The Comical Misadventures of a Rambling Mind

5/06/2008

MOTHERLESS CHILD. DON'T KNOW RIGHT FROM WRONG

The plight of the older sibling

This article doesn't seem like anything too surprising, but I suppose that having it suddenly 'proven' is newsworthy. The new study confirmed that amongst siblings the eldest child get the roughest go of it. While the younger siblings have it easier.

Really? Big shock...

I'm in the odd category of having siblings that didn't live with me. So I can't speak on how such a parently reign of power on the oldest siblings might have worked. My Grandparents had already raised two kids. My Dad fathered a couple kids after me. But I never was raised with any of them. So as far as the 'youngest' of the kids my grandparents raised I had it pretty easy. "Stay alive and don't fuck up" was the unofficial motto. They cared about me, but there was definite trust. Compared to my aunt and father (their children) as long as I stayed out of jail and off of drugs I was golden.

I wonder about the little quirks families have. If you've got older step-children that come in to a family do they get the rough go of it even if an older child comes into the family from a marriage? Does a bigger age gap make it easier or worse on the siblings? What about adopted kids?

I'm doing my own informal survey. I should draft a grant proposal and get paid millions of dollars to investigate it.

Are you the older sibling? Were your parents tougher on you than your siblings? Maybe you were the younger sibling who could get away with murder?

Labels: family

I posted this @ 5/06/2008 05:04:00 PM.............Need a link?..........

7/20/2007

FEELS JUST LIKE WE'RE FALLIN' FOR THE FIRST TIME

Sometime I wonder if I have any personal boundaries in sharing things on this blog. The answer is no.

Having said that, let me start off this story by asking you to keep in mind... he is alright!

My Grandfather had an accident the other day. He fell down a half-flight of stairs and somehow managed not to break anything. He is currently spending a few days in an assisted living home while he re-coops. Which is good for both my Grandfather and my Grandmother, who also can use the break from caring for him.

I got a call from my Grandmother with the news of the accident. I'm to the point in my life (well, their life technically speaking) that when she initiates a phone call it usually means something bad. She doesn't call to talk. She calls to check in, which I appreciate. I'm just saying... Phone call = Bad. I was unable to get to the phone, but seeing she called I didn't bother to listen to the message. I just called her back. When she answered the phone she started in about the situation as tho I'd already listened to the message. I hadn't. In repeat, she explains that as my Grandfather was making his way downstairs he fell half way down. She doesn't know if he missed a step, collapsed, slipped, or how it happened exactly.

She helped him up. Bandaged him up and got him back upstairs where the sat down and had lunch.

Now... I understand that if someone says to you that they're fine that you might be inclined to believe. But in a situation like this where you are having trouble stopping the bleeding, sitting down to lunch doesn't seem like the highest priority. My Grandmother's explanation was that he said he was fine and rather than argue with him about she just helped get him up and bandaged. I don't expect her to know about how shock and adrenaline from an accident can temporarily mask any pain you might have. Or how a broken bone doesn't have to be poking through the skin to be broken. Cracked ribs. Internal bleeding. You get the idea.

None of that stuff happened. Like I said... he is alright. I'm not looking to fault anyone. I'm just pointing out the comical.

So they had lunch and by this point he was starting to feel the pain in his back. She took him to the hospital where the stitched him up (which explains why she couldn't stop the bleeding). The exam showed nothing broken. No concussion. Nothing out of the ordinary other than needing some stitches and pain meds. This to me is incredible. It's a testament to the stout European blood that runs in my family. Here he is, 86 years old, 50-year smoker, heart surgery patient for a pacemaker, who just tumbled down some steps and didn't break anything?! He is the youngest of five siblings and his oldest sister is approaching 100!

If anyone wants to know where I get my stubbornness from, I think we have a winner.

Labels: family, funny

I posted this @ 7/20/2007 08:24:00 AM.............Need a link?..........

6/04/2007

REMAINS OF THE DAY

What a weekend... It's been over a year in planning and I'm glad it's over. I can't guarantee that I'll be brief. This will be somewhat personal and cathartic. Yet, feel free to skip a paragraph now and then.

Over a year ago my Grandparents decided to have a household auction. The reason being my Grandfather's declining health. Would they need to move into a smaller house so he could get around better? Would they need to move him into a nursing home and put all their money into his care? In the end it was decided that their current house was their home and where they were the most comfortable. They would go stir crazy in a small house or apartment. So they would have an auction to reduce how much stuff they had.

