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love is hell

So I'm sitting here at work listening to the Ry*n Adams EPs (much better, so far, than the last 2 albums) and agreeing that, yes indeed, love is hell...

I'm just so disappointed in my father - but what do I expect? Hell, I expected more than this - and don't I have the right to?

I haven't spoken to him for nearly five years. The last time we talked was right before my wedding. He said he couldn't make it out but he promised me he would be better about being a part of my life. My grandfather had been ill and I'd just found out about a major heart surgery he'd had a few months prior. I asked my father to help keep me up-to-date with what was going on with them. Obviously I have a responsibility to -and want to - stay in touch with them, but if something happens and someone is hospitalized then I'm relying on him to tell me. I can't and shouldn't have to rely on my grandmother during times like that.

That's the ONE thing I asked of him and he couldn't even do that.

Not only does my grandfather suffer three strokes in the last year and my father does not call me (I find out about 2 of the strokes on my own), but after suffering the third one, he dies and my father lies to my grandmother and says he cannot reach me to tell me.

My phone number has not changed in five years.

My work number is easily found on the Internet - how do I know this? Because my GRANDMOTHER who knows almost ZERO about computers and the Internet found my work number via Goog1e after my grandfather's last stroke.

My mother's phone number has not changed in 20 years - he could have called her. After all my brothers should have also been notified.

I am just seething with anger and hurt but undercutting it all right now is just knowing that my grandfather is gone and I didn't get to say goodbye. The last time I talked to him was in December, right after my birthday. He seemed upbeat. He was happy to be speaking normally again since suffering the first stroke.

He told me loved me.

I guess I did, in a way, get to say goodbye to him.

I lived with my grandparents in England when I was little - following my dad's divorce from BioMom and BioMom's disappearance to the Bahamas. After my dad married my adoptive mother, I still stayed with them for extended periods during the summer (at this point they were living in Texas). As I grew older our relationships shifted. My relationship with my grandmother turned into me figuring out how to deal with someone who could be fun and glamorous one minute (she was a showgirl during WWII - entertained the troops) and then horrible and nasty the next minute (alcoholism will do that to you; a lifetime of unhappiness that's been shut down deep inside of you and not acknowledged will do that to you). Meanwhile my relationship with my grandfather shifted as well. It moved from me idolizing him (much like I once idolized my father) to me struggling to assert my independence, to prove myself as smart and capable and yet still be his "Little Miss Granddaughter". During the summers I stayed with him as a teenager there were fights - he used to put down my adoptive mother and once I finally packed my bags and told him I'd find my own way to the airport or bus station if he didn't shut the hell up. I think I was 16 at the time. He did shut the hell up and from that point on I was able to quell any of his comments against her. He knew I wouldn't take it.

Of course there were other issues.

Over the years my grandparents have barely acknowledged my brothers. Like my dad, I guess, they blamed us for moving to California. Instead of just being mad at my mother, they took it out on my brothers. I think it was easier than taking any of it out on my dad who never made the effort to see us.

(Between the age of 16 and 26 I saw my dad exactly once - the day before my high school graduation).

Over the years my grandparents also continued to make excuses for my dad - for how busy and successful he was - that's why he never had time to see us or call us. He was too busy meeting with the president, getting his Ph.D, teaching, blah blah blah. He's too busy now with his new company, getting glowing articles in the NY Times.

Still, despite all of this, it's easier for me to make excuses for them than for my father. They were caught in the middle and obviously didn't handle everything very well but despite my conflicted feelings on everything - how they've treated my mother, how they've treated my brothers, how they've treated me on occasion - I still love them and I'm really going to miss my grandfather and his brash New York accent and his sharp sense of humor and his very existence on this earth.

And through it all, I feel very sad for my grandmother who just lost her husband of more than 50 years and then she has to listen to me crying on the phone, asking her WHY my father didn't call me and what have I done that is so wrong that he hates me so.

And for once she didn't make an excuse for him, but only cried as well. And there we were, me and the woman I was named for, sobbing about life and death across a mass of telephone wires that span 1500 miles and such is life and love is hell.

...but thank you thank you thank you to all that signed the guestbook with kind thoughts....much love....

10:18 am - 03.12.04

sounds: ry*n adams
words:
i am:

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previously on ... - next time on ...

money can't buy happiness but it does buy small pieces of of serenity - 15.07.12 - 4:29 pm

sh)t's about to get real, y'all - 31.05.12 - 9:46 am

why the hell not? - 29.04.12 - 8:38 pm

Hear that lonesome whistle blow... - 02.04.12 - 5:18 pm

a faith in something I can't see - 30.03.12 - 3:33 pm

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