Still on the late 80s odyssey, because new stuff keeps coming to light that's relevant to what I'm dealing with in the present moment with elder and all the generational stronghold stuff.
My boss, the best ever from a few years ago, got me on a daily prayer/reflection email blast (and I'm not sure when they discontinued me, but I was fired lol); one of the recurring themes was 'the generational stronghold.'
Like deconstruction back in grad school, this kept tripping me up--I thought I got it until I really started thinking about it, then it would slip away and I'd be annoyed because I felt like this was something I needed to know and I Just.Wasn't. Getting. It.
The reflection on elder's current age and where I was at the time reminded me of a couple things. Probably the big thing I all but forgot about was how upset FOO was when I started grad school. I literally didn't know what to do with that. I was out on my own two years by that time, and I even said to my mom, "I don't see the problem, it's not like I'm asking you to pay for it." And the subject changed, as it does when there isn't really an argument, just a feeling that needs to be given a voice and a hearing.
That's literally all I remember--the general consternation. I remember feeling confused and not understanding the WHY, why everyone took this so personally and had such a strong opinion about it, because it literally had ZERO to do with them and everything about what I wanted to do in the moment.
And I think it comes up now because my partner in crime makes much of my degrees, and how she didn't choose the way I did, and it's coming to bite her, and I don't get the why behind that, either. Education was just something I did. I wanted to study lit as an undergrad, but I was deterred from that in favor of a degree I'd "do" something with, only to go back and get a higher level degree in the thing, anyway.
(That is likely the thing that pissed everyone off--that I went back and did what I wanted, anyway.)
So I compare my single-minded pursuit of a life style, which, by the way, never happened the way I planned it, with elder and suddenly his situation becomes crystal clear. He lacks that driver. I think that's what R has been trying to get me to see and I am just a little too dense to understand it.
(Meanwhile, hubby just did what he always planned on doing, and you could say he took me along that ride with him. I never would have done grad school if not for him, and I know it's true.)
Just trying to make sense of the mosaic that is my life. Oddly, it's all starting to fall into place....
No comments:
Post a Comment