Get off, get off, get off! Some things stick to me worse than super-strength super glue. I need to vent. This won't be pretty.
We were on the phone a little while ago talking to my parents about our plans to travel back east this March. We were working around two things: the university's spring break and my best friend's wedding. We proposed the dates to my parents and they were elated at the amount of time we would be spending there (hey - with the price of flying being enough to buy a decent second-hand car, one might as well take advantage of a flight, right?)
My husband continued to inform my parents about our logic and the dates we were working around and why. Only this is where the "stuff on my chest" originated. Upon hearing my long-time friend was getting married, my father, who is a professional photographer, immediately had a thing or two to say... or should I say, inquire.
HIM: "So-and-so's getting married?" "Does she have a photographer?"
ME: "I don't know; I never asked."
HIM: "Oh, do you think it was a budget thing? Because I can work around that."
ME: "I really don't know."
HIM: "So where is she having it?"
ME: "A place called Candlewood."
HIM: "Candlewood Inn?"
ME: "I don't know ... Candlewood is all I remember right now. I'd have to check."
HIM: (With some strange attitude) "Well, it's definitely not a budget issue, because if it is Candlewood Inn that place is very expensive."
ME: (Losing my patience) "I really don't know."
I just wanted him to stop. It's like he 1) took it personally that my friend didn't get ask him to be their photographer and 2) he was disappointed in me. I'm not a recruiter for crying out loud. God forbid a friend of mine who gets married doesn't have him as their wedding photographer. I mean, by all means, he is an amazing photographer, but I just don't butt in: that is none of my business and not up to me. He infuriates me. No "Ooo, she's getting married? Tell her congratulations!" Nope, he just wanted to know straight away why, oh why on earth, he wasn't the photographer for her wedding. It sickens me. I seriously feel sick.
I have another friend getting married this upcoming October, and I never asked "Who is going to be your photographer". It's just not right. But when she asked if my dad would do her wedding, I gave her his contact info. It is completely none of my business otherwise and is completely up to the person.
I just cannot get over my father. You have no idea how much this has upset me. And you know what? If I ever told him how this bothered me he would think - no - KNOW he didn't do anything wrong and look at me like I was the one with the problem AND hold a grudge against me for saying/feeling/thinking such a thing.
I'm on a tangent and I'm not about to stop...
Critical. Unforgiving. I can't bare it. Every wrong-doing ever noted: guilt that plagues me even with my desperate attempts to right the perceived wrongs. Every friend ever disapproved of: discarded for acceptance. Everything considered inadequate or not good enough: sacrificed. Afterall, their most powerful tool: we let you live here for free AND we pay your college tuition. I felt that I had to comply. But trying to please my parents is like trying to nail jelly to a tree.
Now, I know people who also strive to please their parents. I have one friend who is living at home until married, because this is what is respectful. And there is nothing wrong with this, I was like this and probably still am despite my infuriation at the moment. But I reached a point a year or so ago where I realized that I'd just been suckered into sacrificing so much damn shit to appease my parents. And I gave up. I have lost opportunities, pieces of my identity, friends, and could have lost my life once when falling asleep at the wheel ... all to make them happy. And you know what? They never were happy even when I did everything they wanted. I've reached the conclusion, that no matter what, there will always be something "not right"...
4 comments:
Parents aren't infallible. They raise us by teaching us to believe in that. They teach us to believe in what is nothing but a big fat lie. I don't know what difference would make but I'd love to see parents who could show their kids that there are human figures behind their parental masks!
laila, so true. I remember the day I realized that. it was a shock, yet it made perfect sense.
perhaps I should stay away from this blog when I am so infuriated. I thought writing would be a good release and, while it was, in the end a brisk walk helped more than anything...
my parents are good people. I trust all of you who have parents understand that this is only part of the spectrum of our parent-child relationship. I could equally "bash" them with fondness...
Sarah if you vent we will read it, not to judge you but to empathize with you. We, all of us, feel this same way about something in our lives, that's what makes writing an art form; the sharing of feelings. Like John Lennon said,
“My role in society, or any artist's or poet's role, is to try and express what we all feel. Not to tell people how to feel. Not as a preacher, not as a leader, but as a reflection of us all."
Big old scrunchy hugs, Lori
What can I say that the above lovely ladies haven't already said?
Yes, we love our parents. Yes, they are human. Sometimes, though...
My husband's cousin is an Olympic athlete. She's a friend. She's super famous in our hometown. I have hosted parties at my parents' house around the holidays, and she has attended. My folks had a way of convincing themselves she was there for them. I didn't give it much thought because my goal was to have everyone under the same roof. My parents have a tendency to make me invisible, however. Take me out of the equation if things I planned go really well. (another time)
So, pre-major athletic event, my Mom asked me for the cousin's address.
I was asked not to give it out.
I asked my Mom what she intended on doing with it.
She said her teacher friends wanted it so that they could have their students send good luck mail. Not just friends from HER school...the entire sorority was gonna end up with this address.
Once it was out there, it was out there. This was not a good idea.
I was put in that rocky hard place.
Turns out, she'd already told everyone, "Oh, sure, I can get the address, no problem. She's been to our house several (3) times."
I said, "Sorry. No. She asked me not to give it to anyone."
She hung up on me. All she could think of was how embarassing it was going to be telling her friends that I wouldn't give it to her. She thought I was power tripping.
I would have given it to her, but I knew she'd hand it out like social currency.
"Can't you just collect all of the mail and send it off yourself?"
Apparently not. It was about being the one who knew the celebrity.
My point? I don't think I'd EVER put my kids into that situation. But my parents are always right, and if that ends up pissing someone else off...end result, their daughter losing a friend...so be it. Their perceptions are the only perceptions.
They are absolutely baffled when I don't do what I'm told...because they never look at the other view, and so what's to discuss? What opposition could there possibly be?
There's human, and then there's self involved to an extreme.
Maybe when my kids are bigger...after the years of diapers and grey hairs and self sacrifice, I'll start thinking, "G-D it! These kids OWE me."
But I hope not.
I totally understand how you feel. :)
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