More disillusionment...

Once again I am washing my hands of my sister Melody, once again I am swearing her off, telling myself the emotional turmoil never absent after an encounter with her is just not worth it. Always, always I end up crawling back to her and pouring out my heart to her as she listens with limpid eye and tilted head, only to inevitably have my words, usually twisted, thrown back in my face at a later date. Note the pattern, Rebecca! On this particular occasion, however, she blindsided me completely with a chain of criticism on - my apparently flawed coping mechanisms of my Huntington's disease? What the hell! That is the very reason I have always returned to her, that and the fact that she and I (well, and Jim) share the same history, the same father - Melody and I have more in common with each other than with anyone else in the world. She is the only girl I know who has Huntington's and my sister - that should be enough, right?

Not for her. Last week I saw her, stayed the night at the apartment she shares with our sister Jewell so that we could go see Les Miserables at the Fox Theatre. Now, anyone who is the slightest bit acquainted with me is aware of my affinity for musical theatre; get to know me a bit more and I will be sure to inform you that Les Mis is my favorite musical of all time and has been since the day I heard those first bars of "Look Down." Also Les Miserables and we three oldest sisters go way back: we listened to the music upon pain of death, in secret with the fear of God and our parents looming before our eyes - we knew what they thought of rock musicals and those who listened to them and where they would go. Actually Big Jim did walk in on us - did he even knock when he entered the girls' room? - and heard Eponine in the middle of "On My Own" and demanded, "What in the world is this?!" We stuttered that after reading the book we were curious to hear musical and so procured the recording from the library, which was true enough - actually I read the book and then nightly would relate to Jewell and Melody on what had occurred in my reading since last night, but we were all three lovers of musicals and all interested in hearing this one. Anyway, Big Jim bought our explanation and listened himself for a moment before uttering with a shake of his head, "Ah, yes, the music of the world," and left. We didn't stop listening, though - we were hooked. Big Jim didn't actually tell us not to listen to the recording. Ah, yes, the old letter of the law. We'd listen to it on the way to homeschool choir when it was just us girls, and when we had to return the CD we'd sing it ourselves, every line, and despairing of ever being able to see it on stage in all its awesomeness- too good to be true!

Anyway, even though all three of us had since seen Les Miserables, we saw different productions (Jewell in Atlanta and Melody and me in London at different times), and when I found out a year ago that it was coming to Atlanta again, I was excited beyond words and instantly informed Jewell and Melody that we three were seeing it together this time, we owed it to ourselves and all that, and I at least thought I got enthusiastic responses.

Somehow, however, I ended up almost having to see it alone. Jewell ended up going with Big Jim after unwittingly giving him the idea that they go together when she mentioned the musical was coming into town again (he fancies himself a fan since he and Mama were the ones to accompany Jewell to see it a couple of years previously). So Jewell and her father went to see it the night before I did. And then Melody backed out because she couldn't afford it - or that's what she said, anyway, and so Lydia and I decided to go together since she had been planning on seeing herself. I, good sister that I am, offered to pay for a ticket for Melody as early birthday present but she said she had picked another day of massaging and so would pay for it herself.

Melody told me later on that she didn't even want to go, that she's not a fan of musicals anymore but she felt forced to spend money she didn't have so I wouldn't have to spend money on her, and she didn't even really want me there in her place because she knew we would end up fighting like always. Yeah, that attitude makes for a nice self-fulfilling prophecy. Particularly since she didn't bother to hide that she really didn't want to be with me or at the musical. I felt like a third wheel with Lydia and Melody devoting themselves to each other, wrapped up in each other's drama. They are best friends who live in the same city, go the same church - they see each other all the time. So that evening of course left me a bit disgruntled at Melody.

Jewell and I spent the next morning together before she had to go to work and actually had a nice time. She and Melody are not exactly getting along amazingly, either - she says she no longer tells Melody beforehand when she's going to be hanging around her coworkers after work or on off days because Melody, while not outright forbidding her, expresses her disapproval vehemently. In Melody's mind the church folk should be plenty company for Jewell. Now the house church that Melody goes to is actually the very same church my family went to when we lived in Atlanta right before we found out about Big Jim's incestuous behavior and the fact that both my parents approved of the church demonstrates what a close-minded little community - although in its defense my family was by FAR the most conservative there at the time - the females were allowed to were pants and our girlfriends had jobs (gasp!) and there were many fans of "worldly" music.

Still, the girls that I was closest to are still exactly where they were back when I was one of them - one or two of the daughters have gone to college but ALL of them who are still unmarried live with their parents, under the protection of their parents. The last time I talked to the girl I used to be closest to, she caught me up on what had been happening in her life - she had been considering going to Bible college in Colorado but her parents were reluctant to give their consent, but then the Lord took care of everything, of course, and dropped a job at a local crises center in her lap which she was passionate about. She proceeded to tell me inspiring success stories from the center and and went on one or two angry rants on Planned Parenthood with tears of indignation in her eyes. I seriously felt like slapping her and telling her to get a life of her own - she's 25!

