28.7.08

"A Nice Evening at the MacKeigan Residence", written April 30th, 2006

I don't know if it is even possible to accurately describe the day I had today, but I'm going to attempt to do so as vividly as I can, within reason.
I woke up to Cyle crawling in my bed around 9am after a night of drinking with some boys, which was fine until he said, "Now would be the time when other people would have to puke, but not me, I hold it in." Thus followed by him hauling ass to the washroom and vomiting. Twice.
After waking him up around 12pm, I decided it would be nice if I made him some breakfast. I think things started to go downhill when he asked for scrambled eggs and I said, "I don't really know how to make them but I'll just guess as I go along". He threw them out. I guess they're not supposed to be brown and taste like burnt playdough. Or have shells in them.
After he left, Kate and I got ready to go to dinner at my parents place. I don't know why I was so eager to go, because I knew it was going to be a disaster. Which it was. Kate and I fought on the way there, when we arrived, during dinner and after dinner. Of course all of this is my fault.
Let me explain to everyone something about my family (and Kate has openly acknowledged that this is basically how it goes...) If I say something mean or give a dirty look, it's :"Megan, stop being so patronizing and bitchy to your sister." If Kate was to say or do the EXACT same thing, it would go "Megan, stop provoking your sister and grow up you selfish little bitch". Well, basically. I don't want to put words in anyones mouth.
I don't know if it's a younger sister thing or what, but it makes me cranky. Because I'm always wrong. I'm always the bad guy and I always start everything (apparently). So yeah, I get cranky. And rightfully so I believe. But can I say anything? NO. then I'm just furthering the proof that I'm being a bitch. So then I don't want to see anyone. So I leave. Apparently, this desire to be by onesself so one is not scrutinized or yelled at is NOT a simple act of wanting to keep to oneself. Oh no, this is 'sulking' and 'pouting', and 'not wanting to be a part of the family'. I'm SORRY if I don't want to sit downstairs in the basement with the 3 other freakshows and watch shows about people getting hit by trains and listen to my dad say things like, "Your mother is unhappy. And when your mother is unhappy, everyone is unhappy. Let's watch a funny movie", while waiting for dinner, but if I did, they would find some reason to blame me for my mother BEING unhappy, and perhaps even for people being hit by trains.
This is all just leading up to dinner, we haven't even gotten to the meal part yet, which believe me, is just as much a treat as the formentioned activities.
There is a reason why the four of us don't sit down to the dinner table together anymore, and I guess it just took this extended period of time apart to forget why, and about 5 minutes to remember. Let me paint you a pretty picture: Three obsessive compulsive idiots, one of which who is emotionally unstable (me) and one of which whom is intent on saying things that provoke those who are unstable (my father) and one who with one look can irritate even the most patient and loving of the human race (Kate), plus one emotional woman with hot flashes who ran out of barbecue propane in the middle of cooking steaks, plus one dog who will not shut up and stop begging but if you feed him meat he shits santan.
We almost made it, we did, until mom mentioned my cousins University graduation ceremony in May and asked if I was going. I rolled my eyes, because there's no way in hell that will be anything less than excrutiatingly tedious, and then my dad drops, "You better go Meg, it might be the only University graduation you ever get to go to."
Waterworks. In the middle of my steak and corn on the cob, I sobbed uncontrollably for the rest of the meal. Which made my mother sob (because once one Parker woman goes the rest of them do) which made my sister and my dad laugh, which made me cry harder. But was I comforted? No. I was made fun of. The emotional angst and guilt and confusion I have been carrying about school for months and months, the worrying and fear and wondering all came out at that fucking dinner table. And they just sat there. And kept eating, and took every opportunity to make a crack at the fact that I was having an emotional breakdown right in front of them.
Then my dad gave the dog steak. I hope he shits in his goddaamn slippers.
Then for some reason, my dad starts telling this fucking story about how last weekend he got really drunk and his friend Frank pants him, like full monty, in front of our Martha-Stuart-esque God-fearing neighbour Susan. Sadly, he doesn't remember if it actually happened, but Susan swears it did. Fortunately, Susan said she "didn't look". Mom says it wasn't that she didn't 'look', it's probably that she "didn't see", which then brought on a conversation about the size of my dad's manlihood no child should ever have to endure. Especially not at the dinner table while she's crying over a half cooked steak with a bow-legged yorkshire terrier scratching at her leg.
Therapy. I'm going to need much more of it that previosuly anticipated I think.
But as bad as the night was, I keep seeing signs everywhere. It sounds stupid, but I watched 'Inside the Actor's Studio' with Dave Chappelle and a lot of stuff he said helped me make sense of some stuff in my own life. About crossing lines, about being yourself, about not giving a shit about what other people think. About Africa. He's one of the most honest people I have ever heard speak, and it made me realize a lot of stuff.
Anyways, no matter how much clarity the guy who shouts, "I'm Rick James bitch!' gave me, I still need therapy. It really just can't come soon enough.

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