April 27th will mark the one year anniversary of the death of my beloved sister. Since January of 2005, my two (and only) sisters have died and my son and his wife will have have divorced. I'm indulging myself again with a "Queen for A Day" story. Take that any way you like. Maybe I'll win the appliances and furniture this time. If you're young, you may not even know what I'm talking about. Google "Queen For A Day".
Truly, I feel like a battered woman - not physically battered, but emotionally battered. It's been too much in too short a time. I don't have time to heal from one blow before the next one is upon me. Somehow I think my slow recovery is related to my early home life with my alcoholic father, where my sisters and I were emotionally and verbally abused as a regular part of our days. There's a hurt inside that has never totally healed, and it resurfaces in times like this.
Don't think that I see myself as unique, or suffering worse than anyone else. Others have suffered and are still suffering far worse than I. I am quite sure of that. I don't think that I'm the female version of Job, whom God has singled out for suffering. All of us have periods in our childhood that were less than perfect, and all of us suffer losses throughout our lives.
Somehow, despite the long-running verbal abuse from my father, I grew up with a strong sense of self. I did not internalize the abuse, for I knew that there was something very wrong with my father, and that the abuse was not because of anything I did, or because of anything inherently wrong with me. I remember when I was around 11 years old, thinking to myself, that my father could control my actions, and he could pile on the verbal and emotional abuse, but he could not control my thoughts. I have often wondered at this declaration of my independence - at least in my thoughts - and I have searched for influences that helped me to take this step.
My mother was emotionally absent, probably because she was overwhelmed by her disastrous marriage to an alcoholic and by the burden of a husband who worked only sporadically and changed jobs frequently, with the result that her low-paying clerical job was the steadiest source of income for my family. Of course, her low wage was not enough, and we were kept afloat with support from my mother's extended family, my grandparents, and my aunt. My mother loved us and worked hard to supply our physical needs, but we weren't close. Emotionally, she wasn't present for us, because her life was too hard. My middle sister and I wondered often why she didn't separate from our father and take us out of our miserable situation.
My grandmother, Mémère, was certainly a strong influence in my life. She was a strong woman, the hen who ruled the henhouse and the rooster. My grandfather, Didi, was sweet and loving and let her have her way. Occasionally, the sainted man would have an outburst of anger, filled with drama, that we didn't soon forget. One day, my younger sister and my cousin were fighting over a doll carriage. He really hated children fighting, and he said, "Give me that G*d damned carriage!" He took hold of the carriage and flung it high into the air far away in the distance from both of them. That ended the fight. I can't even remember if the carriage survived.
Mémère exercised her strength within the extended family, and her advice and interference - for that's what it often was - was not always welcomed by her children and sons- and daughters-in-law, and on more than one occasion, was not exercised wisely.
She was quite devout and would have liked all seven of her children to become nuns and priests. Alas, not one followed her plan. Four of the seven divorced their original spouses, and all of them made bad choices in their marriages. She had one son and three sons-in-law who were alcoholics. The family would have done Tennessee Williams proud as characters in one of his plays. I've wondered why my grandmother didn't choose the nunnery for herself, instead of getting married.
However, she loved me unconditionally. I was one of her favorites, and she was rather open about her favorites among her grandchildren, which did not help the little egos of those who were not favored. She was good to all of us, but you knew whom she liked best.
Another influence for the good was my Roman Catholic schooling. Although a bit of nonsense was doled out to us, on the whole we were well-taught, and the faith was planted early in my young soul. The school brought a sense of order into my life which was missing from my chaotic life at home.
My sisters did not make the same transition to independent thinking that I did. My middle sister married at 18 to a good man - or boy, I should say - for he was 19. She was a subservient wife for many years to her mostly benign patriarch of a husband. On occasion, I could glimpse his manipulative ways, but I held my tongue. I can say that he would not have fooled me for one minute.
Rather late in their marriage, she wanted a divorce, and they separated for two years but decided to get back together. My sister returned to the marriage a new person, her own woman, and I don't think that my brother-in-law ever got over the shock. In his favor, he loved her dearly, and took excellent care of her in her final illness, and sorely misses her since she's gone.
My younger sister took the path of replaying our early lives by marrying a much older man who was - guess what? - an alcoholic. She put herself and her children through a life similar in trauma to ours, but perhaps worse, because she lived away from us and did not have the benefit of extended family. I could not understand how she could live that awful life over again, but I gather that it's not uncommon for children of alcoholics to marry alcoholics. One time around was surely enough for me.
She died estranged from us. She was in and out of our lives periodically, and we did not know she was sick until two days before she died. We never saw her alive again, because she died before we could get to her. She died of untreated breast cancer - untreated by her own choice.
Along with present family difficulties, I face each day the catastrophic results of the appalling actions of the Bush administration throughout the world, these actions done in my name. In addition, my church looks to be self-destructing before my eyes.
However, through the trials then and now, I seem to be able to hang on to at least a slender thread of hope that things will get better. It's my faith that brought me thus far, and faith that will carry me the rest of the way. That is the truth of it.
I pray that this time of testing will lead me to be more compassionate to others who are suffering. I find it truly impossible to understand how with all the unpleasantness that comes our way in the normal course of human life that we choose to inflict unnecessary suffering on each other. I live in hope that we will see better days within my family, within my family in Christ, and within the family of my fellow citizens in my country.
Can you believe that I sometimes have the temerity to post a comment on Tobias Haller's erudite web site,
In A Godward Direction? There sit my simple-minded comments among the comments of the learned theologians and Scripture scholars. Tobias, gentleman that he is, is unfailingly kind and welcoming.
For all his learning, or perhaps because of his learning, Tobias's sermons, which you can find
here, are quite wonderful and accessible.
Here is an excerpt from his sermon on hope from last Sunday:
We too live between the two Jerusalems, the spoiled and unpromising Jerusalem of much of our daily life, and the hopeful joy of the Jerusalem in which the Lord’s table is set, and in which our true citizenship lies, a citizenship shared with the multitudes who gather for the banquet. May we, as our Lenten pilgrimage continues, learn to see the promise and the sharing and the hope, even when things seem unpromising, when people prove selfish, and hope seems impractical.
UPDATE: My nephew and his wife have a beautiful new baby girl. New life breaks through to bring us joy. Thanks be to God. May the Lord pour out abundant blessings upon them.
