ninanevermore

I handled the announcement well. We all did. No one got too emotional, no one panicked, and no one had to be consoled. Not me, and not my oldest or my youngest brother, either. We were told to keep quiet for now, because my middle brother – who is estranged from us siblings but no longer from our father – had not been told that our father has cancer.

It took me a full 24 hours to fall apart, right in the middle of congratulating myself on how well I was handling the news. I hate it when that happens.

( We don’t want you kids to worry, but I guess you need to know. )

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My kid brother Ron has always been weird, from the time he was small. My mother worried it was her fault. She was almost 39 when he was born and had scheduled a tubal ligation immediately after his birth, so he was induced in order to accommodate the surgeon's schedule. In addition to this, my mom's policy was to stop nursing her babies as soon as they got teeth and started to bite. Ron's teeth came in early, at 5 months old. She thought that taking him out of the womb and away from the breast before he was ready may have adversely affected him.

As a child, I was too guilt ridden to tell her that I was pretty sure it was my fault that Ron was weird, because when he was 4 and I was 5 I stood by and let him take an ass beating that I had coming and he didn't. Until Ron was in college and was diagnosed with Attention Deficit Disorder, I thought that perhaps this whooping had warped him beyond repair.

My mother died before she got the chance to learn that her youngest child was simply organically and physiologically strange, through no fault of her own. I was glad to be off the hook. Twenty five years after the whooping, I even apologized to Ron about the whooping. I hoped he didn't even remember it, but he did. Decency prevents me from typing out what he said I ought to have done to me for putting him through that, but lets just say he did not graciously accept my apology the way I hoped he would.

( Little Girls Will Look You in The Eye and Lie )

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Part of being a married couple is working around have two sides to your one family. For Thanksgiving Day this year, my husband's family called dibs, so we spent it with them. As a consolation prize, I told my father I would bring his grandson over the day after Thanksgiving to spend with him.

Two weeks ago when I asked if there were plans for Thanksgiving, my Dad answered, "Probably not." A few days before the big day, when he learned that my youngest brother, Ron, would not have to work (he is a corrections officer, and his 5-days on, 4-day off work schedule requires a calendar to keep track of when he can come around) and my oldest brother, Randy, would be home from Tennessee, he asked me what my plans were and if I wanted to join them for Thanksgiving dinner. During the first call, I think I did a good job of sounding regretful when I told him I had already made plans with my husband's family. I probably did a less convincing job of sounding excited when he called me back to let me know they would all put off Thanksgiving for 24 hours so I could be there. I had no choice but to resign myself to my fate and ask what I could bring to the meal.

( Turkey with a side of stewed discontent )

Today on my drive into work, I was thinking about one of the most important lessons that I learned from my mother: just because you harbor something ugly inside of you doesn't mean it has to control you. She never said this too me directly; I realized the lesson as an adult looking back some 10 years after she was dead.

My kid brother brought it up one day when we had coffee together, but it was something I had been thinking about a lot myself.

"Remember when mom used to make us go to our rooms and we weren't allowed to come out until she stopped throwing things?" he said, "You realize that she was scared she would beat the crap out of us, don't you?"

( It's okay to throw pillows, but never your children )

Today on the drive into work, I was thinking about my younger brother, Ron. In a family full of odd balls, he makes me look someone normal. I feel grateful to him for this.

( Some years ago, )