Easter 2013

As I sit here on this Easter Sunday, imagining the fun of seeing my grand-kids hunting for Easter eggs and playing with the cousins and I wish so much that I could be there.  Instead, I sit here at home and hope that someone will post pictures for me to see.  Just when I think I have it filed away all nice and tidy, no longer able to bring me to tears, the packaging bursts and my heart breaks just like it did on the first day that two of my daughters cut me from their life.  So I sit and write poetry and try to exorcise the demons that fill my chest and cause me pain.  So this is where I put it.  I hope it stays there this time and at the same time I know it won't.

Love Lost

How easy it seems to be, to cut someone from your life

Son or Daughter, Friend or Foe, Husband or Wife

For the one who makes the cut, the pain seems fleeting

But the person who is cut has a wound that’s never healing

Did my love mean so little that it was easy to keep at bay?

Was your love for me so shallow that it was easy to wipe away?

Your sentence of life without your love was effortless to pass

And there are many who would, quite simply, tell you to kiss their ass

I’m not that kind of person; I’ve never been that way

I will sit here mourning for your love for all of my days.

Part of me is angry because this was a surprise to me

 I’ve been shunned before and should have been able to see

The price for one poem is never to see my family again

Two of my daughters will not forgive the sin.

When a person’s been gone for a long interval

 Their memory fades away until it’s hardly visible

I’ve cut someone before so I know how it goes

In your mind you think it’s over but the anger still grows

You pretend you just don’t care but you know that’s not true

It’s just a clever way to build a wall between that person and you

So you can pretend I don’t exist and you don’t give a damn

But one day you may wonder, and if you do; here I am

I’m not interested in assigning blame because the issue is so old

It may take a while before the pain in my heart grows cold

I must be guarded, suspicious and protective of my heart

It must be carefully shielded so it isn’t ripped apart

Once my heart is broken it begins a disconnect

The hurt is just too great to bear so I have to protect

I long for family contact that I know may never come

Each day that passes without it, is one day closer to succumb

I fail to see the humor in things that used to make me laugh

I spend hours listening to music so I don’t have to interact

I’m so busy doing nothing that it takes up all my time

I pretend that I’m ok, but my light fails to shine

In a room full of people I feel unlovable and alone

People can’t understand why I prefer to be on my own

Some days I sit quietly and wonder with each breath

Would anyone feel sorrow upon hearing of my death?

My mind knows that there are and that’s the only thing that keeps

Me from swallowing a fistful of pills and taking the long deep sleep

The battle rages in me every day

Do I go or do I stay?

I never know the answer for any given day.

Kathy Wilson

November 1, 2012

"the boy"

