Moving On- Vol. 2

I've been wanting to talk to my grandma about the things that I've decided in the last week or so. My bestfriends tend to always be the men in my life that I'm romantically-linked to and, while the three men that I mentioned in the post are all outwardly supportive, I can't really trust their opinion on this decision because they all want me to make the decision that most benefits them. That's quite understandable. Their biggest critique is just that I shouldn't close myself off to possibilities at happiness just to follow some notion that I should go out on my own and that I MUST make it on my own. (And I'll address my issues with all that stuff in another post, but right now I kinda want to focus on my family.)

I told my mom about it and she is very supportive. She said that she's always thought that I should do something like this and that, while it sucks that this is the impetious behind it, I should still go for it. When I had made the decision a few months ago to try living with TyRoy, she was supportive of ME but she also wanted me to work at getting to a place where I could move out on my own if I ever needed to at any point. She also thought that I should cover my ass with some kind of roommate contract, so he couldn't just kick me out in the street in the middle of the night with nothing and no way to get at my stuff. I understood all of this and she's been a big proponent of stuff like this my whole life. It isn't anything new that started with TyRoy or started after the issues with BT. She went through too much shit with my bio father and money- not having enough to leave, then even after she left both having to pay his back bills because they negatively effected her credit and work a full-time job which only afforded for us to live with my grandparents. Also, while she'll never say it, I think that she regets that she never lived on her own, properly. She moved from her parents' house to living with my bio father after they were married, back to living at my grandparents' until she got married again. That isn't to say that she hasn't always worked or that she doesn't know how to pay the bills (in fact, she takes care of that so much so that my step-father can't really get along when she's gone for more than a week without some prior planning on her part because she has control and knowledge of all the money and bills.) But she's just never lived on her own. While I'm not sure she really feels that I MUST live on my own, all alone, for some set period of time, so that I can assure myself that I can do it, she does think that everyone, especially every woman, should have enough money in his/her power and enough confidence and knowledge to know that s/he can leave whatever situation s/he is in, especially if that is a romantic living situation, at any point that s/he decides.

But telling my mother was both easy and predictable. I knew what she would say and why she would say it. I guess I want to hear my grandmother's opinion because she's had a different life experience, especially with men/husbands and money than my mom has, but also because of the difference her experiences in this past year, since my grandfather's first stroke and especially since his death, might have on her opinion. Alot of it has to do with what I wonder her opinions are on me passing by "opportunities at happiness", as they all like to say, with 3 men who I do love each in their own way and who all do love me, who I could have very different lives with, to live a life on my own, hoping to find that LOVE that also doesn't bankrupt me, to take the financial and career opportunities offered to me on their own merits not based on my partner's life choices, etc, etc, hell- just to fucking prove to myself that I can make it out there, sink or swim, even if I end up finding out that I can't survive on my own, well, at least I'll know. (More on all that later though.) But, while I've talked to people and thought about it and blogged about it in hopes of getting the opinions of my reallife realworld friends who I hope also read my blog and only getting the opinions of online "friends" and the men involved, I haven't called my grandma. In fact, I haven't called her at all, about anything- because I know that I'll feel compelled to talk about this. And why can't I talk about this?, you might ask. Because no one has told her. In fact, no one really told me. I knew something was up when my uncle and my mom were up seeing the doctors because my mom wouldn't tell me anything. So when I went to see my uncle, I finally got drunk enough to ask him and just asked. But I still had to go to my mom and ask for a time frame because my uncle wouldn't really give me that.

