Grandma's Favorite? This is Fucked Up.

At every family gathering this year, there has been a point when the older folks switch the topic of conversation from living to dying. I don't know if they've been doing this the whole time, or if I've just happened to walk in on it this year. It's not subtle either--straight up things like, "I just know any day now, I'm gonna roll over to wake him up and he's gonna be cold."

It's not just talk of dying, either.

The family, generally speaking, knows about my grandma's brother and father. How they weren't right in the head, how they were alcoholics. How they were predators. My grandma left them behind in Massachusetts, but not before my mom was exposed to them. It's ugly and sick and shameful, and I can't imagine how it must feel to be harmed, like that, by people directly related to me.

We all know of it, but it's not detailed in our minds; in fact, I'm sure they left it that way because they didn't want us to feel like we'd been through it too. We don't need specific instances, we don't need to know what room it was, or what time it happened.

But it's part of the story of my family, and the stories of my mother and grandmother. They were altered as people because of those events, which affected every part of their lives--their emotional distance, the way they raised their children, and their ability to show (and be shown) love.

I picked up a Christmas card on my aunt's table while sitting around on Christmas day. It said, "Hope you all are OK. We are OK. Lou is not so well. It's hard to see", and then the pre-printed Christmas message. It is the saddest Christmas card I've ever seen in my life. A bit later, I'm outside with my grandma, and I ask her about the card from her sister. All she said to that was, "I don't talk to them no more." I asked why, and she tells me that they neglected to notify her when her brother died. She didn't know until three months later.

Then, she started talking about her brother. I wasn't asking her anything about it at this point--this is free-form grandma, and grandma doesn't talk much, and very rarely complains. She said he was her favorite, but he had a bad streak in him. She said he picked her up from school one day and got a ticket because he didn't stop for the school bus. And you know, I laugh, cause it's funny to me. And she laughs, and then tells me he didn't stop because he was trying to put his hand up her skirt.
"...and you know, I told him not to do that..."

My little sister, who was sitting there listening with me, audibly gasped. She looked at me for a cue, and I didn't have one. I just looked at her, wide-eyed.

All I had was confirmation that my happy childhood had only existed because all of them--my mother, grandmother, aunts and uncles, families by marriage and the like--had put us in the middle and made a human barrier to keep out the darkness. They were the Atlas that held my world on their shoulders. They'd all looked at it so we didn't have to.

Once you get to a certain age, you know or at least suspect as much. A few years ago, I started to see the reason why it's so hard to hold other people to my expectations: because everyone is from a different world, has had different struggles, and has seen different amounts of darkness. You don't know how warped they are, or if they've ever seen true darkness. Or if they've seen too much of it and can't trust anyone because of it.

Not all my memories of my grandma are good ones. She had it out for me when I was young, for reasons still kind of unclear. We'd stay at her house a lot, and she'd always accuse me of random offenses, like eating her lipstick. Furthermore, she'd make fun of me in public, or straight-up TRIP me when I was 7. She cackled like a demon, she thought it was so funny. The terrible thing was that I wanted her to love me more than anything. I'm sure she did, but when I was 7, that shit didn't feel like love.

She's clearly outgrown that phase, but after talking to her on Christmas, it occurred to me that maybe she resented her grandkids back then--just the tiniest, childish little bit--because growing up was made so easy for us. Paired with our generation's excellent complaining skills, she doesn't get it, and felt like she got the shaft. Why do we get nerf guns and hundreds of barbies while she grew up eating expired food from the restaurant her family lived behind? In the bitter cold Massachusetts winter, with an abusive alcoholic predator of a father? After the depression? WITH 8 SIBLINGS? I guess the least she could do was trip me in public to make me feel a slight smidgen of how painful growing up was for her.

Every Christmas feels more and more like "The Dead". All the kids leave, and the spirit dies, and all that's left is the old ones talking about their impending death like they'll put it in tomorrow's coffee.