Floating In

I hadn't thought about this particular memory in a long time.  It sort of floated into my consciousness the other day, and I'm not exactly sure why.  I remember at the time feeling absolutely dejected, although on the surface, it didn't seem like such a big deal.

I've written before about my parents divorce and how it just devastated me.  Of course, it wasn't a complete shock, as my parents fought a lot and didn't seem particularly in love.  Our house was a negative, somewhat cold household.  But I was 14 and I remember thinking that parents don't get divorced when their kids are 14.  I can remember thinking that I was "safe" from that happening (which, for a kid to be thinking about that at all must mean I had some inklings things were not good).  It came shortly on the heels of my father losing his job and going back to college (which made money more scarce, and amped up NM's anxiety) and the death of my grandfather.   I sort of felt like I was in a tail spin.

And the divorce itself was hard.  My dad fell apart and my sister fell apart.  It was like a bomb exploded in my life, shattering the pieces to the far corners of the world.  And then there was NM.  She was happy for the most part.  She felt it was "finally (her) turn to be happy".  She was in love, in a new romance, and she had stars in her eyes.  The problem was, she also decided to "check out" of being a mom at that point (not that she had been a gold star mom before that, but she completely took a vacation from almost all mom duties).

NM was completely checkout and it she never checked in to see how I was doing.  I got no counseling.  She never discussed my feelings (when I tried, she made it clear I was infringing on her happiness and I didn't have a right to deny her her happiness.  And, hell, I wanted her to be happy, right?).  My dad was so devastated that he was useless.  My sister was spiraling out of control. 

I remember that for a long time (weeks, a month?)  I didn't come out of my bedroom.  I borrowed my father's small black and white television for my room.  I got up, took a shower, and went back to my room until the bus came.   I didn't talk to anyone.  I went to school, came home, and went back to my room.  I came out to eat dinner (silently) and went back to my room for the rest of the day.   Even if I only did this for a week, shouldn't that have been enough to clue NM into the fact that maybe I wasn't handling things that well.  I do remember my dad coming back to check on me.  Once.  But at least he asked me if I was OK.  NM just ignored me.

NM had an affair with the man she would later marry.  I remember not feeling very kindly towards my stepdad.  How could I like him?  He was the reason (in my mind) my parents divorced.  When NM introduced us to him, she gave us no warning.  NSIS and I were lounging around on a Sunday, watching TV, when she rolled in with him and his kids.  I remember feeling completely off guard and...just weird.  It was weird.  And NM expected us to love him as much as SHE loved him.  She told me, not too many years ago, that she had felt that step dad would be a "better" father for us.   Like she had traded my "old" dad in and got us a new, better, (richer), model.  I remember feeling very bitter, but NM would have none of that.

When she got married, it was a small "family" affair.  Just me, NSIS, my aunt, uncle, and two cousins and stepdad's parents and kids.  Maybe a friend or two.  Most of NM's family didn't come (I wonder why now....)  NM had decided that NSIS and I should sing NM and stepdad's "song" for their wedding.

There was a lot of little things that NM kept secret.  She and stepdad signed their cards, and had on the cake, a number (213).  NM wouldn't tell me what it meant, but I imagine that it was the hotel room number where they would meet up (I DID know that they had one specific hotel that they would meet at.  I can't remember how I found that out....)

So, all these secret little things, toted as "romantic symbols", the marriage itself, the wedding made me feel so many things.  Grossed out, bitter, angry, sad.  I felt all hope I had that my parents would get back together would disappear when NM got married again.  It was a really, really rough day for me and NSIS.  I struggled to put on the happy face and be "happy" like NM wanted.  I struggled with the step family who didn't seem to want anything to do with us.  I struggled to accept the step father whom I felt had betrayed my family, whom I blamed for so many things. 

And NM wanted me to get up and SING HER DAMN LOVE SONG TOO.  I remember telling her I didn't want to do.  I didn't tell her exactly why (I mean, she wasn't interested in my feelings) but it had to occur to her that this would be a hard day.  Somewhere, along the line, when NSIS was drinking or I was locking myself in my room, or I went to high school every day in sweat pants, a flannel and no makeup that something was WRONG.  She HAD to have known.  It HAD to have occurred to her that her wedding might be hard on me and NSIS.

But she, apparently, didn't give a shit.  Because she was pushing, hard, for NSIS and I to sing that damn song.  I remember her attributing my not wanting to do it to nerves.  Maybe I even told her I was too nervous.  But she had to know that wasn't true either.  I had been in theater for YEARS, performed a ton of solos in front of people.  I didn't have stage fright. 

I just didn't want to stand up and be a part of her "celebration" of her marriage.  A marriage that symbolized, to me, the end of my family, the end of my childhood, the reason my mother abandoned me.   She abandoned me and my sister for her "new" family, and now she wanted to celebrate that.  And she expected me to play my part of happy, little daughter.  She didn't care that I felt I was dishonoring my father.  That I felt I was being disrespectful by acknowledging, by singing their "love song", to them.  I remember feeling so horribly conflicted. 

And she either didn't care, didn't notice, or didn't want to notice.  It doesn't really matter.  All she cared about that day was herself.  All she cared about was HER happiness, HER marriage, and God forbid, she have to put that aside for a moment and think about how her children might be processing that day. 

It's not a huge thing, singing a song at a wedding.  But it symbolizes so much of what was wrong in her damn head.  And how enmeshed I was.  Because I ended up singing the damn song.