I hug them and head out while my sister is telling me that I should stay and have lunch with them since my other cousins will be joining us soon, and I shake my head in disagreement. My uncle smiles: " She has reached her boiling point." and I pretend to disagree....
The truth is that I had reached my boiling point the night before, when I walked to the closest grocery store and bought myself a giant ass beer and a pack of cigarettes. That very moment explained all the years of my dad's chain smoking and drinking. I spent two days with only two of his brothers and sisters in a beach house, my poor dad grew up with those people and no matter how much he tried to escape them, and he still does try to escape them, they never left his head.
Not that they are horrible people, on the contrary they are the best uncles and aunts one can wish for, I owe every ounce of my achievements and happiness in life to them. At the times of despair they are the people I turn to, and they never ever let me down. But the reality is that they are neurotic, grandiose and controlling and see nothing wrong with the way they are.
Failed marriages, unhappy relationships and very few friends does not deter them, they will always be right in their tiny universe.
And then there is the family curse, the curse of memory. It is a right of passage to the old age and death. We lose it all before crossing the gates of heaven or god knows what....
There was my grandpa, his sisters, and then bunch of people on my father's mother side...
We have learned the best way to deal with it is having a sense humor about it...
My aunt has good days, regular days, bad days and there are the impossible days...
Good days are when she asks the same questions only couple of times: "Is there a cure for my memory problem?" She asks me couple of time and each time I come up with a different answer and she doesn't notice...
In regular days she loses her raincoat, she leaves it in one room or some body's car and then frantically searches for it...
In bad days she is nervous and agitated...
And then there are the impossible days when she retreats to a corner and becomes silent. We all know there are consequences to pay, she is gonna kick someone out of her circle of trustees and will never ever set foot in that person's house. My youngest aunt's husband whom she has known literally since birth since he has been my older uncle's childhood friend is still in her black list and nobody really knows why, she has mentioned something about an inappropriate joke that has hurt her pride to my father and we all know her claim has no ground, but then she does not really live in the same world as we do.....
Well all joke about it, maybe she has caught it from grandpa, the bug of Alzheimer, since she was his take care in the last years; when my dad would kneel down in front of him and begging his father to remember him . And he would look at my dad indifferent, looking more interested in his food than a middle aged stranger who claimed to be the son who left home for college some thirty years ago.
The interesting aspect of this disease is that it only inflicts pain on the people around the patient not the patient itself.
I remember my father staring at a Pet Scan of his dad's brain and showing it to me.. " You see this, its my fathers' memory all disappearing." he would tell me. There it was the memory of my father's birth and then his college graduation, then his wedding. My aunt's death, my cousins births and then the famous poetry nights in my grandparents house all fading away.....
My mother is worried, my dad could be next . And sometimes I feel she looks forward to it, maybe he finally changes for better who knows?
I have now crossed over from growing up to growing old....
I now help to care for the elderly in my family, drink beer when I am distressed and take long walks on the beach.....
Sooner than later I am buying a house......
I am now pretty much part of the life, no more escapes, cause really there is no escaping this...
The truth is that I had reached my boiling point the night before, when I walked to the closest grocery store and bought myself a giant ass beer and a pack of cigarettes. That very moment explained all the years of my dad's chain smoking and drinking. I spent two days with only two of his brothers and sisters in a beach house, my poor dad grew up with those people and no matter how much he tried to escape them, and he still does try to escape them, they never left his head.
Not that they are horrible people, on the contrary they are the best uncles and aunts one can wish for, I owe every ounce of my achievements and happiness in life to them. At the times of despair they are the people I turn to, and they never ever let me down. But the reality is that they are neurotic, grandiose and controlling and see nothing wrong with the way they are.
Failed marriages, unhappy relationships and very few friends does not deter them, they will always be right in their tiny universe.
And then there is the family curse, the curse of memory. It is a right of passage to the old age and death. We lose it all before crossing the gates of heaven or god knows what....
There was my grandpa, his sisters, and then bunch of people on my father's mother side...
We have learned the best way to deal with it is having a sense humor about it...
My aunt has good days, regular days, bad days and there are the impossible days...
Good days are when she asks the same questions only couple of times: "Is there a cure for my memory problem?" She asks me couple of time and each time I come up with a different answer and she doesn't notice...
In regular days she loses her raincoat, she leaves it in one room or some body's car and then frantically searches for it...
In bad days she is nervous and agitated...
And then there are the impossible days when she retreats to a corner and becomes silent. We all know there are consequences to pay, she is gonna kick someone out of her circle of trustees and will never ever set foot in that person's house. My youngest aunt's husband whom she has known literally since birth since he has been my older uncle's childhood friend is still in her black list and nobody really knows why, she has mentioned something about an inappropriate joke that has hurt her pride to my father and we all know her claim has no ground, but then she does not really live in the same world as we do.....
Well all joke about it, maybe she has caught it from grandpa, the bug of Alzheimer, since she was his take care in the last years; when my dad would kneel down in front of him and begging his father to remember him . And he would look at my dad indifferent, looking more interested in his food than a middle aged stranger who claimed to be the son who left home for college some thirty years ago.
The interesting aspect of this disease is that it only inflicts pain on the people around the patient not the patient itself.
I remember my father staring at a Pet Scan of his dad's brain and showing it to me.. " You see this, its my fathers' memory all disappearing." he would tell me. There it was the memory of my father's birth and then his college graduation, then his wedding. My aunt's death, my cousins births and then the famous poetry nights in my grandparents house all fading away.....
My mother is worried, my dad could be next . And sometimes I feel she looks forward to it, maybe he finally changes for better who knows?
I have now crossed over from growing up to growing old....
I now help to care for the elderly in my family, drink beer when I am distressed and take long walks on the beach.....
Sooner than later I am buying a house......
I am now pretty much part of the life, no more escapes, cause really there is no escaping this...
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