Sunday, August 14, 2011

As time passes by....

I haven't been on for a long while and there are of course reasons for that. I am sorry if I didn't respond to a comment you made, probably ages ago now... It meant a lot to me anyway. And I appreciate the warm and caring online community that I seem to have been lucky enough to find. Thank you. Your comments really did mean so much...

My relationship with my mother has greatly improved. As one reader surmised she was indeed just very, very worried about me. I've come to understand that.

On the other hand my life has turned yet another corner...

My boyfriend and I have inched our way toward what looks like something that might be forever... We have problems we deal with that are difficult and tiring, but I think and I hope that it will work out with time.

We do love each other an extraordinary amount I think... and we are both dedicated to making our lives intermingle and intertwine with unity and love. And I know they already do in some far off alternate place where everything is as it could be if we were our best selves and not the broken versions we now are.

I may have a ring in the near future. It's a sapphire I believe and I think I am falling in love with it already. I'll post pictures soon perhaps... ;)

___

A long while back I wrote about finding out information about my family heritage. this subject has emerged again.

A long while back I almost had things figured out but it all fell apart. Now, I am at it again and this time I want to talk about it with you.

You see it's a very complicated story involving people who didn't want a mistake to "ruin" people's lives.. That "mistake" may have been me... I have suspected something off about the way I fit into the fabric of my family for years and years. I don't look that much like anyone else. My personality isn't like any one's either. My interests are all very different from the rest too and that's just the tip of the iceberg. The thing is, they are some of the best people you could meet and for years I have semi disparaged myself for not being more like them.

During summer months I would sit at my grandmother's kitchen table and observe as they sat around and discussed things over coffee and sandwiches at lunch. I never knew what to say. It wasn't that I didn't find the conversation interesting or enjoyable. It was that my soul, my mind, my being felt like it didn't belong there
and yet... I was wanted. At least I think I was. My great aunt who dominated conversations when she visited would always slip me a few dollars at some point and tell me to go get something fun with it. They always hugged me.

They were decent, intelligent and good-hearted people. They were hard workers who were great neighbors, friends and Americans - there were many war heroes from World War II in the family. My great grandmother prayed daily for her sons, as did my grandmother and her sisters during the war. They stuck together wherever they were and no matter how far apart they were. They were kind Norwegian farmers. They were amazing people - rare people.

I just never seemed to belong there and it isn't for lack of wanting to...

Somehow I have always felt like an objective observer - someone sitting on the inside but coming from without. I have hated this. I remember one summer in particular, around age 19, I sat upstairs, in my grandmothers lovely old house, and mourned my lack of belonging.

Everyone else was sitting downstairs chatting. It was a sunny day in July and by all accounts was beyond perfect. The air was warm, but crisp and inviting. The smell of old books and the feel of the cool stucco walls should have been as nostalgia inducing, soothing and embracing as ever. But I had exhausted my efforts of trying to fit in by that summer and I didn't know what to do next.

I had tried to find a way into the world of this family - to become a real part of it and not just an admirer. One summer I spent hours digging through trunks filled with scrapbooks and letters from years past. I brought them around to people and tried to evoke their memories as a way to connect in the present. I was trying to find a way to feel a part of it all. They did share their memories and we had a few good, long conversations that were historically fascinating. I even wanted to write a story involving my grandmother. She had led such a fascinating life, I thought. However, I never escaped the feeling that I wasn't one of them, although I didn't even know that that was what I was feeling. I never knew until years later looking back that I entertained thoughts of truly not belonging. It wasn't a possibility that would have made any sense to me then. Everyone acted as though I was exactly who I was supposed to be. I have no reason to believe they ever thought otherwise either.

So I quietly excused myself to an upstairs bedroom and read a book on planning for your retirement. I know that sounds like an incredibly odd thing for a 19 year old to do to relax and comfort themselves... I think I felt like at least I could plan ahead and be a success in life that way, even if I couldn't win at living life in the moment because the present didn't intuitively make any emotional sense. How could such good people make me feel so alone? It couldn't be their fault. After all, they all seemed to fit in with one another. Was it my fault that I felt that way? I couldn't make it work in my head. Who was causing what? All I knew was that I didn't seem to belong downstairs and I desperately wanted to.

That was a miserable experience. After reading several chapters in my well written but emotionally unsatisfying book about the advantage of saving for retirement as soon as possible I cried. I felt so alone. I later attempted to talk with my mother about how "rejected" I felt by our family, but she never could comment on it. She would and has always just said, "I don't know what that's all about. I know they all love you."

Anyhow, this week I am finally finding an answer. I am going to be doing a DNA test. That might sound drastic, but I feel that it is necessary. I don't know how my mother finally agreed to to do it. I think she can tell that it's been gnawing at me for years and disrupting my thoughts on a deep level. I doubt she knows anything if anything indeed is amiss, because she insists it will come out that I am her daughter. If she is right then I guess it will be back to the drawing board on all those summers spent feeling like an outsider. If the tests prove that my suspicions are accurate I don't know what I will do... Suddenly things might make sense but then comes the hard part of actually dealing with them. As long as I am in limbo nothing can be truly processed, because it isn't necessarily real. What will I do if I find that I am not me? Or will I finally really be me for the first time in my life?

I am relieved though, I think.

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