The shithole of 2016

As noted in a previous post, I had my arm broken for me. (I didn't break it myself, did I?)

I have so far gotten back somewhere around 85-90 percent of normal function, albeit with a degree of stiffness at times.

And, on Dec. 30, I got fired / downsized / shitcanned / newspapersized from my now-former newspaper.

The last time I was unemployed, in 2009, it was for just over two months and the PTSD-related anxiety started chewing on me.

On the plus side, this time, was having even more money saved up toward the future, having more of an idea of networking, having more options for job searching, and being a bit less fearless / anti-selfish in creating alternate resumes and trying to get them to sparkle more.

On the minus side? Being in a small town well away from cities of real size. The PTSD again. Being of an age where in America, one is subject to age discrimination. (Seen it happen before.)

Well, I landed another job. Still in newspapers. Part of it sounds like a dog returning to its vomit. Part of me, though, knows it's "realistic," at least for today's America. That's even as one sobriety friend whom I friended on Facebook, and need to cut out of start seeing such posts, says people should start practicing more "acceptance" of such, not just psychologically but politically.

And, emotionally? Maybe it took this additional "break," pun intended, but ...

I finally cried tonight (other than for 30 seconds before calling my sis on that day) for the first time since I broke that arm, or rather, had it broken for me. It was while I was watching on You Tube a song excerpt from one of my favorite, poignant, musical movies of all time — "Sunrise, Sunset" from "Fiddler on the Roof."

I had said a while back to sobriety friends, and then social media friends, that I still felt like such a thing was coming on, and needed to be coming on.

It's 2 a.m., and time to wrap this one up, as poignant, introspective Rachmaninov now plays.

That was an interesting dream

President Obama was at some end-of-presidency event, maybe a post-presidential one. I was there with my dad, who eventually kissed him, not in a gay way, but a Middle Eastern greeting way. Then, my mom popped in the picture and I introduced her to Obama. (Both parents died before he became president, compounding the unreality.) Then my sis came in. Not sure at all where this dream sequence came from.

Deep thoughts, deep emotions

It's been more than four months since I've written here.

In large part, the second part of that has been unavoidable.

My arm was broken in a car wreck on June 10. I've been meaning to sit down here for a while, but, getting through doctor's visits, surgery to remove the pin from the outside bone, the ulna, continuing to work, including showing back up on the Monday morning after a Friday afternoon wreck — I'll talk more on that below — and other things have chewed deeply into my time.

And, that said, maybe I've been afraid to face myself here.

I've already been confronted with an aging, single secularist dependent on help from others, particularly from one coworker, the staff writer at my newspaper.

Beyond her help as a chauffeur and also an occasional emotional sounding board, I've simply ...

already been confronted with an aging, single secularist who is afraid he won't get back 100 percent of his arm and hand usage, along with ramped-up versions of old fears about being stuck in his current job and locale.

THAT's part of what I've been afraid to face.

Meanwhile, I have the job-related anxieties of a new publisher now here, having taken many weeks, and finally landing a sports writer (I think), and a bit of a small resentment over feeling underappreciated, and, beyond the local level, not enough concern expressed about how my broken arm was rehabbing and other things.

I've had some new rounds of quasi-deja vu that I'm going to get out of here. But, deja vu isn't a metaphysical fulcrum. Whether it's to consolidate memories, a brain with a mini-glitch in firing or what, it's not that. But, it is, perhaps, hope.

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.

==

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.

==

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.

Death doesn't take a holiday, as college makes me feel older

Regular readers, who know the person behind this, may know a fair amount of my background, but I'll provide it anyway as an explainer.

I went to my dad's conservative religious alma mater for my undergraduate degree, out of a mix of drift, depression, and not bucking his passive control of me, when I was in high school. I then went on to his graduate seminary before kicking at the traces.

The above is part of why I worry about employment and related economic issues. The college is now closed, and with my originally slated four-year graduating class having about 50-60 people (yes, that small) and my actual five-year graduating class (in the last year the school was open) having even less, I don't have a lot of networking for jobs among the old fellow alums. And, of course, a seminary exists for one particular thing. (Well, with academic graduate degrees, it exists also for continuing education of pastors, and creation of professors for there and the denomination's colleges, but still, there's no alumni office for job placement help there, either.)

