First and foremost: pardon my language, but I am not myself today...
Here I am, writing to you, faithful readers, if indeed you exist, from my parents' computer room, between bouts of frantic, noisy sobbing. I am utterly miserable, and my plan is to make all the readers of this entry completely aware of it. The reason? Well, you'd think on Sunday, the 8th of August 2004, I would be at the Folk Music Festival, gorging on delicious fried food and and engaging in conversation with my beloved family. Well, I'm not, and I don't love my family. I hate them, I think they're sadistic bitches, at least for today. I'm stuck at home, heartbroken, because I can't make up my fucking mind and my parents are unwilling to make it up for me.
I had been granted the freedom to go or not to go today, seeing as I usually do not enjoy the Folk Festival to the extent that the rest of my family does. Today was the last day of the festival. I had been to the Craft tent, and received my annual Folk Fest gift (a Shinto pendant), seen all the acts that I thought were worth seeing (only one: Great Big Sea, and they got boring after 20 minutes), and today was overcast with menacing clouds. I really had nothing to look forward to, and my parents had made it perfectly clear that they severely disapproved of my bringing my giant 600-page fantasy novel to read on the hill. If I couldn't read, what could I do?
So, to answer my sisters' annoying questions, I answered a hearty "No!" to whether I would accompany them. Of course, that was not my real answer. I'd been going to Folk Fest for eight years, and I'd always brought a novel with me, I really couldn't understand why my parents would pick this year in particular to try to wean me off my addiction. Of COURSE I'd be going. Sure, there was nothing to look forward to, indeed, the day ahead looked positively bleak, but I wasn't going to skip out and risk missing something special. I am a hermit by nature, and I was eager to break out of that shell before leaving for University. Of course, my father had to ruin my moment by asking me himself whether or not I'll be attending, instead of asking my sisters and acting surprising when I reveal I will be going. So of course, I say "no" to him as well. My mother immediately starts to praise my decision, "Of course you shouldn't go! I'm proud of your choice! Don't go, if you aren't going to enjoy yourself!" Where does she get off, being happy I won't be with her? So, naturally, to spite her I change my mind and declare I will be going. I'm not packed at all (I discovered, after the final and irrevocable decision had been made, that I'd left my only source of warmth, my sweatshirt, at home anyways) so I have to scramble to gather my things underneath the exhasperated looks of my family. My mother and sisters insist I shouldn't go if I'll be unhappy (and I believe their suspicions were aroused by the fact that I was going about doing everything with a dreary scowl on my face), but I replied, with passive-aggressive charm, "Whatever! I'll just go!"
I get into the van with my mother and youngest sister, while my younger sister and my father take the car. We've started to drive, and suddenly my mother starts telling how it's best to do things that you like, how you shouldn't try to be something you're not, how staying home all day reading books and watching anime and playing videogames must be much better than being miserable on a cold, wet hill for the sake of one's family. We're already well on our way to the Park N' Ride, so why the hell is she telling me this? Ah yes, to make me regretful and miserable.
"We're already well on our way to the Folk Fest," I whine indignantly, "So why are you giving me MORE reasons about how staying home would have been better?" To my horror, instead of admitting that she was getting off on making her eldest child wallow in depression, she turns the car around and starts heading for home, despite the squeals of rage from my spoiled youngest sister. Then, on the way home, my mother begins to lecture about how I should come out of my shell, and do something different for a change, live life to the fullest, open my mind to new experiences...I start to cry at this stage, due to the hopelessness of the situation, and my mother lets fly a whopping fib by saying that "The last thing I want is to make you unhappy." Fuck you, mom! By now it's too late to INSIST on what I really wanted to do in the first place (which was, in case you hadn't guessed, to spend some quality time with my fucking beloved family for a fucking blessed change), because that would result in wasting even more time. After seeing that I was good and wretched, my mother drops me off at home and leaves for the Folk Fest, cheerful at having accomplished a whole year's worth of torturing her eldest born in the space of an hour.
As soon as the door is shut I promptly burst into tears. It's quite fortunate that you cannot hear me, for my sobbing is rarely a peaceful and quiet affair. Heaving, wheezing, wailing, and screaming usually accompany such rages, until the whole neighbourhood begins to wonder why my family has purchased such a large number of stray cats, and why in God's blessed name aren't they feeding them? Then, the phone rings. Now, I should warn you that my mother is far more subtle and clever in causing me suffering, snipping and slicing away at my soul with the grace of a neurosurgeon. My father, on the other hand, is far more blunt, cleaving carelessly away at my spirit like a gleeful butcher on holiday. So, when I picked up the telephone (and trained my voice so that it sounded sad, but not too sad, so that whoever it was one the other line would feel sorry for me instead of disgusted), it was to hear my father roar, "Well, I hope you know you've ruined the whole day for everyone!" after which I promptly hung up on him. His voracious hunger for emotional pain not yet sated, he called again, to make sure I listened for a full five minutes while he raged about how all of his and my mother's plans for Folk Fest were screwed up because she chose to turn around, and then it was his turn to hang up.
After that little show, I picked up the telephone and dialed my mother's cellphone number, and in a breathless, sobbing voice, told her (through my youngest sister, because my mother isn't stupid enough to talk on a cellphone while she's driving) how sorry I was that I caused her to be late for the show she wanted to see, all the while informing them on my father's little tirade. You see, I didn't call out of any real sympathy for my mother's situation, but to tattle on mean ol' Daddy to make sure that he was properly punished.
--Oh dear. My mother just called, letting me know that she could come home and do something special with me, if I wanted to. After letting out this little rant onto my blog, I'm in quite high spirits again, so having my mother give up her fun is the last thing I would want her to do. I insist she stay at the Folk Fest, because that is what she really enjoys doing, and she relents.
Okay, my mother's an emotional sadist....but for only one hour every year.
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