Le Sigh

Familial fragmentation and dysfunction makes me indescribably frustrated to the point where getting away sounds like it may just be the best option. To that end, my applications for both MSW programs, at Boston College and USC (fight on!) have been completed. I should hear back within a couple of months, and while BC struck me as the most logical choice as it obviated the need for a cross country move (insofar as I thought geographic stability would influence overall stability), the tide has swung back to the alma mater. I’m in an even better place than I was when I began the application process months back. Despite the progress I had made, I felt somewhat drained, like “fuck, I gotta move again!?” Now that winter nears the halfway point with, spring around the corner, I’m starting to feel the energies of the seasonal change affecting me in a positive, rejuvenating way.

The first step is to get into either school. While the young woman who graduated a rank below me in undergrad went on to Harvard Law I’m hardly presuming an acceptance after going three for ten during my black studies graduate application gauntlet in 2007. I suppose those admissions committees don’t take too kindly to a bunch of dead, non-enriching space on the resume. In any case, as things stand right now, if I were to get into USC, and the financial aid package was in order, I’d have two words to say to Boston, and the people in it: “I’m gone.” Aside from the torturous winters, there’s just too much static here for me to look past.

Sometimes, I allow other peoples’ nonsense to get to me. For example, the on again off again estrangement from my father is off again. He stopped by on Christmas in what I took to him finally receiving the olive branch I extended over a year ago. I thought that was decent of him, so I stopped by his house (he is living at my deceased grandparents’ home, the same one he grew up in) to drop off a couple of pieces of mail the other week, and stopped by just because two nights ago.

As much as they say opposites attract, it seems as if both of my parents thrive off chaos to a certain extent. My mother self-admittedly hoards and is forever trying feebly to get organized (when she isn’t busy chauffeuring my younger, non-driving sister to and from school, work, the mall, etc., she somehow manages to occupy her time doing everything but de-cluttering).

My father’s”home”, a term I used loosely, is in disrepair. It hurts me heart, to see my grandparents old dwelling in such decrepit condition. The two bum-ass, do-nothing, father-son carpenters he has living with him are leeches of the highest degree, but there’s also a certain symbiosis operating as my father has always seemed to find people in need to lean on him; I can only assume it gives him some sense of power, in what, otherwise is a pretty meaningless existence. In any case, the first thing I said after seeing the house in its entirety to the old man was, “are you living here or squatting?”

Playing middle man between two parents whose relationship is essentially non-existent can be taxing. Aside from that, they both seem down and defeated in their own ways. That shit can be depressing to see your parents, who are supposed to be your guideposts, in such a light.

TBC…