Jewell in consternation told me she felt she had nothing in common with those girls except for their faith. They are all significantly older than Jewell, who will be 19 this July, but because she is in so many ways ahead of them in life, living on her own and supporting herself, those girls kind of have no real life advice to offer.

"And even their Christianity which you say you talk about with the girls, it's not real," I seethed to Jewell. "They genuinely believe they love Jesus more than anything and want their whole lives to be pleasing to Christ - but they haven't had a chance to figure out what THEY believe - not their parents, not their church. They strive to be such good Christians but to them that means nothing but having blind faith and not questioning a thing they were taught growing up!" Yeah, that's me on my soap box. But Jewell, she was right there with me (Jewell! I know!) - she had told me she didn't know how she herself felt about God and Christianity.

Anyway, Jewell went to work while she and I still had so much to discuss, and she asked if couldn't I stay another night, could she call Melody to see if that would be all right?

Well, Melody returned to the apartment after dark, sweaty from her day of massaging and demanding, scowling, why Jewell wanted me to stay another night?

"Never mind," said I coldly. "It's clear YOU don't want me here any longer than necessary. Take me to the shuttle and I will be out of your hair."

So she did. And our heated conversation continued. I told her she should lay off Jewell, that I was worried because of Jewell's depression. "She said earlier this week she just drove around after work until three in the morning because she just couldn't stand the thought of going back to the apartment. I know how disabling and scary depression can be..."

To which Melody replied that if Jewell had a problem she could bring it to Melody, herself, and it was none of my business.

This infuriated me all the more, but I was determined to press on until I had had my say. For some reason I kept hoping she would thoughtfully reconsider our conversation later on. Ha. I told her Jewell hated that Melody's only list of pre-approved friends were the church girls. "You of all people should know where she's coming from. You are the one girl living on her own and have been frustrated so many times with the church people who didn't respect your independence. Those girls are in their mid-20s and still living at home!"

"YOU'RE living at home," said Melody. That was so mean and completely caught me off guard. She knew as well as anybody how determined I was not to move to Montezuma after college. I was in the same boat as many other graduates in having no clue what was coming next, but there was no way in hell that I was moving back in with my parents - I had finally tasted independence! Again, she was aware of how much I had struggled since being forced to go home to Mama last summer, how low I had been. She knew.

And when I had recovered myself I told her as much. But she wasn't finished. She said that I use my Huntinton's disease to manipulate people, that I feel way too sorry for myself on account of my illness.

"What? What does that even mean? Why would you even say that?" I frantically searched my mind for any memory to make sense of this, and the only thing that came to me was a recent conversation in which Melody wanted to know how my relationship with Mama was and one thing I mentioned was how Mama thinks I'm wallowing in self-pity if ever I share something I'm going through or some aspect of Huntington's I haven't thought of previously - I never know what's going to trigger a surge of wistfulness. "But," I told Melody then, "the thing is, I really don't feel like I have more moments of self-pity than the average person would if they were in my situation. I know there would be those who handle this so much better, but certainly those who would be worse as well." Melody emphatically agreed with me and expressed outrage at me treatment.

So that was what I came up with. "Wow," I said to Melody, "that was a low blow. Why do you invite my confidence only to bite me in the ass later on?"

How can Melody, of all people, be so callous and insensitive about my Huntington's, she who will in just a few short years be exactly where I am? I felt something akin to the shock of discovering how one-sided my relationship has been with my mother. I told her that, reminded her how devastated I was when she tested positive, having told God for years that I would gladly take on the burden of this illness if only he spared my sister, how honestly happy I was that she was still presymptomatic even I couldn't be. What is it about me that causes me to spend an unhealthy and inordinate affection on my family members and to assume they felt similarly towards me? It must be some kind of Oldest Child Syndrome...

And yet the irony of the emotional distance between me and my individual family members is hardly lost on me. Necessarily I was close growing up to my siblings, best friends with Melody and maternally affectionate towards the younger set. Mama reveled in our love for each other, reminding us often that she, one of three kids, had never known what it was like to feel that way towards a brother or sister. When we eight kids and the parents would be out together, riding bikes by the river or playing hide-and-seek and an affected stranger would approach us to tell us how blessed they were by our sheer happiness, maybe even press a few bills into Mama's hand, Mama glowed at our testimony, our manifestation of what a truly joyful Christian family should look like. Oh, if only those people could see us now...

My whole life I have been schooled in the homeschooling mindset that it both unnatural and unhealthy for children to be primarily surrounded by their peers, in a school setting amongst children of the same age. Peer pressure was an evil to avoided at all costs. So the fact that the people in my life who care about and love me the most are my friends, my peers and NOT my family, still fills me with astonishment.