Unconscious sisterly motivations?

I'm starting a vacation at the end of this week ahead. On Saturday, I'll be in Phoenix, with sister, brother-in-law, niece and nephew.

I'm closest to them of any family, because of what she and I went through together, and because she pushes religion much less than most the rest.

That said, she wants me to stay over Sunday morning. To hear my niece sing. In church.

Sorry, but no. First, I think my niece has some musical talent, but, she's not budding potential opera star. And, if I stay that late, I miss half a day at Joshua Tree, and it's almost not worth it unless I spend another day there.

Plus, while she does restrain from pushing religion on me ... unconsciously, I think her worries about my soul, or whatever, are more than she might consciously recognize.

With our parents' deaths, I don't have to see my oldest brother any more. I also don't have to go to church at all for religious-connected reasons any more.

And, it's not big, but, yes, there's a small bit of resentmentness in the back of my head.

My family of origin steps up its hypocritical preaching at me

Old readers of this blog, or my posting on secular recovery websites know that I'm a PK, and that most my family of origin is in church work careers, or married to those who are, or both. And me? I'm the atheist black sheep of the family (with a graduate divinity degree myself).

Oldsters also know that I'm a "survivor." Within the family — an incest survivor.

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Anyway, my aunt, my dad's sister (retired Lutheran parochial school teacher herself) has "preached" at me off and on over a decade, mainly via Christmas and Easter cards, as discussed here. Her daughter has done so off and on again on Facebook, and occasionally by email.

And now ... the younger of my two abuser brothers has started in. With the sidebar that he's still never admitted that. He has offered a backhanded apology in the past for not stopping my older brother. And now, he's offered a backhanded apology for anything else he might have done, while talking about Walt, my oldest brother, still as though he were the only abuser. He wrote me a six-page letter about this, in part a follow-up to him "outing" Walt to some family members last fall, as I discussed here.

That said, there was plenty of specific "other stuff" Tim has done even if he doesn't want to admit to that. Like getting me to steal from my sister's piggy bank. Teaching me how to shoplift. Introducing me to pot. Watching a friend of his give me white crosses. (Thank DOORKNOB I didn't get hooked on speed.)

I'm certainly not perfect. And I surely have bits of hypocrisy in my life. But not like that.

(My oldest brother, years ago, gave a backhanded admission of the abuse, but then said the fact that he was a minister was proof he was "beyond that now.")

Six page letter of preaching from Tim, the younger of the two. I have zero contact with Walt since both my parents' funerals. And, will certainly now lessen the degree of contact I have with Tim, too. I mean, I was so screwed up I used to think I had abused my sister!

Just needed to vent a bit, as part of a mental "fuck off" to him. And moving on.

If I am EVER that hypocritical, and you see me in person, please shoot me, have me arrested or something.

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As for Tim, the younger brother? If he's seeking some sort of absolution, as I think he is after his wife's death last summer, I have none to give. With Walt, with no contact with him, there's no old sore getting picked at again. But with Tim, in that sense, it's worse. He's being some degree of hypocritical about our childhood even while preaching at me today.

Add in that I'm by far the most politically liberal member of our family too — including that all three brothers, especially first and third, skirt close to racial lines, or even push beyond that envelope at times, and I have little reason to want to talk to them for that reason.

All I want to do, as the brother who makes the least money of any in the family, and the one who had the most of childhood life and development stripped away from him, is survive a few more years. I want to survive a few more years fiscally, even as I work in a dying industry, to know that I'll have no problems getting to the Social Security finish line. After that, I know I can further detach from my family, because I won't even have any dire begging financial need at that point. Give me two and a half, maybe three more years.

I may finish venting by writing one of those "never to be sent" letters. Otherwise, for his consumption, I'm ignoring him now.