Thursday, October 4, 2012

Aaaaand the crazy train just keeps on rolling.

There was a waning gibbous moon tonight, so you can't even blame it on a full moon. I don't know what to blame it on, actually. But something aligned in the cosmos today to bring out the crazy in my family. In waves.
First, it was an email from my father's evil wife. And let me say that I am not opposed in principle to my father's wives. There's my mother, of course, and then my stepmother who I'm still connected to. But this third one I do not like. She's done everything within her power to cause division between my father and his children, a task that has become increasingly easy for her as his Alzheimer's has progressed. He's always been politically conservative, but that is something that has never particularly concerned me. Even when he made the shift into Fox "News" far right lunacy, I overlooked it. But the email was a forwarded poem (and I use that term loosely) about Obama and "his boys" taking money from the writer to give to people who hadn't worked a day in their lives while the writer "gagged from the stink." It was ugly, sophomoric stuff ending with telling us we had to vote if we didn't want to be socialists. The evil one claimed that my father wanted her to send it to all of us, and btw thanks for the birthday cards we sent. Well. I hit "reply all" and thanked her for sending it and reminding me how vital it was that I get out and vote for Obama. I was going to leave it at that. But in the meantime, I was hearing from my other appalled sibs , and then the one conservative in the bunch who said she loved that they'd send that to all us liberals. I felt a throbbing pain behind my eyeball and a queasiness in my stomach and I thought, "Oh hell no." This woman had just spewed her last bit of poison on me. So I hit "reply all" once more and sent this:

I'm not sure if this really came from Dad, but it doesn't matter. On reflection, I've decided this was meant to be hateful because you know full well that all but one of us are Democrats. I would never in a million years consider sending such a venomous anti-Republican message to you. Rather than allow you to continue to subject me to this sort of nastiness, I am now blocking your email address. But I hope you will ponder the hypocrisy of calling yourself a Christian while denouncing the "socialist" values espoused by Jesus.

I set my email filter to send anything further from her directly to the trash file, shook the dust off my sandals and walked away. The man I knew was already disappearing when I saw him more than a year ago and his wife was openly vicious to me after I'd driven the 7 hour round trip to take him out to lunch on Father's Day. He and I made our peace years ago, and I sincerely doubt he has the wherewithal or the animosity to direct her to send that email.
So that ought to be enough for one day, right? Wrong. There was a message on my work machine from my former stepfather saying he was now coaching a college track team and would be in a nearby town Saturday morning and would love to see me. I have deliberately had no contact with him since my brother's funeral in 2001. I hope to never have occasion to see him again. I won't go into it, but let's just say I have ample reason to wish this man dead. And not necessarily a quick, painless death. So why in the world would he think I'd drive to a town 50 miles away to see him? I wouldn't speak to him if he were staying next door! And not just because he's too dumb to leave a phone number in the message. I told my friend about this and he asked if I wanted to borrow a gun. I suggested he protect me instead and he texted back, "A phone call away!" Which was comforting, but I'm not really worried. Just creeped out that he'd tried to contact me. Thankfully, my mother has deflected all his attempts to get my email address or cell phone number from her.
So, Universe, I have a request: I didn't pick the people my parents chose to inflict on me. How about you send them crawling on back to the depths from which they emerged?

30 comments:

  1. goodness....can the day be over already....ha...oy...sorry you had some negative vibes today...i spam filter my SIL for a similar reason...

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    1. This one wasn't even an attack on me personally like many of her emails have been, but it was the last straw.

      Delete
  2. yikes, i am so sorry you have ever had to have dealings with such people.

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  3. You must understand people given your profession but then maybe craziness can't be understood. Hopefully, you can move on to better things the universe has to offer.

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    1. Understanding craziness and tolerating crazy viciousness are two different things. I'm done with those two mean-spirited people.

      Delete
  4. When it rains.....

    I hope you feel some relief. Sounds like a final cleaning was in order and you used a sturdy broom

    I struggle with my FB page: high school friends who surprise me with tea party views. And my SIL: she posts and says ' support Ramsey' . That took the cake!

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    1. I know you know the sort of person I'm talking about - just unleashing bile right and left. If it were only politics, I'd probably ignore it.

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    2. oh yes, cs, i know you know i know xoxo i don't miss it one bit

      Delete
  5. The old saying "You can choose your friends but you can't choose your family" ring true for you then? :(

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    1. Indeed it does. I've also heard that families include people you'd never associate with if you weren't related to them.

