The need to vent

And that's what blogs are for right? Good so know that the following is me expressing pent up frustrations and unresolved anger.

I do not trust my family. Isn't that a sad thing to say? But it's true. I am a person who believes in judging people on their actions and my family has proven with their actions that they cannot be relied upon to do what is right, nor to have my best interests in mind.

I feel wronged by them, and have felt this way for a while and will probably always feel this way. And maybe these feelings aren't valid but they exsist and I guess it's about time I brought them to light.

When I was fresh out of highschool I was moved in with my grandmother here in Berkeley as a way to jump start me into thinking about my future. Shortly there after my uncle who was going through a divorce and getting rid of his house moved in with us as well.

At first everything was fine, my uncle though dramatic was a nice enough guy and while my grandmother and I clashed heads often it wasn't horrible. And then the drinking started. My uncle you see is an alcoholic and suffers from post-polio syndrome, along with a slue of other psychological issues he has accumulated over his life.

I went through the emotions of feeling bad for him, trying to help him, tough love and then just disgust. Things got hard fast. He would drink a week away, it became a game of hiding the keys, looking for the signs and praying he would sober up. My grade plumetted, and I had to switch my enrollment to web-classes because I couldn't trust him home alone with my 86 year grandmother, he wasn't violent towards myself or her but he was angry and if he just knocked her over would have been enough.

Her health declined, and while I was desperate to get him out of the house, she couldn't bring herself to kick him out. No one could apparently. despite my frequent pleas to my father and my mother and even to my other Uncle, nothing was done. It was grandmothers house only she could kick him out.

Things went from bad to worse as the drinking continued and my accesses to the computer and my classes were effectively cut off by his rampages. And while I tried to get the money together for a laptop my grades and attendance levels finally reached the point of suspension.

Life was miserable, dark, depressing and repressive. Everyone acted like the drunken episodes never happened once he sobered up, the house was filled with seething tension. I couldn't understand why no one would help, why no one would DO anything. I tried to get Grandma to spur into action but she flatly refused, said I didn't understand you can't just kick out your son. I called Dad daily in near tears but nothing, he's hands were tied it was grandmother's house.

It was the first time my Dad ever let me down.

And maybe that's not fair, but I was a kid who had never had to see anything so serious and dark before in my life, never had to deal with something so rank as the situation I was in and he just left me there! And I know he didn't mean for it to feel that way, and loves me and never wanted any of that to happen but it did and he did.

If it weren't for Bran during those times I honestly don't know what would have become of me. I had no friends then, no social network, my whole life was being consumed by the health and welfare of my grandmother and binges of my uncle.

Once it became obvious that the situation wasn't going to change and that no one was going to act, we did. We moved. It was hard, overcoming the sense of responsibility towards my grandmother and the guilt of leaving her. But it was becoming more and more obvious that if we stayed we would be consumed as well.

And we did, and it was the best thing we could have done.

Then about six months after moving out we get asked by a very weak grandma (more like told) to move back , my uncle was gone and in his wake he left a feable old woman who had aged more in the three years he lived with her than I had ever seen. She could barely walk, and with the help of my Dad we got her moved into a place with round the clock care.

A few months later, April of this year she died.

And now...now we've taken the house that was my prison and turned it into a home. Both my father and my other Uncle say the house has more life in it than they can ever recall. Life had settled and I was looking forward to a few years of getting on track and just being young.

But the curse of family rears his ugly head again. Today I received a call from my father, who had just spoken with my apparently drunk uncle, who had let slip that he would like to kick out our upstairs tenants and move in himself.

And in that short amount of time all the anger and depression was back. I've never come so close to hating anyone in my life as truly as this man, so bent on ruining all the calm and peace that I have finally cultivated.

Logically it makes no sense for them to allow it, as he has proven himself time and time again to be untrustworthy. How could he be dependent upon to pay a rent check, and even more so dependent upon to deposit the other tenants rent check (for there is no way in this world or any other that I would live in the same structure as him ever again). In his drunken spells he is known to destroy things, why trust him with the family estate.

Logic tells me not to worry.

But I don't trust them. I don't trust them to tell him no, to do what is right, to give me what little peace that I think is my due.

I don't want to leave this house, I don't want to return to a state of constant worries and what if's , planning out several modes of survival. But what choice do I have?


I'll do everything in my power, mundane and otherwise to keep him out of this house and out of my life. In the mean time it's time to prepare for the worst, find a stable job, get a license, and squirrel away money.

I Pray to the Dadga, Danu, Lugh, and Morrigan that we don't lose our home
I pray to the Land, Sea and Sky
That this may all pass us by
Without harm nor disruption
May the Tuatha give me the strength to defend my home from those notorious souls
So mote it be