Not My "REAL" Father....

Funny how those words - "not my REAL Father" - have turned out to have the exact opposite meaning now for me than when I was a child.  And I am thankful that my 'real' father understood my mind-shift in the years before he passed away in 2007.

Even so, those words have become even more meaningful to me in the past few weeks.

My Mom (who passed away at the young age of 46) was finishing high school in the mid-1950's.  She met a man while she was still in high school and they dated for some time.  Just after she graduated at age 18, she and this man became engaged.  Shortly after that, my Mom also became pregnant with me.  And shortly after that, he ended the relationship with my mother.

Family lore says that he had also been with another woman who was also pregnant with his child and that there was a 'shotgun' wedding, leaving my mom on her own to deal with her heartbreak, pregnancy...and eventually me.

My grandparents were very supportive of my Mom and helped her to keep me and raise me.  The man paid some money to my mother to help cover medical expenses and then legal forms were signed and he had nothing to do with me or my Mom after that.  Other than....again according to family lore....a few ominous phone calls made to the house presumably threatening my safety.

Eventually my Mom met another man and eventually they married.  I was three years old at the time.  This man adopted me, giving me his last name, and a couple of years later, giving me my sister.

Of course life is never really without its lumps and twists and raising children is definitely challenging. 

Somewhere along the way in elementary school, I realized that most kids had not been to their parents weddings and there I was in the wedding photos!  My Mom, being the honest lady that she was, gently told me the short version of the story.

As I grew a bit older into my teen years and started rebelling against parental rules and seemingly getting grounded every time I looked like I had done something wrong (whether or not I had!), the drama in me started to emerge.  I decided that the reason all this was befalling me was because I was living in a house with my Mom and a man WHO WAS NOT MY REAL FATHER.  This then was the real reason I was always in the doghouse while my sister was running around being perfect.  She, after all, was living in a house with our Mom and a man who WAS her REAL father.

Moving out, living without the parental rules.....is when kids (twenty something kids) finally get their brain cells back and realize why those rules were there in the first place.  And also that your parents really did know what they were talking about.  And that trying to teach these things to unappreciative children who think they already know it all was probably not the most fun your parents ever had either.

I began to realize the value of my family and my upbringing and had lots of conversations with my dad on the whats and whys and if you had to do it again would you do the same things of my growing up years.  As I eventually had my own kids and found myself teaching them the very same things my dad and mom had taught me - even using the same words sometimes - I became even closer to my dad.

Recently, I have been caught up in genealogy.  I've done a lot of work on the the 'tree' in the past 10 years and much of it in the last 2 years.  I have my dad and his family on this tree.  But one day my husband pointed out that my dad wasn't really a bloodline and suggested that maybe he should not be on there, technically speaking.

I pondered this and I did add on 'the other man' as an alternate father for myself.  I did some research to find his family members and ancestors and verify my information.  I did find out, technically speaking, that he is still living and that I have 2 half brothers and a half sister that I did not know about.  I also found out that he is estranged from his children and still does not want to know me.

I gave a lot of thought as to what constitutes a REAL FATHER.  A real father is not necessarily the one who created you.  A real father is the one who raises and guides you.  Who puts up with you.  Who loves you even when you are difficult and fighting.  Who forgives you for being a complete jerk sometimes.  Who is there for you.  Who is a family with you.  That is some of what constitutes a real father.

So yes, this other man is listed on my tree as an alternate father.... with a note so people will understand that a biological father is not necessarily the same thing as a REAL FATHER and it is my REAL FATHER who gets first billing on my tree.

July already?

What happened to my year?  Here it is July already.  And my blogging intentions have obviously gone right out the window somewhere along the way.  I was unemployed until mid June and all I did was ONE blog post in January?  Pffft.  I doubt I will entertain any followers that way! 

In any case, I am feeling very timid about linking my blog anywhere people can actually find it....

So what did I do for those unemployed months? 

I joined a gym for women but my timing on that was wonderful as it has now closed down - lack of interest by enough women in this small town to make it a viable business.

I did manage a small weeklong vacation to Las Vegas in the middle of the time off.  It was an ok trip but Vegas was much quieter this time than last time.  Last trip (which was my first trip there) was before the 'ECONOMIC CRISIS' so there were tons of people and lots going on.  This time...plenty of people but many businesses had closed or disappeared.  Less frenzied which doesn't really suit that big glitzy crazy city.

The other thing I did which is partly what prompted me to join a gym was taking up COOKING.  In capital letters.  In one of my first blog postings I raved about Julia Child but said I had not taken up cooking her recipes because I didn't have her cookbook.  That problem was remedied at Christmas when I received that book as a gift.

