insights. Thank you Brigid!
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October, this is so powerful it made me literally gasp when I read it.
Thanks Longtire. I am learning along with you, and maybe gasping at the same time too. It fits with my idea of English as my second language (which it isn't), because somehow my first language was a truthful one, and I have lost it.
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I really did not start seeing how dysfunctional my family situation was until I became a parent myself.
Yes! This is the experience I had. My children are showing me the way I ought to have been parented. I now have a chance to correct my childhood by making theirs what it should be.
Absolutely right. Amen to both. In protecting our children, we find our own healing.
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there were years when I do seem to have believed everything, and thought that the above description fitted my reality, but when in spite of that belief I was not happy, the only answer was to blame myself for that. I would like to know what others think of this.
Maybe you weren't the only one blaming you. In many families there is a scapegoat who is said to be the problem person, where all the problems are focused and blamed. Were you that person? That might account for your path being different from that of your siblings.
In my family it wasn't me, but I tread that mill to avoid becoming the one!
Or are you saying that you blamed yourself for not having the proper emotions, given that the situation was *so* ideal?
A somehow logged off
Plucky
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In many families there is a scapegoat who is said to be the problem person, where all the problems are focused and blamed. Were you that person?
I think this is more true of my older brother. He was always expected to be far older and more responsible than he could ever cope with.
Same for his oldest boy. Only a child, but blamed like an adult for his parents' anger and unhappiness.
I was mostly invisible, but at one point I was given the accolade of 'bad influence' over my younger brother. :lol: This was because when he was considering taking a year out before University, I listened to him and respected his opinions, and gave him some suggestions of where to go for further information.
In the end he decided not to do it, on his own. When my parents (and older brother) found out they were furious that he did not consult them and let them make the decision, and they were also furious that I did not tell them his personal business. My dad did not and would not understand the difference between taking a year out and dropping out. :?
I used to give my younger brother pocket money out of my student grant, because my parents did not believe in pocket money, and I did not believe in teenagers with no money whatever of their own. I used to be there for him, more than ever our mum and dad were. I knew when he was being bullied at school, and tried to help him sort it out. I took him to the barber when my mum didn't give a damn about his hair being too long. I told him about Santa when he got too old (11) not to know any more, and risked real humiliation at school. (I got into trouble for that too; they wanted him to stay a baby forever.)
If this is being a 'bad influence' I am not sure what language is left for a sister who actually leads her brother astray, such as into drugs or smoking or whatever. :?
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SOrry, I am just catching up with this thread. October, I loved the reference to Cssandra. I will have to look that up. It so seemed like my early adult years and even now.
I think the difficulty of the fantasy for me is sometimes it was the fantasy or at least appeared that way to the outside world. Naturally I doubted my own feelings and voice. The latest journey has helped so much getting me centered and regaining my voice. Sometimes I even see subtle changes in the family.
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The problem for me is that my family are all dead (or seem so because there is no contact) and so I have to form the fantasy from memories that seem far away and even unreal sometimes.
I do remember something that was a clue as to how one person from the outside world saw our family, which happened one time.
I was trimming the hedge that ran along the front and side of my parents home (which was a corner house and I was on the outside of the hedge, on the side walk, near the back of the property) and suddenly a boy about my age (maybe 12?? 13??) flew threw the hedge (so he must have run across the lawn, cutting the corner, rather than walking around the outside of the hedge on the sidewalk). He startled me, as he landed about 4 feet away from me.
I had put the hedge trimmer down, had raked the trimmings, put the rake down and was about to start loading the trimmings into a basket, that was sitting on the lawn, so I supposed, he didn't notice and just thought I was walking along the side walk toward him, when he said:
"You should see the crazy people who live in that house!!"
Me: "Really? What do you mean?"
Boy: "Oh.....they're all batty. Especially the father! He's a real cook!!"
Me: "Is that so? How do you know that?"
Boy: "Oh..... I see him all the time and he's really a looney. His garage is full of rocks, you know, and he tries to get people to look at them, so he can talk and talk. And he drives a beat up old car and drinks whiskey, from a flask. Yells and swears a lot!! And the son.....you should see him! He's a nutty as a fruit cake!"
Me: "Oh.....tell me more?"
Boy: "Well.......he's in his 20's and he rides and old bike and smokes a pipe and wears weird hats, has a gotee and brings his getto blaster with him, playing blues and jazz and strange music like that, while he rides around. Doesn't work. Always going to the pool hall. He's crazy alright!"
Me: "Oh really?"
Boy: "Ya. Where do you live? Around here? Have you seen them?"
Me: Embarassed :oops: :oops: "Oh....not too far from here. I better go".
So I guess...... I must have been fairly invisible back then....at least to that boy....but the "crazy people who live in that house" weren't.
That was the strangest thing. Talking to that boy and pretending not to know about that house or who lived in it. I never saw him again and was worried, after that, that I might. :oops: :oops:
I think IIIIIIIII had the fantasy that they were able to hide the craziness behind closed doors until that day. I think that boy helped me realize that other people could see a bit of it. So I guess, he did me a favour. Made me feel kind of.....validated....in a very odd way.
Those crazy people who lived in that house. :shock: And he also made me feel connected. :? I was one of them. :shock: One of those crazy people who lived in that house. :shock: Except.....unseen. :( Or was I crazy? He made me think about that. I think it was a good thing maybe. I decided I wasn't crazy after thinking about it awhile. :D
Sorry for the highjack. This just came to my mind when I read this thread. All the weird feelings I had when he was describing his view.
