via Daily Prompt: Explore

In my step work I am forced to explore a lot of my character defects.  I have done a thorough inventory of my self and put pen to paper.  I have yet to sit down and share this with anyone.  Which is the next step.  I will let my higher power decide when the time is right for this to happen.  So far what I’ve discovered is that most of my life and behavior has been run by FEAR.  I suffer from a fear of abandonment, anxiety, people pleasing and self contentedness.  I don’t know that I need to know where it all came from, but I do know that I need acknowledge it.  I need to look at each defect and understand how it affects me.  How I can learn to cope with them and not allow them to control my thinking and my actions.  It’s a daily struggle if my recovery is to remain strong then I need to consistently work on this.

I’m supposed to be going to dinner with my family tonight.  I’m not even the least bit excited.  I’m filled with anxiety and searching for a way to get out of it.  I often wonder what “normal” people feel when it comes time to visit with family.  I could take it or leave it.  I think of it as an obligation for being born.  It’s just something that I have to do.  I would rather not have to go, but it makes them happy.  I feel like the guilt trips that I would get would be worse than sitting through an our of awkward social interaction.  I dread the thought of all the time they will spend planning other functions or asking questions about my life.  It’s feel so fake being there.  Put on a smile and eat your food….

I know that they can sense my unease.  I have a tendency to come across as angry, and maybe I am a bit, about having to be there.  I think that my brother and his wife take advantage of the fact that Dad is paying for this meal.  They will order the most expensive thing on the menu and even order a bottle of wine with their meal.  Maybe this is what “normal” people do? But it always makes me uncomfortable.  Not the drinking part of it, but just that they don’t seem to have a problem with spending someone else’s money.  When it’s someone else’s dime I try to be modest about what I’m going to order.  I suppose I should not let it bother me, if it bothered my Dad I think he would say something.  Then again, he is not one to say anything to your face about what’s bothering him.  When he is pissed about something he goes to Mom and tells her about it.  Which is totally healthy, given they’ve been divorced for 18 years…..

 

update…..

So dinner has come and passed.  It wasn’t the worst I guess.  I can’t help but feel like Mom was upset because I didn’t sit near her and Dad and because I didn’t spend enough time with them.  But it’s kind of hard when it’s a table of 8 and you have all these personalities to contend with.  Every family event turns into this drama.  She gets a glass of wine into her and suddenly she is hyper emotional and I’m mad at her, or Mare doesn’t like her, or we think she is ditsy (or some such word she often uses)   I can’t recall the last time that I had a nice uneventful visit with her.  I can, however, remember the last time that I had to pre-game (drink a bunch of vodka) prior to having dinner with her.  She was often more tolerable when I was drinking, I just don’t have the patience for it now.  Usually Pat and I would be downing the beers or Jagr during the visit.  I don’t think he realized that I had already had a mickey or so of vodka.  Sometimes having other family members around can ease the tension.  Our niece Kayla is such a character and she usually makes things tolerable because she is hilarious.  They also brought Thelma, Kelly’s grandmother, she is a fantastic lady.  She is 91 and is really very funny.  Thank God for those two.  I was happy to spend time with them and it would have been nice to get to talk to Pat a little more. But I made it through another family event.

When I got home Mare suddenly became very moody again.  I asked her what’s wrong, and she says “nothing”.  (of course because we all storm around like someone shit in our mouth when everything is good)  So I asked her again, “what’s really going on?”  She told me that her Dad still hasn’t called.  I asked if she tried calling again, and of course not nor did she leave a message and ask him to call her.  I suppose it’s reasonable to assume he is supposed to know to call given his daughters mood.  Totally…….nothing weird at all about that.

I’ve done it again dammit.  I’ve let someone else’s mood and emotions affect my day.  I have no control over people places and things.  But I can control how I react to things.  This is said to me over and over and over….how has it not sunk in yet?  Mare has been in a bad mood all day and I could not figure out why.  I point out to her that she seems to be moody and she confirms it and then just leaves the house with out saying one word to me.  She takes off for the gym, which is fine but how come I don’t even get to hear a “see you soon” or a “bye, be back in a bit”.  Nothing, not a fucking peep.  How is a person supposed to react to this type of situation?  I can’t get my head around it.  She eventually told me that she is upset because it is Easter and she isn’t speaking to her family.  Well what pisses me off is that it’s HER choice not to speak to her family.  She could call her Dad, or her Sister and have a conversation very easily.  But she won’t, they don’t even know that she isn’t talking to them.  This is a one sided, self imposed situation.  And I’m the one that has the problems?  Of course I couldn’t keep my mouth shut and asked her why she couldn’t just tell me that or just call her Dad.  She told me that she hates to talk about her feelings.  Which I know, and I empathize with but I also know that nothing changes if nothing is done.  You can’t expect the world to know what is going on in your head.  You can’t be pissed off with someone and just expect things to change if they never know that there is a problem.  I feel like I’ve heard this before…..

The second time I was involved in a drug deal it was supposed to be for myself.  I had this friend in school that used to sell stuff on the side.  He worked at a fancy men’s clothing shop downtown in Pembroke.  They sold suits and rented tuxes and Chris used to sell drugs out of there as well.  He wasn’t the most prolific drug dealer, but he was busy enough.  A buddy of mine and I decided to buy a small amount of hash, hash was much easier to get in the Valley compared to weed.  So I talked to Chris and he told me it would be no problem, just get him twenty bucks and he would sort us out.  Adrian and I gathered our money and we cam up with the twenty bucks and headed down to the store to meet Chris.  We get there and go into this store and we stand out like a sore thumb.  I’m a punk guy with ripped jeans, a beard, black doc martens and I clearly don’t look like I am there to rent a tux.  Not many tuxes get worn to a punk show.  Anyway, I see Chris behind the front desk and go over to him.  He says to us that “sure I can break a twenty!” and he takes my money.  Then he hands me a toonie.  I look at the toonie and it’s got a blob of hash stuck to it.  Chris looks at us and says have a nice evening.  Sweet!  Drug deal completed!

We rush out of the store and head to our friends car that is waiting for us out on the street.  Now it’s summer in the Valley and that means it’s hot and muggy so we figure why not head down to one of the local beaches on the Ottawa river.  The hash can get smoked either at the beach or when we get home.  So the three of us head to the beach and jump in the water.  It’s a fantastic feeling washing the sweat and heat away.  After a few minutes I get out of the river and up onto the beach.  Here is the fuck up.  I suddenly realize that I have forgotten to take the special toonie out of my pocket and now I am scrambling checking my pocket to see if it’s still in there.  I can’t find it anywhere.  We jump back into the water to see if we can find it.  The driver turns his car to face the beach and puts the lights and high beams on, Adrian and I are crawling up and down the beach looking for this fucking toonie.  After about 20 minutes, we are all laughing our asses off at the ridiculousness of this situation.  Eventually the search is called off and we head back into town to get some coffee.  I’m just not cut out to be a drug guy…….