Oh that was a wonderful gift.  For the first time in my life I had plenty of time to cook.  And here is the interesting thing - I thought I knew how to cook.  I figured I had all the basics down pat and making anything fancier was just a matter of cooking that on a weekend when I had a bit more time to spend.  Well...!!!  I learned so much cooking her recipes.  Apparently I have been cooking the crap out of my chicken for years!  I always figured 40 minutes for pieces.  Not so according to Julia.  I learned how to cook chicken breasts in about 10 minutes and have them turn out tender and very juicy, but cooked!  Which amazed me completely.

I adventured on with more of Julia's recipes, avoiding some of the less familiar foods, and had a riot.  Setting off smoke alarms and generally making quite a mess while producing some othe best meals I have ever had.

I even took up wearing an apron.

I also became addicted to cooking shows and have developed quite a crush on one guy in particular and follow him on facebook.  I feel a bit like a stalker doing that but I guess that's why they make the fan pages.

All this immersion into cooking got me interested in branching off to other cuisines.  My family is pretty game for trying new stuff and we have lately been into East Indian cuisine.  Fascinating cooking methods - particularly the quantities and combinations of spices...ahhh.  Though we did find it was easier to buy samosas already made.  We had interesting fillings but have not yet come up with a dough/method that seals well and they are pretty disgusting if they burst open while you are frying them.  They become little oil sponges and that's pretty much yuck.

All that fun is on hold for now though since I am limited in my time for food preparation after work and with the summer heat, a person mostly wants to barbeque or have a salad anyway.  huh.  Maybe not...  I did stumble across a phenomenal raspberry vinegarette recipe which I have modified to make it mine and I am thinking up new salads to try as I write this!  Maybe not Julia so much in the summer but maybe not the end of the creativity either!

What would you want to know?

It is early Sunday morning. I'm just having my second cup of coffee and catching up on a couple of blogs I am following. One is casual and upbeat in spite of life handing you some rough stuff. The other is almost painfully introspective....and somewhat mysterious. Maybe because I have only just begun to follow that blog in the past year I have missed some clues to why this person has so many 'scars' that haven't managed to heal.

I don't have a lot of patience with people who do not attempt - seriously attempt - to get past things of their childhood. There is a big difference between understanding that you react certain ways in a situation because of things from your childhood - and 'blaming' your reactions on things from your childhood. For instance one of my reactions to people being angry with me is to feel like no one loves me. I feel lost, devastated, alone, unworthy and that everything is my fault.

This does come from things that happened to me as a child. And it also comes from how I reacted as a child along with the dynamics of the rest of the household.

But you know what? I understand this! I have talked - alot - over the years with professionals and my family. I have gained an understanding of why. And I have gained an understanding of why some of those things happened the way they did - from the other person's perspective.

So now - I do not always react in that same way. And when I do, I can see what I am doing and sometimes it is even ok that I am doing that. But I don't take it as a fate - that I am always going to be that way and feel that way.

I feel that I do have control over things in my life. If you are a 'fate' person, you can blame everything and everyone else except yourself for the way things go and the way you feel. That way it is easy for you. You don't actually have to participate in your own life!

I found the introspective mysterious blog a bit depressing this morning and loved the upbeat blog. So I was wondering - if anyone started reading my blog - what would you want to know?

Maybe.....

Books are on my mind lately. I am reading like a maniac and feeling urges to review the books! I don't want my random meanderings to have to be renamed 'book reviews'. So today, I will not do a book review.

What I am thinking about is why I am in this bookish mode and why have I completely changed the pattern of my reads in the last few months. I always read. Alot. But for many years my reads have been light and always have a happy ending.

Maybe because I don't watch television much and this is my form of entertainment - but the kind of entertainment where you really don't have to think, just zone on out and everything turns out ok in the end. Kind of like watching a sitcom I guess. A bit mindless.

Maybe it was because my own life wasn't turning out ok in the end and I needed to get away from that. Maybe because I am one of those people that when I am reading - I am right there in the book, the 'real' world disappears, and if there were upsetting things in the book, I would be upset and I did not want that. I had enough upsets in my real life to deal with.

Maybe my reading is changing because my life is better lately than it was a few years ago. I feel more able to handle emotions in a book - and also in my life - without dropping into a pit of misery in my real world. It doesn't mean I have stopped living inside the books I am reading - but I can handle the emotions inside the book. So far anyway.

Julie and Julia was my initial leaving of the happily ever after romance novels I had been reading. That wasn't very traumatic - nor did it have any really depressing stories inside it.

But my next one, Still Alice, scared me before I started reading it. I was afraid. Seriously. I was afraid it would grab something inside me and rip it apart and I would drop back into my pit. I didn't! The book touched me, no question about that. I feel I lived with Alice and her family. I was inside Alice's head and could feel her emotions. But no pit of misery awaited me in my real world.

Instead - I was encouraged to continue my venture out into variety. Into books that challenge me to think and feel instead of just mush.

I'm loving it. I don't know why my pit has disappeared - seemingly for good, but I am glad it has gone.

Maybe things do turn out ok in the end.