choices....

"Tiny" when I met him November/December 1991

You didn't really come to this blog to read about someone else's family problems, did you?

Did you come here to learn how to make a bad ass blackberry cobbler?

Did you come for photography or acrylic art advice?

Well, bollocks.

So, I've been quiet for a while because it seemed the right thing to do at the time. Guess who doesn't want to be quiet anymore? Yes, that would be me. I'm tired of putting my head down and keeping my mouth shut for people who have my name in their mouth more than they have food or water. I'm tired of being loyal to people who'd happily shoot me in my face if they got a chance; or if I was shot, would stand there and watch me bleed out because they didn't know how to stop it (or that would be the excuse).

At Mom's apartment December 1991

I could tell you a story. It could be fiction. Then that's passive aggressive, right? Then I could change the names like I used to so nobody actually knows for sure who I'm talking about and they have to assume. That's what's done, right?

Y'all don't know me very well.

Today I'm going to give you an excerpt of how things are done in my life. My own choices get me everywhere I go, and I take full responsibility for the choices I've made, albeit sometimes questionably informed choices.

I chose to love someone who didn't love her own mother.

I chose to love someone who didn't love his own mother.

I chose to love someone who couldn't love herself.

I chose that, knowing that if they couldn’t love their own mother, then they could never love me.

I chose that, and now I'm reaping the whirlwind of that choice.

Does it hurt?

Robert Morehart, may he rest in peace

Nah, not really. The hurting part of this has already passed. The part where I felt the hurt and the grief of unrequited affection finally dulled to where now it's just annoyance. It's not even anger anymore. Isn't that funny? I don't even have the courtesy to be mad anymore, just annoyed/bothered when they say stupid stuff that used to hurt me (or ignore me completely).

I gave my heart and soul to people who spoke ill of their own mother. Not for them, necessarily, but for their children - innocent babies who needed someone to love them who would not manipulate their existence to hurt someone else. It was temporary and it didn't last, but I still did it; my flesh and blood even, and they took her from my life after promising me and my husband they would not. Everyone else? Small compared to that.

Now? It's 2021. It's been 30 years this year since drama queen and her ilk came into my world. Had I chosen to turn left instead of right. Had I chosen to stay home instead of go out. Had I chosen to walk away instead of getting involved thirty years ago; oh what a different life I'd be leading right now.

Shannon & Chase 1993 singing at Mikey's trailer

I didn't though. I got involved. I allowed myself to be used to hurt other people, not realizing that a narcissist was wielding me like a weapon against her husband and her boyfriend and her girlfriend and everyone else. Not realizing that they were all using me as a weapon against her. I was just a tool then, and 6 years later I walked away and moved so I could escape the conundrum that was my personal life.

In 2012, it started all over again. The players were the same, the game was a little different and the rules were different; but I chose to participate. Why? Closure? Finding out what was going to happen at the end of the book? Yeah, probably because my curiosity has always been my downfall.

The difference is - I AM GENUINE. At no point did I say "I love you" out of a perfunctory gesture. At no point did I show how much I cared by going out of my way for people in order to hurt someone else. It was all me, legitimately ALWAYS, all me. It wasn't Jerry and it wasn't FOR Jerry. He doesn't care. He didn't ask me to, and those are words the world regrets when they say them to me. "I didn't ask you to."

Margaret

Oh you're damned right you didn't. You sure didn't ask me, and that's the beauty of it - you didn't have to. I was already there and already performing the functions of a mother, grandmother, aunt, friend, sister, cousin, without being asked. Not because I wanted loyalty or love, not because I wanted acceptance or a bond with you, and DEFINITELY not because I wanted to hurt someone else (because I helped them too at one time or another). No, if I ever said I LOVE YOU, I meant that. If I ever reached out when you were hurting and comforted you, it was because I felt it.

I hate it when people project their insecurities and their personality flaws onto me. I am not a narcissist. I am an empath with extremely deep feelings for every living creature on Earth. I love until I begin to deteriorate myself; then I have to rebuild me. I give so much love away that it feels the font will empty, but it always refills. I don't know how, and I don't know from where, but it always refills and there's always a new person who needs it.

If you want to talk shit about me, and I genuinely don't care WHO YOU ARE, then how about prove what you're saying? How about say it to my face or better yet, prove it - because I can.

For the record....the reason the pictures have never been published online is because she has children. I don't care about that so much now, honestly, because they're as warped as she is (if not worse). I care about the grandchildren that should never see their grandmother like that. She can thank whatever god she worships that her children had children because if it wasn't for that fact, all of her vulgarity would be out there for the world to see at this point.