I punched out of work at 11:06pm Saturday night. The exact time my sister died 23 years ago. August 23, 1985. I have to sit in my car for a few minutes and collect myself and my thoughts before I attempt to drive. On the one hand it hardly seems as if 23 years have elapsed. I can recall that night in vivid detail. If I close my eyes I’m there watching it all play out again in my minds eye. For obvious reasons I try not to do that. On the anniversary of her death I allow myself the latitude to mourn wholeheartedly. I got home from work and went right to bed, which is so unlike me. I just wanted to escape from the world and everyone in it. I guess as long as that’s a temporary feeling it’s OK to run with it.
I didn’t remind my kids what August 23rd was. None of them were alive. All they know about her they learned from me, over the years. The stories I would tell and the memories I would share. Ironically, they know more about my deceased sister, whom they never met, than they do about my still living, breathing, crazy, psycho, vindictive, revenge-seeking, life destroying surviving sister (whose made it this far because EVIL never dies). Well, I have 2 surviving sisters. The psycho and the twin of my deceased sister who my kids know and love.
That crazy b$#@h takes the ‘fun’ out of dys’fun’ctional. That’s all I can say about her right now. Seriously, she is a story for another day. If I write about her y’all will think I’m telling tales – she’s off the hook and off her rocker!
August 24th dawns clear and beautiful. A trip to Atlantic City awaits. A phone call from daughter #1 almost changes all that. She is taking daughter #3 to the Jimmy Buffett concert in AC for a birthday gift. The ex and I are driving down to make sure they arrive alive and walk the beach and boardwalk. We’re not going to the concert, per se.
Daughter #1 tells me she is going to meet us in Atlantic City, which was NOT the original plan because she is going with her friend whose birthday it is, to jump out of an airplane!!!!!!! Ayep! She drops that on me like a bomb. A ton of bricks. No fanfare. No cushion. She’s going to jump out of a plane with a knapsack strapped to her back containing a nylon bag and some string that some stranger folded up for her and trust that it will deliver her safely back to earth – ALIVE! I mean, c’mon, of course it will deliver her back to earth. I have NO question about that. It’s in what condition that concerns me. Needless to say, I FREAKED out. (I’m prone to doing that when it concerns my kids) It’s my God-given right as a mother.
Daughter #1 was, well, my 1st born child. I lost one before her. She nearly didn’t survive a traumatic birth. It was touch and go for weeks with 15 months of medication and tests and scans etc…..before she was pronounced 100%. I did NOT go through all that so she could kill herself jumping from a plane 22 years later. I have always told my kids, as they were growing up, I gave them life and if anyone was going to take it away from them it would be me, NOT some stupid risky reckless act on their part.
Life is filled with enough dangers like just crossing the street. Why exponentially increase the chances of something bad happening by doing something stupid? She even tried the argument that ‘air travel’ is safer then driving a car. OK!!!!! Jumping from a plane is so NOT considered ‘air travel’. Nice try, thought! Sheesh. She must think me an idiot.
In the middle of my freak out I asked her what made her think she was qualified to jump out of a plane when she can’t even ride a bike. She doesn’t ride a bike, she informed me, because she doesn’t have one. To which I replied, well, you don’t have a plane or a parachute so it only stands to reason you shouldn’t jump out of one with the other strapped to your back then. Same concept, eh?
She assured me that you don’t jump alone. There is someone with you, DUH, mother. Well DUH yourself. Is having someone else tethered to you going to somehow break your fall when you plummet to the earth after the chute fails to open? Is having someone with you going to somehow ensure your very survival just by virtue of their being there ‘with you’? Yeah! That’s what I thought. All that will do is make sure you plummet to your death with a witness who will never live to tell and me and some other mother are both out a child!!!!!
Just for the record, the ex was here when she called and he wasn’t much help. Were you expecting he should be? Ha! Neither did I. He didn’t think she should go – on the day of the concert. Schedule it for some other day, he says. I say – WHAT?!?!??! Are you crazy too? He says, I would probably try it. I say, GOOD!!!!! You go with your daughter’s friend and plummet to an early grave. I have less to lose if you don’t make it. I don’t have any EXTRA kids. I planned on 4. I had 4. Therefore I have NO extras to lose to some ridiculous risk taking adventure. They were all laughing at me – and my obvious pain. They thought I was funny – freaking out the way I did. They’re ALL nuts and now I have proof it’s hereditary – and they get it from HIS side of the family!!!!!!!
If they were psycho-crazy I wouldn’t be able to make the same argument. I would have to agree they probably got it from my sister, the aforementioned one. But we’re talking slightly insane here, not textbook psychopathic. What’s that ‘rattle’ I hear. The skeletons in the closet, I presume? The branches in our respective family trees?
Nah! It’s my teeth chattering as I dodge yet another bullet on the rocky road to the funny farm, where my children are collectively driving me!!! I’m sure this is what they have planned for me, instead of being like all the other kids and just picking my nursing home!!!!
Tags: Children, crazy, Insanity, Kids, Motherhood, parents, Skydiving
