My father always sends me a text when he is leaving to travel somewhere. And another text when he arrives. Instead, this time I get a photo message from my mother, of my nephew, and it is clear they have travelled 6hrs from home to see my brother and his family.
I know what the purpose of that picture message was; to incite a response. Well it hasn’t.
Neither has my brother apologised, nor am I bothered.
I am managing to feel conspired against but I’m working on quashing that.
These people confuse me. I feel like I grew up understanding how people worked and how to engage with them, and the types of people not to engage with. Not because they were bad people… well, they were.. but because I understood how the wrong sort of people thought.
My family don’t think like any sort of people I know, that is, the three family members I’m supposed to be closest to. The rest of the family, cousins, etc. They’re all level headed and predictable. Even my Sister In Law.... I’m struck with this sense of dumbfoundedness shared by people who can’t grasp basic logic or simple maths concepts. Staring at an equation that makes sense to everyone else but me. And because it’s Them vs Me.. and there’s more of Them… logic dictates I must be the dumb kid in this class.
But when every single other person I’ve encountered thought in a particular pattern and from a certain perspective that was entirely predictable and able to be categorised as “That Type” of person… there are three who just don’t. Three of them who know one another. Which is another anomaly. Dropkicks don’t hang around dropkicks, they look for other people to leech from. But the three of them are equally confusing, in the same way. Normally one is sucking everyone else and the others see sense and cut the leech off, or the leech oversteps their own moral boundary and evacuates. I can’t pinpoint it here. I don’t understand them.
Anyway. I realised since my parents have journeyed to visit my brother, there’d have been at least two late night deep and meaningful talks about me and my problem/s, and I giggled at the mental image of a staged intervention without the intervenee.
I wonder if they’re imagining me at the beginning of my journey of self understanding? That point where people struggle to keep it all in and they start to lash out at everyone as they fall apart. I wonder if they think I feel guilty over my…I say honesty they read actions… and am shunning them in shame?
These questions don’t keep me awake at night. Let’s be clear on that. That part of my journey has ended. I’ve found closure there and maybe that’s what’s upsetting them? That I’m not starting this journey with them and suffering emotions together ‘as a family’?
It’s time I heard from them next week. I wonder if Dad will mention their trip.. I will have to be more guarded with him. Sadly.
-SP
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