I didn't figure out until recently what a rare creature I am.  When I was younger, I saw my Dad doing things with "the boy" - you know him, he's the oldest child of three and the only boy hence the name "the boy".  Anyway, I would see my Dad trying to impart his wisdom to "the boy" and having "the boy" shrug his shoulder or roll his eyes at the mere mention of the projects Dad wanted to share with "the boy".  I am, however, in the under-sanctified class of third child and second daughter.  In China, I would have been put in a basket and left out in the cold until I succumbed to the elements and perished.  In fact, my mother once told me that, "It wasn't so much that I didn't want you, I just tried all I could not to have you" and if that doesn't leave you with a warm fuzzy feeling I don't know what will. What it did do is give me a feeling of worthlessness (is that even a word?) and being unwanted and somehow less loved than my other two siblings.  I also believe that this was the beginning of the death of my emotions. This may also be why I fucked up parenting my children.  I mean really...who says that to a child? I so very badly wanted all three of my daughters. I never wanted them to feel unwanted and abortion never entered my mind, even when I knew that I was messing it up, making the same mistakes my mother made with me but I really tried so hard not to.  They are each precious little wounded souls who have learned by my example what a truly shitty parent is and thus have become uber parents to their children.  I won't hide behind my mental illness because there really is no satisfactory excuse.  None.  Anyway, I digress...my Dad was a smart man despite having only an 8th grade education.  He was country smart.  He grew up in a world where he might be a migrant worker one day and a lumberjack the next.  Born in the mid 1930's he was right in the midst of the great depression and they learned to "expletive" rig everything.  He grew up, worked at various jobs, married my mother, went in the army and was lucky enough to miss both WWII and Korea.  He worked at many jobs but his final career was Superintendent of the maintenance department at a Connecticut steel mill.  He worked hard all of his adult life, retired at 65 and died two years later of cancer.  My mother had passed four months earlier from cancer as well. My father, all through "the boy's" gifted life, tried so hard to turn "the boy" into a son that he could be proud of only to have "the boy" piss on it and throw it back in his face.  In the meantime, I - in my role of "princess infanticide" - would be standing around my Dad doing my best "Horshack" imitation of, "ooo..pick me!...I'm here...pick me...ooo...ooo..pick me!" which my Dad would ignore because I was a girl and girls don't do those things.  Instead I was sent into the kitchen to do dishes and play with my dolls until my knight in shining armor rode in to sweep me away.  Don't get me wrong!  I am all girl.  I like big sparkly jewelry and frilly clothes, but sometimes it's nice to thread a worm onto a hook and go fishin' with my Dad!!  When "the boy" did his final fuck up and was given a choice of army, navy, or air force in lieu of being murdered by my father - he jumped at the chance and enlisted in the Air Force where he served for almost two years before, during a deployment to Ramstein Air Base in Germany, he was arrested by the MP's for possession of hashish.  He was summarily sent to a military prison in Colorado and then given a general discharge and when "the boy" came home he proceeded to drink himself silly and wreck several cars.  During the time of "the boys" military service my Dad was on the lookout for a little buddy to hang out with him and Lo and Behold his eyes stopped on me and I began the era during which I was the best son my father could ask for.  Need help loading that john-boat on the top of the truck?  No problem be right there.  Need someone to help load and/or unload the camper?  Not a problem, here I am. Need someone to go fishin' with?  You got it, my rod and reel is ready 24/7.  Thinking about going squirrel hunting?  I've got my small 22 shotgun and a box of bullets!  Let's go!! I really did enjoy those times with my dad and I'm going to tell you why if you promise not to laugh.  When I was little 5 or 6, I thought my dad was John Wayne. Really! I did!  I thought he left the house in the morning and went to get his horse and hunt down cattle rustlers and horse thieves.  I never told anyone because they would just laugh and make me feel stupid as they so often did. I loved both of my parents.  I would marvel at my mothers artistic skill.  She could make a wedding cake covered in flowers or beads and borders, she made tons of candy around Easter and Christmas (Home-made peanut butter cups were my favorites), ceramics, toll painting, sewing, and crochet were among her many talents.  Even though I knew deep down that she loved me, I can still hear what she said and I wonder, if abortions were legal then...would I be here today??  I'm not so sure.  My Dad on the other hand, was a great father who worked and provided for his family, he was there when you needed him and continued to try and make "the boy" into a man and not too long ago (After 11 years of not speaking at all, I found a picture of "the boy" on his birthday with his goofy grin holding a video game at 57 years of age.  I don't guess "the boy" will ever grow up.

Payment Due Upon Receipt

Shortly after I published the poem"Abuse may Stop"  to Facebook with a security setting of private in a group that was the women of my family exclusively.  Not to the public at all.  Soon after (within 15 minutes)  my ex-mother-in-law asked me on Facebook if I gave any thought to how this poem about her son would hurt her and my daughters.  Look at the poem in my previous post.  Do you see any names? Do you see any physical descriptions of any one person?  I thought it highly ironic that they instantly recognized someone who was never named or described.  This leads me to believe that my testimony about a previous relationship resounded with a truth they don't wish to acknowledge.  I write poetry as an avenue of releasing my stress, anger, and pain.  That one in particular had a devastating effect.  Which I wrote about below.  I no longer share my poetry with my family.  They have no interest in hearing my feelings.  I am only useful when I provide them with something.  For one in particular who made it very clear that  now that she is married and had a baby she was an adult and expected to be treated as one (which I find extremely humorous since she is driving the car that I gave her, covered by insurance I pay for, and watching Hulu+ which I also pay for.) Yeah, she doesn't need me at all.  Proven by the verbal beat down that I received when I visited her at the hospital when she had her daughter.  No matter what I said she told me I was wrong, passive aggressive, patronizing and guilt tripping just to name a few.  She very specifically told me that she was an adult and had no need of me at all.  In that few minutes she crushed me with a verbal boulder.  My excitement at seeing my granddaughter for the first time and then being told that I couldn't hold her and then her verbal barrage took a day I was so excited for and pissed on it and threw it back in my face.  Even now I can't write this because the tears cloud my eyes.  My oldest on the other hand just closed her Facebook account and refuses to speak to me.  My middle daughter, the reasonable one, corresponded and allowed me to explain the poem and it's purpose and that I intended no harm.  I was actually thinking it was a decent poem and I only wanted their opinion.  Stupid me.  Anyway, just to prove my point I give this poem as a testament to my idiocy.

