Samedi in Mental Masturbation in Montréal: Confessions from the Boulevard

So. Peter's dad won the Parental Death Pool. (I was kinda hoping it would be my "mom" but... whaddayagonnado?) He died on Wednesday or Thursday (not sure) and Peter is doing okay. Like, for real. He's mostly taken it in stride with something akin to actual maturity as opposed to his usual everything-is-fine-couldn't-be-happier-leprechaun-jig-of-alcoholic-denial. It's weird. Seems I'm not the only one who's been doing some changing and growing. Huh. Plus, ol' Sammy (Peter's dad) had been sick for years... like, walking-corpse skin'n'bones sick. Plus, blind and diabetic and... thanks, modern medicine! Thanks for all that prolonged unnecessary suffering brought to you by the letters B-I-G P-H-A-R-M-A. Seriously, we are NOT meant to live this long, in my opinion. I have zero interest in years and YEARS of being pretty much disabled and frail and thought to be feeble-minded and treated like a child and relegated to sitting around, in diapers, waiting for death. No, no, no... no THANK YOU.

Anygay... Sam was a drunk for the most part. An emotionally unavailable, abruptly dismissive chap with all the warmth and charm of a rabid porcupine. This is not news. That's just who he was. Hugging him was painful... never mind 26 years of trying to make small-talk with this guy. I dunno. I was more upset than Peter was when he told me about it - but only because I'm extremely self-centered and death-obsessed and in some kind of menopause mild-melt shit-storm where I feel like my period is about to start at any-goddamned-second - except it never does. I'm all hair-trigger-y and anything can set me off. SO FUN. Plus, I admit it - I'm still stuck in the past and still really LOVE to occasionally play a few rounds of: "Our parents were fucking criminally irresponsible assholes with zero redeeming qualities as human beings outside of their POWDER KEG fecundity/inability to secure a reliable form of birth control."... yeah. SIGH.

I'm STILL very prone to getting hung up on that idea. It's also seriously warped my own vision of parenting - because: as a parent I can't take ALL the blame, I just can't. There are a million variables to take into consideration and most of them are beyond my control. I dunno. Plus I'm still reconciling this idea with my recent experiences with Sean. A few years ago, he was in serious trouble and was completely mentally ill and drinking and drugging himself almost to death. My boy - my baby. The one I tried my fucking-godDAMNedest to raise differently - without all the abuse and neglect and active alcoholism and violence. Yeah, that one. For all my efforts to stem the tsunami of fucked-up-ness on both sides of our family trees - shit just happens. There's those aforementioned variables... plus, throw in: age, temperament/personality, resources, location, timing, birth order, etc... the list is long, yo. Now, it WAS a different time for my (and Peter's) parent's generation. Like, when I'm in a more generous mood - which, granted, is hardly EVER when it comes to these assholes - I try to remember what my mother had to endure. The frothing-at-the-mouth feminist in me is outraged at the systematic sexism and cultural bullshit (rooted in religion!) she had to face. Here was my mother - a top-of-the-class brainiac with zero support, poor coping skills, raised by children-of-alcoholics with no resources nor opportunities. I imagine her shame and horror and how overwhelmingly powerless she must have felt. The first time my dad hit her, she was pregnant with my oldest brother. This was small-town Ontario, 1958. There WEREN'T any shelters. There was no such thing as welfare or mother's allowance or aid for women and children fleeing abusive situations. Plus, it was ingrained - you "stood by your man" and all that shit. Can you even begin to IMAGINE?!?!? I try to relate - I try to imagine being heavily pregnant and having Peter come at me, swinging. There's no stored/catalogued reference for this - I simply CAN'T imagine it. Plus, in my case - I'm a big girl and it's just a fact that nobody hits me. In my mom's case, she stood 5'4" while my raving-lunatic sperm donor menacingly towered over her at 6'4" and was primarily composed of dry-drunk rage. Yeah... Still, though.

I don't even know where I'm going with all this.

When Peter casually mentioned that his dad had kicked it - while we were discussing the weather!!! - I was shocked and immediately concerned for him. Peter has experienced exactly ZERO deaths in his 50 years on the planet. Nobody has died. He's never even been to a funeral. And, he's had a long illustrious career of unresolved daddy-issues that would spring up in the form of starting with :"No, Susan... everything's fiiiiiiine! Don't worry!" and end with the three Ds: drinking, danger, duplicity. But, after I stopped wailing and kvetching - because, y'know... Peter's dad taking the dirt nap is all.about.me.god. - we talked a little more calmly and rationally. I think I mentioned it earlier, flip back a few entries - Peter's pretty steady, yo. Plus, the last time Peter saw him, his dad was sick'n'dying (but not quite dead, obvs.) in the hospital - a few years ago. A few years ago, Peter and I were pretty far-gone in terms of the marriage and we were also preoccupied with life-saving measures for Sean. Seems Peter had some kind of epiphany then - when he saw his dad, all sick'n'dying - he knew it was over. He didn't have some big scene - he just knew. His dad was this extremely emotionally-stunted, totally-Irish-repressed alcoholic who had a shitty life. All Peter's illusions about wanting to have a good relationship with this man were finally laid to rest. Peter said to me yesterday: "That's the last time I saw him. He's been dead since then. Since before then, really. His actual physical death is just confirmation. There's not going to be some big reunion or some big blubbering forgiveness scene. It was just a shitty connection. He wasn't a good dad. I wasn't the best son. It just was. I let it go a few years ago. It's over. It's okay." This has freaked me out considerably. Mostly because I had no.fucking.idea. that any of that went down with him. That's how disconnected we've been - as a couple. Plus, honestly, I didn't really give a shit about anyone on his side of the family because I'd finally come to the point where no fucks were given when it came to what they thought of me. Plus, they're scattered all over and we had very little contact with them anyway. Close family! Psssh. Also, I've been pretty bonkers lately - in the last few years a LOT of shit happened to me. The only thing Peter and I were doing was paying the mortgage together. So, it actually makes sense. Peter's response to his dad's death doesn't feel like his usual bullshittery. It's actually opened my eyes to a few things. Peter actually said things that I actually listened to and actually heard yesterday. And not one time did my "You're-in-denial-stop-fucking-kidding-yourself-AND-me." alarm bell go off. Something has shifted. I guess Peter's been plodding along, doing his thing, with his patented patience and easy-going-ness and acceptance of reality as it's happening. Meanwhile, I've been in Krazy Town, population: me. So, yeah. Peter's dad is star dust. He's not dead, he's just exchanged his form of energy. Particle physics! Look it up, bitches! Hahahaha!

What else? My brother almost died - twice - due to complications from surgery. He's still in the hospital in Toronto but I haven't been able to bring myself to call him. I sent a card. I also haven't been able to bring myself to call Sharon. She's lost to me, I think. She can't handle the fact that I'm an atheist. She's the one who brings it up. She's the one that's always talking about god. I'm not going to explain myself to her - or anyone else, ever again. I feel sad but I also feel relieved. I also feel almost-ready for the new stuff. I've been recovering, resting, recuperating. I moved to this city to have a better life - bigger experiences and more opportunities. I've been feeling very much in-limbo and stuck and like I'm waiting and waiting and waiting with no end in sight. But that's not the truth. I AM in forward motion - barely discernible to the naked eye - but I can FEEL it. Baby steps add up. I'm still here. If I believed in god, I'd call it a miracle.