My college still sends out a quarterly newsletter. That includes an "in remembrance" of the recently dead. This time, that includes the college's business manager when I was there. And an affiliated ministerial-evangelist staffer. And the chaplain at the state mental hospital in the same town, who was an alum and had college affiliation. And, the father of a classmate. And a classmate. Then, after the newsletter had been printed, found out that the college's last president died.

Not only does it make me feel older, but, I think it has subconsciously kicked up another round of resentment over life issues. And, I need to let that happen. Including any feeling of "stuckness."

More family of origin issues

Two months ago, I noted that the younger of my two abusive brothers had sent out a semi-truthful circular letter to my aunt (my dad's one sister) and another sibling.

My aunt, a parochial school teacher, years ago used to say she was hoping for my conversion, in Christmas, Easter and birthday cards.

That had faded away for a few years though.

Until this year.

I got that message in my birthday card a month ago.

Fine enough. I have some childhood issues related to her, anyway; they include trying to be a bit of a surrogate mother after my parents divorced, and especially after my dad moved to St. Louis, where she lived. I don't think this was as total of an effort as another sibling thinks, but I do think there was something to it. And, she, like dear old dad, I think wanted to see all of us kids at least consider religious vocations, so there's that. Certainly she, like dad, knew of my science interests and aptitude and didn't encourage it.

Back to the birthday card.

While saying she still hoped — and prayed — for me to accept Jesus, etc., there was NOTHING about Brother No. 3's letter.

The more I pondered that, the more angry, for me, I got. She and Brother No. 2 both like to "manage" family history and perceptions, and this is clearly another example of that.

I'd stay an unbeliever just to spite family perceptions, if nothing else.

Sorry, Auntie Em, but we're no longer in Kansas. And, if you don't want to talk about that letter, to the degree it is truthful, then let your grandkids be in some kind of danger around Brother No. 1.

A family secrets letter comes in the mail

I'm going to give some of my family of origin background, possibly a bit more than I have before, and certainly more than new readers of this blog have seen.

I am the fourth brother in a family of several children. Brother No. 1, after being sexually abused by somebody (he once, in a pseudo-apologetic letter, said neighborhood kids, and made it sound like a one-time event, which I doubt), sexually abused Brother No. 3, who both then sexual abused me and Another Sibling. For me, at least, it lasted about two years, maybe more. Elizabeth Loftus's theories on childhood memory — some pretty good, some total bullshit — aside, I don't remember a lot of specific events. I remember enough to say that, at a minimum, it lasted about two years.  Abuse was not nightly or even weekly, but it happened often enough to be ongoing, yet intermittent enough to have the additional psychological "reinforcement" that intermittent punishments, like intermittent rewards, have.

Dad was mildly-moderately physically abusive and pretty soundly emotionally abusive. It would be harder to name details, but he as a conservative minister was surely religiously abusive. And, Another Sibling wonders if dad sexually abused all of us. I, for reasons noted above, can't say one way or the other, but it would be no surprise.

Mom was sometimes emotionally neglectful, and other times, even that's not the right phrase. She was simply psychologically absent. And, she engaged in what professionals would call covert sexual abuse.

No broken bones (I think) on the physical side, or burns. But, hits in the mouth/face, among other things. If 1 is totally screwed up and 10 is angelic on child-rearing, dad was 3.5 or so on physical abuse. 3 on emotional/verbal. My brothers were 2.5 on their sexual abuse, and just one act of dad's, if he did it, would be 2.5 or lower. Mom was 3.5 on emotional neglect/absence and 3.5 on covert sexual abuse.

In short, being honest, not the worst of families, but, with all abusive issues combined, a white middle-class family that was in the bottom 10 percent overall, by all races and socioeconomic classes, on family dysfuctionality.

As for that pseudo-apologetic letter from No. 1? Over my first two years of sobriety life, and getting back memories, and getting back emotional connections to them, I grew more confronting (by mail and phone) with both him and dad. He eventually admitted he had done some things, without getting specific, but with claiming the fact that he was a minister himself now showed that was all behind him, and shouldn't this just be water under the bridge? No. He had no real apology, plus, he still seemed to be affected from whatever was in his background. (Note: I of course reject the idea that being abused automatically makes one become an abuser.)

