Life is such a strange complicated web of stories. I have been avoiding writing simply because I just don’t know where to start. The stories of my life hold a massive weight, making me cry while I sit under the shower. I don’t know how to explain to my lover that sometimes I just don’t want to make love, laugh, or do anything of consequence. Sometimes I just want to sit and be, until all those roaming hurtful thoughts just slowing seep back into the darkest crevices of my mind.
I have been thinking about family a lot lately. I am not even sure who that includes anymore. The people I share genetics with, the massive raging exception being my mother, often cause me harm. In my 23 years of age, I have been told and treated as if I am lesser by family. My mother, father, sister, and I are deviant- we dare not to be economically rich. When I was little, my aunts and uncles always invited me on trips. One aunt and uncle just took my sister and me, but my other aunts and uncles only ever invited me so that I would take care of their small children. I hated them even then strangely enough. I understood I was being bribed. We are paying for your trip because your parents cannot afford it so you better listen and take care of our kids. I have never told my mother, but I secretly hated those trips to the beach. My parents feeling obligated to buy me new clothes so I wouldn’t look bad (poor really) in comparison. I always felt a deep sense of guilt, as if I was abandoning them for something “better.”
There was only one instance on one of these trips when I felt a sense of pride. One day everyone was sleeping in waiting for the sun to go down. I was deeply annoyed that I was wasting my time inside when a beautiful sun awaited just beyond the corner. Having no say in the matter and desperately wishing I could escape, I quietly read on the balcony. As everyone started to awake, the sun half hidden on the horizon, I dutifully got up and helped the children get their things together. I went into the kitchen to get a drink and found Elly and her grandmother in the kitchen. Elly was my political aunts’ cousin who is also my age that I was meant to companion. Elly was turning and twisting a handheld can opener in the air, both women staring at it as if it was a space ship. Confused, I continued to watch. Elly, frustrated, begins to bang the can opener up and down exclaiming that the stupid thing was broken. Floored, I suddenly realized that neither of these women knew how to use a regular can opener. I walked into the kitchen, politely grabbed the can opener and started to open the can. Annoyed, Ely asked how I knew to use the can opener. I looked at her strangely, believing everyone knew how to use a can opener. When I told her so, she smirked informing me that MOST people use electric can openers. Despite her air of importance, I felt vindicated. My class had given me a practical skill, marking the first of many moments in my life in which I would thank my lucky stars I was not well off like my cousins.
I may sound ungrateful. After all, they could have found some else to take, but it is not enough. I cannot love or be grateful for a bribe. You cannot love or enjoy the moment when you know you exist for another’s convenience. I was a paid nanny, no longer invited once the children could take care of themselves. You don’t know all the stories yet, but you will. You may think I misunderstood these situations, but I promise I didn’t. Only four days ago my uncle told me I was ashamed of my life, embarrassed for not being rich like them. He truly has no idea. I wonder if he could fathom how happy I was when they stopped inviting me. If he could even imagine how disgusted I feel each time I see them at Christmas, comparing their stocks and “outdressing” each other to show off their economic power. Turning their noses down at my mother and me when we dare to wear jeans to a family function. They are what I am embarrassed at in life. Each day I avoid spending time with them is a massive jolt of power. In that first moment of freedom, it was as if I could now stop being the girl in the corner and start taking up some space in the world. No longer exhibiting a polite and silent demeanor, I subtly fought back for the rest of my life.
