60. Walking away

Many years ago, I was brought up by an angry man.  Easy to offend, I still recall the ringing in my ears and the sting from getting a backhand that sent me clear across the room for ‘insulting’ him. How?  I had made a Father’s Day card and drew a series which started with a baby and ended with old man.  The caption: “Through the years, I will always love you.  Happy Father’s Day!”  The reason for the violence?  I had insulted him with the “old” bit.  Sigh.   A memory that is as unbelievable as it is unforgettable. Luckily for me, many years later, I met and married an incredibly good man who taught me what real love looked and felt like – and that I deserved it. 

Which brings me to another angry man in my life.  Because of our shared history, I often made excuses every time his angry rants arrived in my inbox or showed up on my mobile.  His heavy workload.  His difficult upbringing.  The chip on his shoulder that he had no control over.  Under that guise, I allowed him to treat me unkindly for many years.  Accepting all the blames he piled on me – regardless of how petty or crazy the charges.  It was always my ‘transgressions’ that caused him to get so angry with me.  My fault. Except the load recently became too heavy.  Tired of the mood swings -- vacillating from being incredibly charming and funny one minute to becoming mightily insulted and a raging mass of ill humor the next, I finally said I was “done”.  A slammed door was predictably followed by childish emails and messages.  And yet, if I was to be honest, my initial reaction was relief from the realization that I don’t have to do this silly ‘dance’ anymore.

As I often do when unsure how to proceed, I walked away after writing the above paragraphs.  And I slept on it.  I dreamt vividly.  In my dream, my mother was there.  And I was angry with her.  I woke with a start and a question.  Maybe, without realizing, I too am an angry (wo-) man.  Psychoanalyzing my dream, I obviously still have residual feelings of disappointment from our mother abandoning us and leaving us with the angry man who was our father.

Can it be that I too am like the angry man I grew up with?  Do I also have rage just simmering under the surface, ready to explode at the first sign of a perceived slight but not realize it?  I had previously read somewhere that quite often, you are drawn to or repelled by someone because they possess traits that you also possess.  Am I being a hypocrite? 

And so I have been mulling over this these last few days.  Wanting to be fair.  Yearning to be honest with myself.  Trying to be a good role model for my children.  And this is the conclusion I have reached:  I am a flawed human being who like so many others have had to deal with a childhood filled with less than stellar memories.   I use those memories to drive me to be a better kinder person every day – to make a difference whenever I can. To learn, correct and improve as I go along.  I also realize that having tried for the best part of these last 20 or so years to help this angry man without getting swallowed whole by the toxicity of it all, I have reached the point where I no longer want to be anybody’s punching bag, no matter the shared history or blood connections.  After all, what good is “blood” if it makes you sick to the stomach with anxiety?  As such, with an affirmation to surround myself with kindness, I draw a line in the sand to acknowledge my limits and to move on without prejudice or hate.  One cannot be drawn into a storm if one chooses not to participate and instead just walk away.

*** end ***

38. Letting go

A couple of nights ago, taking Buddy for a quick walk left me incensed.  “You’ll never believe what happened downstairs!”  I raged to Matt on my return.  Continuing my rant, I described the rudeness of our neighbors when I approached them about where they were burning offerings for the Hungry Ghost Festival. 

A brief tutorial for uninitiated: celebrated on the 15^th night of the seventh lunar month (according to the Chinese calendar), believers observe the entire month as “Ghost month” where the ‘gates of hell’ are opened for all spirits to receive food and drink, along with offerings (eg paper ‘money’) burnt for them.  As such, here in Singapore, the month of August is very smoky with joss-stick-adorned-sidewalks and sizable steel barrels ablazed with varying types of paper offerings which rise to the skies in a sooty smoggy vapor.  As a large number of people live in highrises (ie residential towers), there are strict guidelines about where you can ‘set up’ so it doesn’t become a fire or smoke hazard.  Or so I thought.

Getting back to my story, our said-neighbors were performing their rituals near the children’s playground instead of the pre-designated area outside the building.  After checking with the now-angry and flustered guard-on-duty (who apparently had just been insulted by the couple when he tried to carry out his duties) I gently broached the subject.  They both just ignored me.  Thinking they didn’t speak English, I tried again in my third-rate-broken-Chinese.  The man responded, “You are Chinese?”  (which I thought was a weird response), whilst his co-conspirator became confrontational.  Wanting to defuse the situation, I offered that I wasn’t trying to be quarrelsome but needed to point out the gas pipe behind them.  And no, I wasn't bluffing.  But my words fell on deaf ears.  I gave up and walked away, exasperated and decidedly peeved.

After venting to Matt, I didn’t want to keep harping on about it to him so I took to Facebook and wrote: “Very very cross at some very rude, inconsiderate and selfish people who behave as if the world owes them a living and they are 'above' everyone else! Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!”.  But then, I got frustrated with myself.  Why am I getting so upset about an exchange with 2 total strangers?  Why was I letting someone ‘push my buttons’ so to speak?  Wasn’t I always trying to teach the girls about not letting other people’s behavior impact how they feel?

Disheartened, I took to Facebook again: “don't want to be this person... or get this worked up about stuff (especially when you consider things from the whole "bigger picture" perspective).. Sigh.. need to set a better example for the girls and be a better person. Luckily tomorrow is a new day.. x”.  And then, I went to bed.

When I woke, in amongst all the shout-outs from good friends, a message from an ‘old soul’ stood out.  She asked: “What hurts more?  What these people are doing or the way you feel about them?”  Her words made me pause and I took a long hard look at myself.  Why?  Because although it would be much easier to lay blame on my errant neighbors, it was important to me that I took ownership of my negative feelings.

And what did I learn?  After nearly a week of mulling over my wise friend’s words, I concluded that ‘letting go’ is a kinder way of living – to yourself and also those who’s paths you happen to cross.  That ‘letting go’ doesn’t mean you don’t care or that you are ‘selling out’ on your values or beliefs.  But rather, realizing you cannot (and should not) try to hold sway over every situation.  And finally, that ‘letting go’ means being forgiving, compassionate and patient with others (because you don’t know their daily reality) – as well as to yourself.  And so the lessons continue.

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