I never have confronted No. 3. He's engaged in his own form of denialism. He's admitted that No. 1abused him, while telling both me and Another Sibling that he wished he'd done more to stop No. 1 from abusing us, but never admitting that he not only was involved in such abusiveness himself, but that at times, it was ONLY No. 3, without No. 1 being around.

Time to tie these last two paragraphs together.

No. 3's wife died late this summer. Rest of family was there for the funeral, and I was out there, as part of vacation, a couple of weeks later.

Apparently No. 1 was out there a couple of weeks later.

He, No. 3, No. 3's oldest son, his current girlfriend, and her son by previous relationship were all gathered together.

No. 3 asked the son to kiss him, "on the cheek," before they left. No. 1 then reportedly kissed the son on the lips then bragged about it.

No. 3 said this brought up "stuff" for him. So, he wrote a fairly detailed three-page letter. Sent one to me, one to Another Sibling, and the third to dad's sister. Brother No. 2 lives in the same metro area as her and her husband; her two kids, both married and with children at home, also lives there. And, Brother No. 1 lives in the same state and his one child also lives in that same metro area.

So, depending on how much Auntie tells, and to whom, various amounts of shit could be hitting the fan at the very time as I type this, for their Thanksgiving. I think she'll play her cards close to her vest, and not tell either of her kids. Whether she tells No. 2 or not, or even asks him to corroborate, could be a different story, and interesting enough.

Another Sibling had not told No. 2 about No. 1 or No. 3 when I got sober and got back memories. I did, in part unawares that she hadn't. He accused me of false memory syndrome.

I told myself, after mom died (dad was already gone), that I had no real need to see No. 1 again. This only reinforces that. And, although No. 3 isn't as psychologically scarred or twisted in some ways as No. 1, now that his wife is dead, I have little real reason to see him, either.

Sometimes blood is far thinner than water.

Expectations after triggering events

Yes, in both the secular sobriety and 12-step worlds, as well as in life in general, we're admonished about not packing too much in the way of expectations in our suitcases.

As for "triggering events"? If you're an abuse survivor, specifically one diagnosed with PTSD, you know what I mean there. I've had a few other things that have had me "on edge," or primed to be triggered, to boot — one of which will be my next post here — as well as my recent move.

The actual trigger?

For me, it was covering the worst fatality accident I've been to as a newspaper reporter and editor. Usually in such cases, the body of the person killed has been taken to a morgue, if dead at the scene. And, if they die at a hospital or in transport, that's that.

In this case, the mother of a 19-year-old was called out to the scene. And, making things even worse, she missed her daughter's body being taken by the hearse by no more than two minutes.

I've never heard such a sound — the old English word "keening" came to mind — in my life. Possibly a mother seeing her kid killed by gun violence or in a war would be the same, or even worse. And, since it was a pedestrian-car accident after dark, I'm still not sure that what I thought was roadkill remains bits of a small animal wasn't ...

Anyway, I checked in with friends on Facebook and a couple of online sobriety groups. And, on the professional side, after emailing the owner of our small newspaper group about the proprietary of a certain picture angle and content, the next day, did a follow-up email to her noting that, well, I was somewhat out of sorts.

Without wanting to focus on the negatives, because a number of people did more than just "like" my Facebook page, they responded ...

I was disappointed that not more people in my two online sobriety email groups responded. And that my company owner, who I would consider at least a close acquaintance, if not a semi-friend, didn't respond, either, whether as a friend, or professionally as someone with years of experience in the business herself.

No, things do not happen "for a reason"

Personally, I loathe this, whether out of the mouths of conventionally religious, out of the mouths of New Ages, or out of the orifices of 12-steppers, for two reasons.

One is that I know my sexual abuse didn't happen "for a reason."

Two, as shown here in detail, it's got a huge, gross, boatload of insensitivity behind it.

This also illustrates why the Silver Rule is better than the Golden Rule.

"Do NOT do unto others what you do NOT want them to do to you."