I Wrote a Poem One Day

I wrote a poem one day

That literally blew my whole world away

 Two of my children have shut me out

For a perceived slight that they saw without doubt

Even though I named no names

They said they knew the subject of my claims

The poem was a work of fiction

But my family still handed down my conviction

Then not too much to my surprise

They swiftly moved to ostracize

They shut me out and within a few minutes

 They declared themselves to be off limits

It’s so hard to believe that some words on a page

Could provoke and push them into such a rage

There was no motive to assess blame

The poem was meant to help someone in pain.

I must stand by my purpose to give hope with what I wrote

And I intended to do it with no sugarcoat.

Kathy Wilson

November 16, 2012

What's love got to do with it??

I was going through some papers the other day and I found a card my estranged youngest daughter made for my birthday when she was little and I wonder when exactly her love turned to hate.  I mean, I think she used to love me but now she could care less how much my heart hurts.  I see pictures of family gatherings where I am not welcome and I am lonely and alienated over words on a page knowing that I can't un-ring the bell nor do I want to. I wrote about the pain of an abusive relationship.  Pain inflicted by family members is the same no matter the cause.  I had been rejected and told that I was no longer needed by this child of mine.  For two days I sat in disbelief and finally I poured my angst out in a poem meant to describe the pain of being rejected by someone you love because, abuse is very much a rejection of who you are, how you look, what you say, and what you believe..  Here is the poem I wrote:

ABUSE MAY STOP – BUT IT NEVER ENDS

Abuse is dispensed in many fashions

Vile words hurled with no compassion

Physical wounds that swell and bruise

And emotional wounds that hurt and confuse

Punishments meted out for failure to recognize

The rules that he spent countless hours to sermonize

While physical wounds were plain to see

The mental wounds were hidden inside me

My fear, pain, hurt and shame

Are penalties I paid for losing the game

Rewards were few and far between

Public facades provided freedoms rarely seen

Family visits were clouded with fear

What if I say something wrong that he can hear?

Litanies about how false my parent’s love would be…

Why else would they offer him money to marry me?

Hours on end I was told how ugly, fat and stupid I’d been

Couldn’t I see how fortunate I was that he took me in?

Why, no one could ever love someone as pathetic as me

Then came the ultimate betrayal as he professed his love to me

To me though, not for me, but for my only friend you see

Even now those years are past after I found a way to flee

Although, the feelings of shame and sorrow are never far away

It can hit at any second, any hour, or any day

Because I have a dark place deep inside of me

Where I hide the feelings that I cannot bear to see

A word or a phrase can instantly send me back to that shame

And I retreat from human contact and wonder if I’ll ever win the game

I’m remarried now to a man who has shown me what real love means.

His job was really rough to prove he was a man on whom I could lean

But even he is helpless when my flashbacks cripple me

Am I really all that different than the creature I used to be?

Then, just as if it happened only yesterday

I begin at the beginning and try again to find my way

Kathy Wilson

October, 2012

Is it so hard to believe that there was more than one person victimized in this family? I was a rotten mother.  I tell them that and I own that but what's so bad about telling why I was a bad mother?  Am I unable to tell them why because they don't care?  Do they think that my revelation of my pain somehow diminishes theirs?  Even a murderer is allowed to plead their case. I'm not the bad guy here.  I'm the one who is damaged by their hate.  Knowing that my only value to them was what I could do for them that day. Things that I did out of love for them - only to have them spit that love back in my face without once giving me the chance to defend my actions.  That's not what love means to me but that's the love they learned from their father. His mantra is don't ask what you can do for your family but ask what your family can do for you. When your family ceases being able to serve your needs then you need to get rid of them!

For me......Love is love through sickness and health, rich or poor, ugly or beauty, fat or thin, damaged or pristine...These children may think they love but they don't.  They only love when that love works to their advantage.  If either of these daughters read this and feel this indictment is unjust then prove it.  I damn near killed myself because I thought that if I saw someone who could give me that magic pill that would help me be a better me, then maybe I could prove what I would do to earn their love. Instead that pill drove me close to Kidney Failure.  As I sit here crying over all that I've lost I've come to the realization that I shouldn't have to earn their love...Love is not a commodity to be traded like stocks, bonds, or derivatives.. It's either there or it isn't.  I love all three of my daughters equally, even the two who decided I was unworthy of their love.  I feel sorry for them because they will never know the true depth of my love.  They won't see how true marital happiness (Like that I share with my second husband Mike). It makes me sad that they will never know the depths of my love for them.  They are missing out on the lessons I can give about life in general and my mantra which is that life's mission is to knock you down in the dirt and when you get up it knocks you down again.  So the measure of your life is not about how many times you get knocked down...It's measured by the number of times you get up and dust yourself off and move on.  This is my way of saying that my oldest and my youngest daughters may cut me out of their lives and to them I say...Look at me!  I'm getting up and dusting myself off, and I'm Moving On!!