Every parent's worst nightmare

[flexagon]

Come around at Christmas
I really have to see you
Smile at me slyly
Another festive compromise.

I feel like the embodiment of every parent's worst nightmare. Here I sit in the airport, and I am BITTERLY resentful about having to travel to see parents (both heisenbug's and mine). I don't miss any of these people and I don't want to disrupt our lives to fly across the country, fuck up my workout schedule, forget what I'm doing at work and endure forced family-time. I am cruel: I want to shake these people and say "you had us 35 years ago! 40 years ago! Aren't you kind of, you know, OVER IT by now?" But they will never be over it. Parenthood does that to people.

My mother-in-law wasn't very understanding of my desire to do acro with the Portland monkey crew tomorrow night, and my mother (who was) had the nerve to say this is supposed to be a relaxing vacation for me. (Bullshit! if that's what it was, I'd be staying in Boston). At a party with friends on Sunday I felt kind of disconnected too, but that was fine, because that crowd didn't mind my being quiet and taking little book-reading breaks in another room. I know that my mother would see that kind of self-care behavior as rudeness bordering on a direct attack.

All the free-floating peace that I can gather up when in my city, doing my own thing, vaporizes in the presence of older family like so much dry ice. AGH, fuck it. There's this lovely wall right here, and dwelling on this doesn't do me as much good as stretching and doing handstands would.

Comments

[coraline]

right there with you :}
see my much longer commentary to the same effect elsewhere.
hope you're back to your version of normalcy and things that make you happy (and Boston) very soon.

[flexagon]

i already had your post open to comment when they called boarding for my flight!

You, me, Boston, the new year, coffee! Yes? :-) I really want to talk again.

[coraline]

yes please! December got away from me, but we should schedule. weekend days are at a premium - do weekday evenings ever work for you? :)

[flexagon]

Thursday evenings work! Want to grab a Thursday in January? I'd be happy to stand you a drink somewhere.

(You and/or a date would also be welcome to join me and heisenbug for our weekly dinner at Christopher's on Fridays, pretty much any week.)

[coraline]

Thursdays are the one bad day for me - band practice. dinner at Christopher's sounds nice though. *takes this to email*

[silentq.livejournal.com]

Oof, I hear you. I found myself stressing out about how to deal with my mother's enforced xmas phone call last night and it went about as badly as I feared. She just doesn't *get* it that spending the day alone is blissful for me. :-\ See also: guilt for not flying 8 hours to spend a few days crawling out of my skin with them. *sigh*
Hope your travels are safe and you find happiness in acro. :-)

[a-kosmos.livejournal.com]

I totally love that they think that this could be a "relaxing vacation." Relaxing and family don't usually go together.

[soong.livejournal.com]

Since my parents moved away from the town where I grew up I find pretty little reason to go visit them. Haven't done it in a couple years, probably get around to a trip some time this spring to see the new house they're building.

Something about this post reminded me of the old song Cat's In The Cradle (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KUwjNBjqR-c), probably the last couple verses where the kid doesn't really want to spend time with the parent.

[nevers.livejournal.com]

blargh. i relate. and yet i can't deny that there are times when having a relationship with my parents is quite valuable: in part because of things and money given to me (90% of my wardrobe was bought for me by my stepmom over the past few years), and in part because they have insights into my life and personality that nobody else does. and maintaining that good relationship requires visits.