My Grandmother began the long process of cleaning out closets and going through dozens of boxes. Their garage had been turned into an office/rec room years ago. Since then, it had collected boxes of belongings... theirs, mine, and others... over the last 80 years. Eighty years of stuff to sort through and decided what needed to be kept and what needed to be sold. She was able to do it as well as take care of my ailing Grandfather.

The week of the sale my Grandfather checks into the hospital complaining of problems breathing, weakness, and disorientation. They kept him for observation for a couple days. (Which, at his age, I take as 'code' for "in case he dies".) Two days before the sale and my Grandfather is in the hospital. My Grandmother was actually relived in a way. As bad as it might sound, he was at least not underfoot while she was preparing for the sale. Though, thankfully he was released last Thursday? I put a question mark behind that last statement because, as mean as it sounds, he would have been better off not being at home during the sale. Like I said, I know it sounds bad, but honestly...

Anyway, the auction was on Saturday. Friday night I arrived to ready boxes to be sold in the morning. That actually went smoother than I thought it would. My Grandmother mentioned there were still two walls (yes, walls) that had boxes stacked up that she hadn't gone through yet. What!? A year later and she is still going through boxes. Oh God... It turns out that she had sorted through them, but didn't recall what was in them. So as stuff was being put outside for the auction she would "look in them real quick" and see if it was something to be saved or sold. My concern was that she would not just "look" through something. That instead she would need to organize and sort through the box itself. Pulling out pieces of things she wanted to save. Stuff that said she'd done already. I was not completely wrong in that thinking.

At 7AM we began setting boxes out for the auctioneer to place where he wanted. With help from a few hired hands we started the three hour process of unpacking dozens of boxes. Kitchen stuff here. Bedding there. Odds and Ends over there. Tools. Toys. Furniture. Outdoor Christmas decorations. Boxes of plastic grave flowers. National Geographics from way before I was born (when they didn't use photos on the covers). And then junk... lots and lots of junk.

I told my Grandmother that she wasn't allowed to buy anything else. Ever. She laughed. I wasn't joking.

Seriously... as my Aunt Jenny and I were unpacking these boxes we'd come across random things that there was no point in selling. A plastic bag of straws? Folders from when I was in grade school that I'd scribbled and colored on? A box of old cell phones? This one actually was kind of funny. I set the bag phone (yes... BAG PHONE) out like a mother sow and lined all the smaller phones up to it like suckling piglets.

My Aunt Jenny wasn't helping too much at times when she would find something in a box and have to show it to me and ask if I remember when we first got it, whatever 'it' may be. Or if I fondly remember some photo that was taken pre-pubescence. Or if I she should put the encyclopedias in alphabetical order. While all possibly valid questions, under a time crunch was not the best time for most of those questions to be asked.

I probably should mention that these type of events bring out the 'worst' in my personality. When I get motivated to do something, I'm like a bulldog. I won't let it go til I'm done with it. Now, the key is getting that motivated to begin with. But that morning, for example, I had the energy and the drive to get that stuff put out there as quick as possible so it would be done and over with. I didn't have the patience to stop and look at a photo of someone when they were still in onesies. At a family reunion, maybe. But not right then, when there was a job to do.

People had been showing up off and on all morning starting to peruse the sale items. Eying certain antiques that they might want to bid on. The sale hadn't even started yet, and I'm pretty sure most of the furniture had at least one person interested in each piece.

I was surprised to see how defensive I became when I overheard someone mention the state and shape of something. "That's an antique!!" I'd say to myself when someone would comment on the shitty quality of something. I had to remind myself, that none of these things were 'personal' to anyone else but us. No one outside the family cared that the bedroom set was what I slept on when I grew up. No one cared that those vases were things that my Grandfather bought my Grandmother as an engagement present over 50 years ago before he went off to World War II. To them it was some knick knack piece of crap that had been sitting in the back of some closet on a shelf through several presidencies.

This sale wasn't just about 'things'. It was my Grandparents making their lives simpler. Less cluttered and cumbersome. It was a sale that otherwise would be happening in the wake of their deaths. They were saving me from having to do it later. After realizing that, I let any emotions attached to the sale itself go pretty quickly.

Physically and emotionally I was drained by 11AM. The sale had started. Everything that was going to be sold was outside. The predicted rain had held off, and the sun was shining. People were buying stuff that I had no idea would even be sold. Granted it was literal handfuls of items for a buck, but still it was sold.

