In spite of the fact that I have a tendency to try to not entirely get too personal with what I write on my brog, there comes times in which frankly I don’t feel like there’s anyone I can really talk to and actually feel like I’m getting any modicum of empathy or support. And I can’t really say that people are obligated to provide such, since we all have our own problems in our lives, and some most certainly more severe than others, especially compared to someone else’s problems. I think we live in a pretty screwed up times right now, everyone is a little bit more jaded, everyone is a little bit more hardened, and it’s hard to be sympathetic towards others when the world around just ourselves isn’t entirely the best it could possibly be.
It’s times like this in which, where sometimes it really feels like all I can do to not feel so bottled up is to just write it out, throw it up on the brog, and leave it to random chance to who reads it or not, and whether or not they want to do their best impression of an ear to speak into, despite the fact that I’ll likely be writing out everything I’d be saying anyway. Nobody wants accountability anyway, so there’s no obligation, and I don’t track who reads what I write, let alone sees or acknowledges that I write, because I’m long beyond the days of obsessively tracking hits and analytics, since I always felt that such research took something away from the exercise of simply writing.
For the past two years and change, my parents have been having some marital issues. I’m old enough to understand the situation, and not fall into the clichéd fallacy of believing that it’s by any fault of my own or my sister’s, but it still doesn’t really make it any easier to know that the relationship between my own mother and father is deteriorating, and despite their bullshit claims, is not getting better. At this point, for the sake of their sanity, as well as for my sister and I’s as well, divorce looks to be the best possible option, and it’s got to be pretty bad when divorce is seen as a positive option.
But that’s not really what’s eating at me so fiercely lately. As I said, this fucking song and dance has been going on for a while now, and I’m long beyond the point of exasperation with it. By now, I honestly wish my parents would just split, separate from each other, and stop being so fucking delusional in thinking that it can work out when it’s been proven on an annual basis, at around this time every year (maybe a little early this year), that it just simply cannot. In this regard, I think I can partially take some blame, as my parents have said that one reason they wanted to try it to tough it out was so that they could appear as a couple for the eventual day if/when I get married. The fucking Korean obsession with appearances, as if it’s worth sacrificing personal sanity and happiness for it; this I will have a hard time understanding for as long as I live, I bet.
But no, the knowing that my parents are heading towards divorce doesn’t bother me at all at this point. I can accept being just another person in America with divorced parents, I’ve seen that it is clearly not the end of the world, and most certainly not a justifiable reason for a lot of people to turn into fucking retards like so often is the case; again, the accountability issue, but that’s a different can of worms.
What’s really upsetting me is simply the circumstances amidst all of this fighting. The divide it’s creating within my family, and the realization that I’m eventually heading towards a reality where I won’t really have a home to go visit in Virginia in the future.
The latter is naturally smaller and more inconsequential, but it still sucks knowing that in spite of how often I still visit Virginia, I won’t really have a centralized home to visit anymore. It will be either staying with my mom or staying with my dad, and if it’s anything like when I used to visit my dad when he was working out of town in Chattanooga, then it’s honestly, going to royally suck. I think I’d honestly be better off in seeing if any of my friends up there would be willing to let me crash at their places, but then I’d probably be more reluctant in seeing my parents if I’m already with my friends.
And if that becomes the case, then Virginia becomes no different than North Carolina, Richmond, Philadelphia or any other city where I visit for short periods of time to visit friends and/or watch baseball. I’ll cease to actually have a home away from home, and that makes me sad. Is it selfish to make a mountain of a molehill for my own purposes? Yeah, a little bit, but it’s truth.
But the fighting part is what’s eating at me the most right now. And I can’t really do anything about it, which doesn’t help, but then again, nobody really can. Both my parents are at bitter odds again, and in spite of all the near-misses in prior years, there can only be so many strikes before the out occurs, and this time looks like it’s the worst yet.
Long story short, my dad’s trust issues and paranoia is the root of if all, and pretty much everyone is way beyond exasperated by it. My mom’s pissed, my sister’s pissed, and that happens, then my aunts on my mom’s side and all their respective families end up naturally siding with my mom, and ganging up on my dad.
More specifically, what’s saddening me lately is the idea that my dad is pretty much alone in this fight. It’s partially his own fault for having such trust issues, and not having any genuinely close friends to just fucking speak with. It’s definitely his own fault for not reaching out to his own family, his brother, to seek some support; it’s the fucking present time, there’s no excuse, no monetary penalty for making long-distance calls to seeking out unconditional support. But somehow this duty of being my dad’s outlet falls onto me, where there’s both a language barrier as well as an actual conflict of interest because I’m directly in the middle of both my dad and my mom. As much as I’d want to support my dad unconditionally, I feel that I’m in a position where I can’t, as long as my own mom is the conflicting side.
I’m a bit torn lately. I know the facts, and I have my own opinions of the current matters, but at the same time, I hate how my dad’s pretty much alone in this right now. He’s got both my mom and my sister calling him crazy, and my overbearing aunts also doing the same thing. Frankly, I think he’s being crazy too, but the last thing he really needs is me to join in as well. I guess this is where I’m trying to show a little bit of unconditional support, but it’s not easy.
But that’s another thing that’s niggling at me lately too, the idea that my dad might be a little unhinged in the head. Because as far as people try to deny it, a lot of characteristics don’t always fall too far from the tree, which means that I could be subject to the same behaviors too, which frankly concerns the shit out of me. Yes that sounds a little selfish worrying about me in this regard, but honestly I don’t want to end up like my dad, like this right now.
I can’t help but wonder if it’s legitimate mental problems, or if it’s just the culmination of a lifetime of being introverted boiling over. A lot of people, including myself have so-called trust issues; but how many people claim to have them simply because they’ve been burned by other people on numerous occasions, and how many people have them for absolutely zero reason? Honestly my dad hasn’t really told me about his life enough for me to really decide if it’s one or the other. I know I can trust people, because I trust people on a fairly regular basis, and most of the time I say I have trust-issues is because I’m trying to send a veiled message about someone else’s reliability.
As futile of a belief it might be at this point in time, I’d like to hope that such paranoia and trust issues are mostly from a lifetime of simply not having any genuine friends or anyone to really talk to. Isolation is a brutal thing, especially over so much time, and in my dad’s circumstances, it’s really no one’s fault but his own, and really the only one who could fix it is himself, but I just can’t imagine that’s really going to happen anymore. Which makes me upset.
Anyway, this was a lot longer than I thought it would be, but apparently the words seemed to flow out like water when I started writing this. But for all intents and purposes, this is what is going on in my life currently, and it is unfortunately not good at all. It is bothering me a great deal, and I am trying my best to manage my emotions and presentation to where it doesn’t interfere with my personal and professional lives too much.
I am not asking for a shoulder to lean on or an ear to borrow.
I simply cannot keep this bottled up inside.
My family is breaking, and it cannot be repaired.
So hopefully, it will be back to the regularly not-schedule of tasteless racist jokes, nerdy shit, and social commentary.