GFN
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GFN, I don't know how to tell you this, but from your description of that boy's description of your family [whew!]
it sounds to me as though your dad was either a geologist or a paleontologist, and your brother would have made one heckuva jazz/blues DJ if he'd found his way to, say, Toronto or Chicago. The alcohol is sad, the unemployment of your brother is sad, but the rest of it sounds... creative ... as though, even though the emotions didn't work, there were working minds available for them to be attached to ...
but then again, I'm one of those oddballs myself, except with a job and without the booze, so I'm sure that I am seeing this story through the filter of my own ostracism-for-being-"different".
Interesting.
Shyte, now we really have hijacked this thread. SORRY October!!! :oops: :oops: :oops: :oops:
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I loved the reference to Cassandra. I will have to look that up. It so seemed like my early adult years and even now.
...
One link, chosen pretty well at random:
http://homepage.mac.com/cparada/GML/Cassandra.html
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GFN, I don't know how to tell you this, but from your description of that boy's description of your family [whew!]
it sounds to me as though your dad was either a geologist or a paleontologist, and your brother would have made one heckuva jazz/blues DJ if he'd found his way to, say, Toronto or Chicago. The alcohol is sad, the unemployment of your brother is sad, but the rest of it sounds... creative ... as though, even though the emotions didn't work, there were working minds available for them to be attached to ...
but then again, I'm one of those oddballs myself, except with a job and without the booze, so I'm sure that I am seeing this story through the filter of my own ostracism-for-being-"different".
Interesting. And I'm not criticising you... because I know full well that the alcohol, and the not working, and the messed up emotions were the important bit. Those things render anything else moot.
Shyte, now we really have hijacked this thread. SORRY October!!! :oops: :oops: :oops: :oops:
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now we really have hijacked this thread.
Not at all. It is all very relevant. Carry on. :) Only Ns want the floor all to themselves, and the limelight only in their direction. I am happy to share.
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Hey October. Sorry. I was trying to edit my first post and I must have accidentally clicked on the quote button by mistake. Poo.
Glad you see it as relevant... and oh well. Not everyone gets a chance to exhibit both their first and second thoughts.
((((((((((October + C)))))))))) ((((((((((GFN))))))))))
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Hi all:
Thanks for not minding sharing October. Even though it's probably something not needing a thanks for....it's just a quality but thanks anyway.
:D
Hey Stormy:
GFN, I don't know how to tell you this,
Ohhhhhhh just go ahead and tell me then!! :D
but from your description of that boy's description of your family [whew!]
it sounds to me as though your dad was either a geologist or a paleontologist,
Beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep! Nope. He wasn't interested in anyone else's life, prehistoric or not, but his own (but he did like animals).
And I don't think he knew what geology was but maybe I'm wrong. :?
He was neither. Not only that, he wore a 3 piece suit out there, in the garage and everywhere else, even when he was cutting the grass, in 80 degree weather, and he wasn't a business man either. Nope. Ever see a guy wearing a 3 piece suit sitting in an aluminum boat, fishing. If so, that was probably my dad. He was just strange. No other word for it.
and your brother would have made one heckuva jazz/blues DJ if he'd found his way to, say, Toronto or Chicago.
Maybe in any other age but not when rock 'n roll was so innn and so coool man! 8) Naw...he was just eccentric and brain damaged (but.....that's another story).
The alcohol is sad, the unemployment of your brother is sad, but the rest of it sounds... creative ... as though, even though the emotions didn't work, there were working minds available for them to be attached to ...
Ya know Stormy, I gotta hand it to ya, who else would find something so positive to say about such a loonie bunch? Truly......you do see the good stuff! Creative! My mother would kill herself laughing if she heard you say that!! Me too!! Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha....wait a minute......you're right!! :shock: I guess he was pretty darn creative and so was my brother! Cooky but creatively cooky. So that's where I got that!!! :D
Mind you, everyone else in the suburbs were "normal' looking, driving "normal" looking cars, doing "normal" looking hobbies (like model building or gardening or even watching football games on TV but not my dad! Oh no. He was collecting rocks. I'm talking thousands of pounds of very plain looking rocks. There were shelves all along both sides of the garage, across the back, up to the roof, that were lined with these piles and piles of rocks. His hobby was: prospecting......and he was searching for gold!!! :arrow: :arrow: :arrow: :arrow:
(Now if he had of been born back in the Klondike days I could see it.....but then...at that time.......when people were watching "Happy Days" and "Leave it to Beaver"......our garage was piling higher and higher and higher with rocks. It was so full, you couldn't get a car in there if your life depended on it. Other people had lawn mowers and garden tools and bicycles in their garages. We didn't. Just rocks. Lot's and lot's of them. It is funny to think of now. Back then, it was just embarassing. :oops: :oops:
Yes....I guess it was creative though. Not a get rich sceme I'm afraid. He never did find gold. Imagine him trapsing around in the bush, with a pick and a 3 piece suit, swigging from his flask, searching for those rocks!! :roll: Very creative indeed. What a brain!! How much thought did that take??? Not a good brain, I think. Or he would have found some of that precious metal he was looking for. He had it....right under his thumb too.....but he didn't see it. :( :(
Thanks for the hug Stormy. I think I needed that. :roll:
GFN
PS: But.....
but then again, I'm one of those oddballs myself, except with a job and without the booze, so I'm sure that I am seeing this story through the filter of my own ostracism-for-being-"different".
I think it's ok to be odd. That part of him was ok (being odd I mean). But the yelling and the swearing and stopping people on the street and dragging them in to one's garage to show them rocks and yak and yak and the other stuff he did......behind closed doors. That was more than odd. It was crazy and it was evil. :evil:
It just didn't show from the outside.....to the outside world....to boys who walked by that house.