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During my first eight or nine years of life were not exactly easy flowing. By the time I was about ten however I tightly gift wrapped up the pain and shoved it deeply in the back of a very deep and dark closet. This expert wrapping allowed me to fly into my teens pretty happy and care free.
I loved school, it was sort of an escape. I was in EVERYTHING, basketball, hockey, student council, ski club and every school play and musical I could fit in. On the weekends I worked, partied and when in high school did volunteer work teaching drama workshops to kids at our city's teen shelter. I also kept as busy as I could so there was not too much time for my girlfriend, who although I very much loved, did not want to have too too much alone time with.
It was when in University that the tightly wrapped package began to slowly, but steadily, unwrapped itself. I tried to re-wrap it but it would have none of it. When the final piece finally came off it was big, loud and enough pathos that even Tennessee Williams would be saying 'enough!'.
My overly dramatic twenties ended at about 26 and for about the last eight or nine years life has again become level, busy and yes, even happy. This did not happen without a lot of work. I graduated from University, moved a couple of hours from my family and most of my friends (close enough visit often, far enough away to not have to visit too often. I began a new life with new friends in a new town, a town in which owning a cow is pretty much as common as owing a dog. Now in my thirties I have a strong inkling that the calm waters are about to get rough again. I have become a bit restless with small town life and calm stability. It is time to shake things up a bit and feel the next year or two will either bring me closer to the home I left or even farther away.
I write this because as my extended family gathered together Christmas night I was struck by how fluid feeling fucked can be. I looked at the cousins so mentally healthy and successful in their teens, now overweight, bogged down with life and unhappy in their adulthood. I looked at the aunts and uncles so perfect to me when I was a kid, now more human, more real, more complex. My parents who I have both loved and hated at different times in my life (now firmly in the love category!). My siblings all of which at one time or another I went long periods of time banning from my life (all but one firmly unbanned).
Few people are fucked up their entire lives, most go through periods, some longer than others, then pull themselves out. I know for myself the trick is not feeling fucked up, the trick is ensuring you pull yourself out at just the right time. If you don't allow yourself to stay in long enough, you will simply go right back in. If you stay in too long it becomes harder and sometimes impossible to crawl out. I think the mark of a healthy dysfunctional family is not that there members totally screwed up, it is that they attempt to balance one another out, ensuring not everyone is screwed up at the same time.
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