Arg. Frustrating day. I ignored an invoice from Google Apps because I thought it was something we were no longer using. Turns out our corporate e-mail is tied to it so here I am at my office, trying to get it restored. Payed the stupid $80 bill, but now it's still not turned back on. The one amazing thing is that I actually talked to a live person at Google. I didn't think there were live people working there - thought everything was controlled by 'bots. Just kidding of course - I actually have a friend who worked there for a time.
Here's the story I told yesterday, told with different eyes:
When I was a child, one of the highlights was an invitation from wealthy friends to a Fourth of July party held on their waterfront property. This kind of event was rare for our family so, when my father told me of the invitation, I all but jumped out of my skin with excitement. I remember impulsively grabbing him around his waist and hugging him with joy. I remember his shocked reaction - he didn't know what to do with that hug. I remember his stiffening and me backing away, confused and ashamed, feeling like I had done something wrong by hugging him - feeling repelled.
He was an enigma to me. I never could figure him out, never knew how he felt about inheriting an instant family with four children aged 1-9. He had been a bachelor until his late '40's when he met my mother, had lived with his parents all his single years. He was brilliant but odd. It was a mixed blessing that he took us all on. Certainly we were saved from financial ruin - he provided for us. We benefited from his intellectual and musical standards (he was well educated and played many instruments). My mother craved the intellectual stimulation - that must have been what she was drawn to when she married him (that and the the fact that he would have us!).
I'm not sure what happened that day and why I've latched onto that moment as being so life pivotal. Maybe it was and maybe it wasn't. In retrospect I question the story I've told, that the one hug (or lack thereof) was a no-turning-back moment for me. I have to think it was just one of many things that I found confusing and traumatic. When I look at pictures of myself from that time, I was beautiful (if a bit disheveled) - I was not repulsive. I will never know what went through Henry's head that day. I will never know what through his head at all - I do not know his stories - he was very closed to us. I can make some guesses now, with the eyes of an adult. If I look at the man in context of his Victorian upbringing, it seems obvious that he would have been brought up in an austere, unaffectionate way and hugging would feel foreign to him. A more sinister thought has occurred to me. My sister and he had a very different relationship - almost flirty. She has said on occasion that she didn't feel sexually safe around him and asked me if I felt the same. I didn't, so I couldn't answer "Real" on that one. But what if she were right and he was drawn to us in that way? Then his stiffening could have been his recoiling at his own feelings. If that's the case, and he never acted inappropriately towards us (he didn't) then maybe he is the hero of the story to have controlled his impulses. Maybe the physical distance he put between himself and us was for our protection.
This is total conjecture - something I'm not going to spend a lot of time thinking about because I have absolutely no foundation (or very little) to be floating such blasphemous hypotheses and it is not my intention to assassinate his character. The point of this exercise is to simply say, "What if...," and entertain other scenarios, other explanations. There was certainly a lot going on with him that I wasn't then, nor am I now, privy to. He was a brutal man but a complex one. He wasn't all bad. I have a positive legacy from his as well as the unfortunate one I described yesterday. I am intellectual, well read, eschew television like he did, I am musical, a good cook like he was, I am elite (like he was - and I make no apologies for that - elite is not a dirty word), and I have a twisted sense of humor like he did.
Another thing for me to consider. There were two ways to go in my childhood home - it was an eat or be eaten environment. I chose to be a warrior to survive. At an early age I armored up and went out into the world to make my fortune, well equipped for anything I would encounter. My forceful, take no prisoners personality was really useful as I navigated the turbulent seas of adulthood. Failure was not an option. I kept the armor on until such time as I was secure enough to shed it and even now, it sits in the corner, ready to be donned as needed. I'm not so sure that, in this world, being tough as nails, when you need to be, is such a bad thing.
The challenge today is to continue thinking about your own stories. It was harder than I thought to put a different spin on a sacred story that has grown old with ruts for having been told so many times. The takeaway is to think more broadly and creatively about the things you remember - the stories you cling to as life changing events. Maybe you've got it right, but maybe there is more than meets the eye once you accept the challenge of looking deeper. It's like Cold Files. My sister said something important, as we discussed this topic. There is a danger to this re-storying. What we mustn't do is to change the facts to be self serving. The idea is to dig deeper for the truths, not manipulate the past to justify ourselves.
Peace,
Sarah
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