Four hours, two automobiles, five rooms of miscellaneous furniture, and dozens of boxes later the auction was over. People were clearing out, taking their new found 'treasures' to their own basements, garages, and closets. My Grandfathered faired pretty well during the hustle and bustle of the sale. He didn't bark at anyone during an Alzheimer's flare up. My Grandmother seemed relieved. Exhausted mentally and physically as well. And the rain came just as the last pile of bought items was being collected. I'm sure someone with better words than I could make a metaphoric comparison to the rain washing away the collected memories, belongings, and dust of over 80 years of possessions. I am not that man.

Labels: family, introspection

I posted this @ 6/04/2007 08:01:00 AM.............Need a link?..........

4/25/2007

THE MAMAS AND THE PAPAS

My maternal grandmother passed away a couple weeks ago. I didn't mention it at the time because... well... really what is there to mention about her? She is someone that I haven't spoken with since I was about 10 years old. Her husband, my maternal grandfather passed away a couple years ago and it was the same feeling. Or lack of feeling...

These are not the Grandparents who raised me. These are people on my Mother's side of the family.

Should I feel worse because someone that I am related to died? Because I honestly feel nothing. I can't even say I'd call them family. I keep a very unconventional definition of family. I am closer to some friends than I am some blood relatives. The saying goes "you can pick your friends, but not your family." I would disagree with that to a certain extent. You might not be able to pick who you are related to, but you can certainly pick you who you choose to call family.

Before my maternal grandfather passed away, I received an email from my mother. She said that he was ill and suggested that I go see him at some point. While I didn't see anything wrong with that idea. I didn't see the point either. It would be like visiting a stranger. While the news of my maternal grandmother's death was a bit more of a surprise (no one to suggest I should go see her before she dies), I can't imagine much was expected really.

My paternal Grandmother (the one who did raise me) called me to give me the news. She read it in my hometown paper. She asked if my mother had called me. She had not. A few days later I was planning on making a trip to see my paternal Grandmother. It was then she asked me if I was contacted by anyone on my mom's side of the family. Again, no. I guess I was to be a pallbearer at the funeral which was the prior weekend. My name was listed in the obituary as such. Oops!

Now here is where I get emotionally confused inside. Do I have much contact with that side of the family? No. Would I have gone to the funeral? No. Am I surprised that no one bothered to tell me at all? Yes, actually... A little. While I openly admit I don't feel anything, that doesn't mean that they don't. Or my biological mother specifically doesn't. If she cared enough to want me to go see her father, I'm surprised that there wasn't at least some acknowledgment for her mother.

Don't get me wrong. It's not keeping my up at night. But it just goes to show the on again-off again feeling of caring that she has. Does she want to maintain an open line of communication or not? I can't tell most of the time.

I learned that there are several families of aunt and uncles here in the city that I never knew existed. The curious side of me wants to know who they are. I probably won't... because.. really, why? It wouldn't serve to gain anything.

Maybe this is a little too personal for a blog, but I guess if you know me then you probably aren't' surprised by any of this, because you've heard me mention it before.

Labels: family, introspective

I posted this @ 4/25/2007 11:56:00 AM.............Need a link?..........

3/19/2007

YOU WERE ALWAYS ON MY MIND

I consider my friends to be members of my family... extended family if you will. I am fiercely loyal and would do anything for them to make sure that they are ok. If that means helping them out, if I am able to I certainly will. The downside to it is when something is on my mind. Call it an opinion, a viewpoint, a strong feeling, a suggestion, unsolicited advice... whatever. Sometimes it is almost impossible for me to hold my tongue. I'm always thinking. I'm always running 800 scenarios in my head of how things might play out. How they could be only if...

When I feel strongly about something I have a hard time holding my tongue. So, in the case of a friend you care about. A family member... Do you hold your tongue? Or tell them how you feel? What if it meant losing their friendship?

In the end, I feel that my voice has been heard... and I value a friendship more than I value my biased viewpoint. Putting aside the bias, I just hope the truth in what I feel can be seen.

Labels: family, friends, introspective

I posted this @ 3/19/2007 12:55:00 PM.............Need a link?..........

3/05/2007

WE ARE FAMILY

For a time I followed college volleyball. There was a player from Penn State who I thought looked enough like me to be eerie. I could never find a photo to do much of a comparison. Well, I finally did. Here you go! What do you think? One of us was adopted...

Ignore the fact that I'm smilin my ass off. It was three in the morning. We had to do something to entertain ourselves at work.