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  6. Whew! We dealt with a similar 2nd wife of my dad's...but he didn't have the excuse of Alzheimer's. Luckily, she dumped him and he married a third time and that was a winner for him. That was all pre-internet era, so no issues with crazy messages. Sounds like self-preservation was necessary. Bravo for doing what needed to be done.

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    1. He didn't have Alzheimer's when he married her, and she didn't show her true colors until he started deteriorating. But self-preservation is exactly what I needed.

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  7. Ick. I hate that kind of political pressuring. It annoys me even when I agree with the person who's applying the pressure. I just want to be left to make my own decision. Once, a friend of mine sent me a Christmas card that, when I opened it, dumped a bunch of tiny glittery plastic "snowflakes" on my carpet (requring vaccuuming, which I hate) and a message reminding me to vote Conservative (which is pretty much equivalent to your Republican party). I was enraged. Hope your ex-stepfather doesn't bother you anymore, or ever again. He's probably Republican too.

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    1. Ooh, that confetti-filled card would tick me off.

      I don't think this email was even meant to pressure us politically - it was purely a jab at our politics.

      Delete
  8. Gah! What a rotten day. Well, like you said, shake the dust off your sandals and just walk away.

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    1. I have - I hear there was another email and it went safely into the trash!

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  9. This might be one of the times that avoidance is best, usually it just gets us in trouble, but sometimes it's the best course. Good luck.

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    1. I don't avoid conflicts, but there are people too poisonous to allow to stay in your life.

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  10. I hope it is some comfort that those two are not actually your family. Sometimes with family, you are forced to deal with the issues. I think with these two you are more than justified in just shutting them down completely. Good job taking care of yourself!

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    1. It is, but in the case of my father's wife, she blocks access to my father. But I don't feel like I had any options other than to cut her off.

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  11. How unlucky having such dreadful relatives. You're quite right to keep therm well away from you and not let them poison your own life.

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    1. Yes - I want to concentrate my time and energy on the relatives I feel lucky to have.

      Delete
  12. Hi! Just wanted to stop by and say thank you for dropping by my blog earlier today. So nice to meet you!

    Amen to the email you sent to your stepmother! Loved it!

    Isn't it something with 'certain' family members? Trust me, I have them too. Long ago, I decided to remove myself from those who were just plain nasty and negative. I've never believed that just because someone is my family, I have to like or even associate with them. These are people I wouldn't choose as friends, so why would I choose them as family?

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    1. Nice to meet you, too! :-)

      I think tolerance is a good thing, but only within reason. You don't keep petting a biting dog and you don't have to let vicious people stay in your life and continue to hurt you.

      Delete
  13. Always a conundrum.........give the relatives your e-mail address or have them keep bothering you by phone. You have to wonder about your stepmother's motivation to blame the e-mail on your dad. She wants you and the majority of your siblings to be pissed at him so she can have him to herself? SO WACK. I'm sorry that you have to put up with that crap. As well as the whole stepfather situation.

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    1. At least you aren't required to read emails or answer phones. I am a big utilizer of voicemail and the delete button!

      Anything my Dad's wife does is suspect - I think this is a covert way to lash out at us and a way to pit us against each other. She really is a piece of work. And the stepfather situation - I just ignored it and assume he's gone on home by now.

      Delete
  14. I'd be happy to join your friends protection detail and scare the bejeebers out of the creep. It's that kind of crap that makes me worry about my girls. Not that they won't be fine anyway, but just the thought that at some point in their lives they'll probably have to deal with that crap.

    Hope the weirdness fairies take a break from inflicting any more weird on you.

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    1. Thanks, and I hope that, too! I'm going to assume it was just one flukey day.

      (I don't believe my friend would actually shoot my stepfather - but I do think he'd hurt him.)

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  15. I yiyi-- The evil one is really pushing buttons. What a sad sorry shame.

    And Jack Walsh the former CEO of General Electric started the "Chicago guys cooking the books" with a Tweet-- The idiot. I was happy to see him on Anderson Cooper/CNN getting a very hard from from Anderson and Ari-- the very smart finance contributor. Jack wouldn't budge but they made it very clear that it was a TOTALLY inappropriate thing to EVER Tweet. So double shame on The Evil One. Grrr....

    Go Obama!

    xo jj

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