Auntie Miles

Good afternoon, my friend,

How I wish you were here to drink a glass of wine with me and listen to me try to explain how my heart hurts today for both J and A. I could approach my entry from several angles, and given the way I can ramble I will probably touch on them all, but for now let me say that if one could earn points, or frequent flyer miles, for stepping up and being a good aunt, I think I'd be able to travel the world...

I suppose I should back up and tell you (remind you?) that my sister M has decided that rather than pursue marital counseling, separation, or divorce, her energy is best spent wishing upon her husband V a swift and untimely death. While she remains in this marriage, J and A remain in a household in which their father calls the shots, posed in a picture perfect suburban life, spokesperson for an American dream success story. Read: [...] where their mother goes along with it. It's all about appearances for him, and that includes physical appearances. He is always more amorous with Mary if she's in size 10. Back in her 12s you can feel the disgust seep from his pores. And, since A is overweight and has been always, she has already learned to sneak food. She's 11 and her relationship with food will forever be unhealthy. I think V loves to go to work and brag about where they've been skiing, what vacations they've taken, how many stamps in his children's passports.

Given that, he found it a perfectly good idea to send A to Poland for a month to visit with his sister and nieces and their children. During this month with A away, he and M planned to take a couples only trip to an all-inclusive resort in Mexico. As an afterthought, I believe, they realized keeping their 15 year old son home alone might not be a good idea. Moreover, I believe the thought process involved how they might look if they left their teenage boy home while his sister was in Europe and they in Mexico. So they signed him up for an expensive soccer camp, despite the fact that J has no interest in it.

Last night, as I mentioned in yesterday's entry, I took J to dinner. His parents had left in the morning and he had a day to kill before soccer camp, and I owed him some summer reading. As he sat across the table and talked to me, the fact that he is 15, 5'11" and probably 175 pounds vanished. Who sat across from me was my very sensitive nephew, whose stomach gets tied in knots before the first day of school, who threw up before swimming lessons, who cries like me and my mom and dad and his mom. He is of the K family ilk. Not his father's. He told me he was mad about their vacation, about sending him to camp. He told me he'd rather stay home and work with my father and make a couple hundred dollars. (What's worse is I'm not sure he could even try to make that argument with his jack*ss dad. I'm sure it wasn't up for discussion.) It wasn't until we were driving home, and he hadn't spoken for a minute or two, that I looked over and saw him crying.

I stayed with him at the house until his friend came over, the same friend who was going to camp with him and whose parents would be driving them both. While we waited, he cried. And I let him. I reminded him that he has always been an anxious kid, and that for him it's the not knowing that gets him, the anticipation, but once in the moment, he does fine. And he agreed. But cried nonetheless, as did I. When his friend got to the house, his parents came out and went over the itinerary for this morning, what time they would pick J up and what things he should be sure to pack. On the list was a fan, which he didn't have. Once T's parents left, I ran to the store to buy him a fan, and brought it to my parents' and left it there with a note (they were at a barbeque). In the note I asked my father to check in on J (they live only 1/2 mile apart), told him J was nervous. A couple of hours later, unable to concentrate on anything else, I called my Dad to see how things were. He had gone over and they talked and things were okay. Knowing that he and J are very close, I knew I could rest, J was in good hands.

This morning, I went out to the pool to start the new Jennifer Haigh. My sister L called and I could hardly tell the story without welling up, I was still so emotional. But when I got to the part of the story where our sister couldn't even look on line to make sure he had everything he needed, I felt anger. And such disappointment. What if it weren't a fan I could easily pick up for 15 bucks at the local hardware store? M and V are in f**king Mexico. And M's cell is on the kitchen counter, because they don't want to pay for roaming.

Seriously?!?!?!?

A little while later my phone rang again, and I saw J's name in the window. "Hey, Auntie Barb," he said. He told me he was good, it's going to be fun, he got a single room, and it ends up he knows a few other kids in camp. If I hear from his parents could I tell them he's okay? Sure, I said. I'll tell grandma and grandpa too. I was happy he called, and glad he picked me....

Once I had maxed out on sun, I decided to take a drive over to my parents' to lend them The Bucket List. At a recent family dinner we were talking about movies and my father mentioned how much he likes Morgan Freeman and Shawshank Redemption (who knew?), and thought since both kids are gone my parents will be out of their minds with boredom, why not let them have a go at it before I watch it? Here comes my second heartbreak of the weekend....

While I was there the phone rang, and despite the caller ID showing Unknown, my Dad answered. It was A, calling from Poland. It's Sunday, and I think she's a little homesick, and she forgot her parents are in Mexico. After my father talked to her, my mother did, then they passed the phone on to me. I asked her if she found the note my other niece (L's daughter) and I left in her Teen Beat magazine for the plane and she said she had. She told me there's a cat in the house (she, like me, is not a pet person), and then she sang a verse from Lifesize, the Disney movie the girls watched here last weekend on their overnight. I laughed, "You remember the words!" Yes, she said, and then her tone changed. And she got quiet. "A, are you okay," I asked? "Yeah, I'm okay" she said, and I knew she was crying. "Everyone here says they love you, honey. Have fun, okay?"I hung up and wept.

If I could stop crying for even a minute I would feel such rage that my sister could even have thought it was a remotely good idea, or--knowing it wasn't--that she didn't have the balls to stand up to V and work out summer plans a little better. Like maybe keeping their a*sses at home while one kid is at camp and another across the Atlantic.

Amanda, at times like these I am so grateful I am not a mom myself. I don't know how much of this kind of heartache I could endure.

Hope all is well with you and the boys and your J being away.

Thanks, as always, for listening. Love you, Barb