at least sort of. saturday was an incredible flurry of activity on the part of me, mom, and one aunt/uncle set, packing up her stuff. it was a bit tricky to keep mom focused at first, but between me and my uncle (a former army guy) we got done in about 2 hours, including time for mom to write dad a goodbye note.
meantime min kept dad busy, apparently having a very nice time. they really do get along wonderfully, so much that when she had to drop him off under a bit of a guise (reparking the car), she felt horrible for a while, wondering if he would think she was just 'being nice' in order to get him out of the house. i think he knows better, but we'll see.
min met the rest of us at the safeway down the street, and i got back into the car with her. as we drove away i started crying, thinking about how lonely and confused and angry he had to be in that moment. i had woke up that morning crying over the same thing. for all the stupid, hurtful things he has done, he is still my dad, i love him, and don't want him to be hurting.
but these things go in waves, the feelings. and so it was that a while after my early-am crying spell, min stopped me and said, you know i'm really angry at your dad right now. we have all this angst, are going to all this effort because he keeps fucking up.
at that moment i felt very calm and so i said, yeah, i felt that way about a month ago. :-p
my dad is supposed to get a phone sometime today. the only way he had to contact us in the meantime, should he choose, was email. it was quite possible he would do something rash after all this (it has happened before) and so we were very glad to see an email from my dad saturday evening.
of course it was rather pleading, full of very mixed messages...and sent to me. there have been two more messages since and i am determined to talk to my mom tonight, get him her new email address. at first she said she'd reply via my account but later i realized being their intermediary is not ok with me.
that's it for now - my extremely dreary workday is about over, and i am so outta here. i am just grateful this seems to be proceeding rather smoothly so far, and hope i have not just jinxed things.
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8 comments:
Hoping transitions will be as smooth as they possibly can be. These sound like rough emotional times. Kudos to your mom for having the courage and kudos to you and Min for being there for both of your parents....
thanks cecile. i do feel a bit like i'm waiting for the shoe to drop, with my dad, but hopefully things are already shoeless. ;)
Hi, Heather! Gosh, it sounds like a lot has been going on since we last talked. I really hope everything continues to (sort of) work out. Yikes. You've got a lot on your plate. Anyway, thinking of you and wishing you the best, and we'll get together again one of these days! I'll be out of town a lot through the end of the year, but I'll keep checking in on your blog!
thanks kelley. things seem pretty busy for you! if we don't say hi, hope you have a good rest of 2008. =)
Wow. It's a real gut-wrencher when you are forced to hurt someone you love. Thank you for having the courage to share it with us.
There are some situations where there's no win-win outcome, and no matter what you do it will hurt. I know it doesn't help to hear me say it, but you are doing the right thing, and that's the best you can do when something like this happens.
Take care of yourself, too.
thanks gs. this morning i found out my dad is pretty pissed at me. i can see why, but it's odd that i found out via my sister. otoh, maybe it's better he's not venting directly at me. :-p
I'm glad things went sort of smoothly - as smoothly as something so difficult can go. Maybe this is exactly what he needs to try to get a handle on his life. I'm sorry you had to be in the middle of it, but I'm also glad you could be there for your mom.
This is a huge deal for all of you. Wow.
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