Family

I woke up this morning thinking "What the FUCK have I done?? WHY did I say I'd stay for 3 weeks? Oh god... another week and a half to go. Maybe I can claim an emergency at home and change my train tickets."

I'd say that thought process is about normal for halfway through an extended family trip for most people, wouldn't you? Right?!

Right.

This trip has highlighted some things for me. Some things I really, really needed to remember, to have beaten into my head.
I love my folks. I really do. They're awesome, wonderful, weird, crazy people. And I'm just like them. And I love them.
But.
The ever present but.
They are broken. And maybe I'm broken too. But I've been stitching myself back together for 12 years now, and I'll continue stitching myself back together, catching my threads as they unravel, creating a course patchwork, but always bringing myself back together.
And they might not see themselves as broken. Why should they? They are caught up in an entire broken tapestry of people who reassure themselves constantly that they're the only ones in this world who aren't unraveling. And they quickly cut out those parts and people that make them start to question that reassuring knowledge. A tiny little part of a big, beautiful whole, and all they're willing to see is their self imposed borders.

I can see this, but I can't force them to. I can't even find the strength to ask them to. I tried, a bit, last night.
I had a very honest conversation with my sister, Leah. I told her about Bob, and what he said to me, and how it started me down the path of being truly honest with myself.
We talked about faith, hers and mine. We talked about God, and the Devil, and how her faith is built on god and not the organization. How it took her becoming an adult for her to accept the organization.

And underneath it all was the strong subtext that if only my faith had been strong enough, I'd be like her. She asked me why I got baptized, and when I said "Because Jeni and Jeanine were", she said "I thought so.". So dismissively. Because my reality? My reality quite simply can't be right. It can't. There is absolutely no room for my reality in her faith. It is small, and bound up tight, and there is no leeway for error. We didn't even really discuss anything. We started out with a discussion, but it quickly turned into her saying "The reality of things is that Armageddon is coming, that this system is going to end in the next 10 to 15 years, and it doesn't matter what you believe".
Those were her exact words.
It doesn't matter what you believe.

How does one walk away from something like that with any respect in ones heart?

I WANT to respect my family. I want to respect their faith.

But how can I respect such narrow, angry, disrespectful to EVERYTHING I hold dear views? How can I respect them, when they hold so tightly to those views?

I say they, but I guess I mostly mean Leah. My mom and dad... they're caught up in it, and they're narrow minded folks. But they're also really, really mellow about it unless it directly impacts their life. They can be pretty judgmental of other peoples kids, but their own kids are brilliant, if sometimes misled, little copies of themselves. They don't judge us on a deep down level.
Joel is in the truth because he has a wife and kids, and they want to raise their kids in that social structure. That's about it. He wants his kids happy and safe, and he's got a strong network of people within this religion. It's a good life for them. But he's totally on the fringe, and his faith is flexible enough to allow for others beliefs.

Leah, though... Leah is a true believer. And as she gets older, she's gotten harder. Maybe she's had to, to keep her faith. I don't know, and I can't know because I haven't been here. I just see her in snippets, and every snippet is a little more brittle.

I'm ashamed to admit this, but I cried myself to sleep last night.
I had never felt more alone. I mean, I remember being 15 and caught up in a hormonal storm and absolutely convinced that I was the most unique, saddest creature in the world and crying all the freaking time, and I still felt more connected to SOMETHING than I did last night.
I lost the last vestige of hope in something last night. I'm not sure of what. I tend to think, though, that it was a thin little something, whatever it was. Maybe a veneer, something shiny over something dark. And it was stripped away, and I was left with the knowledge that I would never get it back. My family is a construct I've created over the years, something to keep me connected to my base. Their love is real, but it doesn't encompass all of me.

I imagine that this is how drug addicts feel when their family tries and fails to understand them. Or a gay person in a conservative family. Or, I guess, any number of other people who have imperfect folks who just don't want to get them.

It helps to realize how not rare this is.