Let me explain, if I haven't before---My uncle has the middle-child, peace-keeper attitude, so it's often really difficult for him to come out and tell unpleasant truths to those who need to hear it. Unfortunately, there is usually someone around him, namely my mother or I, who know that truth and are burdened with either hiding it or revealing it. I usually end up revealling it because I have NEVER felt the need to keep peace, in fact I usually feel quite the opposite need, so I can't keep my mouth shut, even if I really try very hard. This is how I "out"-ed my uncle. Both my grandmother and my uncle will gladly tell you that it was me who told my grandmother that my uncle was gay and that was the reason that he and his wife were divorcing. But no one ever feels the need to explain that I tried really hard for several weeks not to reveal what I knew. See, my uncle never really told me that he was gay. I told him. Actually, for years, my boyfriends (ex-J and Sir) and several gay male friends had been telling me that my happily married uncle was really gay. Even before ex-J said something about it, my godfather, who I hadn't seen or spoken to in years, upon finding out during our first reunion conversation that my uncle had married 2 years prior, said, "Huh. I always thought he was gay. Guess not." So, finally, nearly 5 years after this conversation with my godfather, and almost 4 years since I'd come out to my family as bisexual, when my uncle moved out of the house he and his wife owned and started talking about divorce, my uncle and I had the stilted conversation in which I tried to pull out of him why they were separated and he tried to not really tell me the whole truth until finally I said, "So it's just because you're gay, right?" I don't even think he ever said, "I am gay," during the whole conversation, just agreed that was the heart of the matter. At the time I was living with my grandparents, working a 3rd shift data entry job until I could save up enough money to get an apartment in the city closer to the university I'd be attending in the fall. By the time I came home in the mornings, dead tired but unable to sleep the way you are when you work 3rd shift, my grandmother had already been up for an hour and was on her 2nd or 3rd cup of coffee and her 10th cigarette. Every morning, she'd grill me for information about whatever was going on in the family, mostly about my uncle. She was certain that my uncle's wife was having this affair with a fellow (male) co-worker whom she saw quite frequently outside of work. It seemed like every morning I was having to defend my uncle's wife, who really was, all things considered, handling things quite well from everything I understood. She really was, and still is, so much more amazingly graceful about the situation than anyone has a right to expect and than I think anyone gives her credit for, including me really. When my grandmother would say, "Well what is it then?", I would just repeat that Dan was going through things and that I was sure that he would tell her when he was ready to talk about. After what seemed like weeks, she finally said, "He's gay, isn't he? That's why they're getting divorced, isn't it?" I didn't negate what she said, which is probably the nail in my coffin on this issue, but only once again told her that she would have to talk to Dan about all of this. But by not saying that he wasn't gay, I had just told her that he was and thus I had out-ed my uncle. As someone who was moderately well-read on the issue of coming out as LGBT and having done it myself, I knew that what I had done was horrible but there was really no way around it. Except to lie, which, in this case, I didn't want to do. But, as you see, dear reader who I assume is always on MY side, my hand was sorta forced by the fact that my uncle wouldn't tell my grandmother what I already knew and by my grandmother never letting anything like that go.

Thus, I did not want to talk to my grandmother about my big life decisions, in which I will go whichever way the wind takes me after I get my BA and after my uncle passes, whichever comes last, because I would naturally end up revealling that my uncle was told he only had 12-18 months, which my grandmother had not been told.

Then, tonight, after BT's mother called me to make sure that no men in dress uniforms had shown up to tell me that my (still at least for now) husband was dead, I called my mom to confirm just that, which of course they hadn't or she would have told me, and Mom said that Grandma knew. Kinda. See, my family on my grandmother's side seems to have this sixth sense kinda thing, if you believe in that kinda stuff, which I do. It's strongest with my grandmother, but my uncle and my mom and even me alittle I think have it. My mom told me that she was talking to my grandmother the other day and my grandmother said, "Do you think he [meaning my uncle] knows how serious this is?" My mom thinks this was my grandmother's way of asking my mom if my mom thought my uncle knew that he was going to die from this and probably kinda soon-ish. My mom said that she did think he knew, but asked how my grandmother knew that. My grandmother said that she'd been having dreams of my grandfather lately. They weren't the nightmare and/or grief dreams that she'd had after he first died. And while my grandmother never said that my grandfather said it outright in the dreams, my grandmother did tell my mom that she thought he was coming to tell her that my uncle was dying. My grandmother asked if my mother had been dreaming of my grandfather. My mom admitted that she hadn't but that, even before the doctors really told my uncle, my mom knew that it was gravely serious because my uncle was having dreams of my grandfather, mostly of the two of them walking around the cancer clinic where my uncle was being treated, talking. Even if my uncle didn't know that the dreams meant what they did, my mom said that she did. Apparently, I was left to figure it out on my own. Or maybe Grandpa just knows that Grandma and my uncle needed him more than I did. Even if you are astrally projecting, I'm sure that you can only do so much at one time. ;) My mom admitted that she didn't know if Grandma knew that I knew, so here she and I both are thinking that the other doesn't know, so we can't talk to the other because neither of us can keep our mouths shut, when we really both know. The most I'll be doing is possibly giving her the timeline that the doctors gave my uncle, knowledge which is both a blessing and a curse.

So, I plan on talking to my grandmother soon about all this. I'll let you know her opinion on the matter. I'm sure it will be as unique as she is. But, I also have to deal with moving BT's stuff back to the place where he used to live before we got married/before he left for training, dealing with money issues, and dealing with finding another job. Oh, yeah, did I mention that I quit my job Friday night? It's kinda funny story and it will be a bit of a rant later, I'm sure. Needless to say, I probably should have know that I couldn't put up with what I viewed as BS management and found another job and given two weeks, instead of quitting the way I did, but I did it and I have to own up to the fact that, other than the fact that I hate not having a job/dependable source of income, I only regret not being a bigger bitch in how I quit. Hell, anything worth doing is worth overdoing. Wish me luck this week, kiddoes, and I wish you the best as well.