|
...my sister dated an African-American guy for nearly ten years. Not shocking to me, but my mother was extremely distraught when she started dating him in high school. What started out as an act of rebellion against my mother turned into a very happy relationship for my sister (until they broke up---he had all kinds of emotional and mental issues). My grandmother, being the racist that she was, read my sister the Riot Act and told her how awful it was that she was putting the family through all that. I was in my freshman year in college when all of this took place (sis was a high school senior), and I got to hear about the drama rather than witnessing it firsthand. It caused a HUGE family fuss for several months, then it died down. Fast-forward to 1993, when my sister began dating the man who is now her husband. He is a conservative Quaker (don't ask me how they ended up with each other---'cause I don't know! :rofl:) who is also a big-time racist. Sis didn't know about the racist part until just before they got married when they had a big discussion. She had told him about her past, with the exception of the race issue. She confided in me that she didn't think race made any difference---which it doesn't, but she didn't bring it up in conversations with him. She asked all of us in the family not to tell him anything about that situation, and none of us have. I have issues with her husband anyway, like the fact that he was furious that she used to smoke (that was way before they met, and she quit in 1987) but it's her business.
A couple more: my dad and my maternal grandmother were/are alcoholics. We were/are an upper-middle-class family, and my mother kept that fact covered up because she lived in mortal fear of our neighbors and friends finding out. Dad has been a recovering alcoholic for nearly ten years now, but growing up, I got to see all kinds of fun stuff when he got drunk. Mom issued instructions to all of us that we were never to talk about it outside of the family. Dad wasn't mean or abusive, but it was embarrassing and humiliating as a kid to see my dad act like a fool in front of people. It was a major factor in my parents' divorce. When I was a senior in high school and up late one night working on a paper, the phone rang about 2 AM. Dad used his one phone call from jail to ask my mom to bail him out after his DUI arrest. Mom was livid but went down to bail him out anyway, and I went with her because she had no business being at the county jail alone at 2 AM. He lost his license as a result of all that. Granny (RIP) was, however, a mean drunk, and she became verbally abusive---and she was arrested for DUI on several occasions. She once spent three months in the SC state hospital because of it, and she had her license revoked twice. Granny came to live with us when I was about eight. She was there for six months. I didn't know it until I was older, but she had been put in my mother's custody after the most recent DUI arrest and basically couldn't leave the house without her. When I was about ten, Granny went on a drinking binge for about three months straight and would call my mother to cuss her out and write letters that were horribly abusive. Mom was heartbroken, and I remember seeing her cry very hard when that would happen. :( Granny eventually got better (but never 100% better) and apologized, and they reconciled. Granny still drank up to the time of her death in 1991, but it was much, much less.
And last but not least: my brother is gay. I have absolutely no problem with that, but Mom certainly did. She did everything she could to keep that fact away from my stepfather because she was sure he'd leave her if he found out. :wtf: My stepfather was a better man than that, but Mom was so afraid he'd blame her. I was at my mom's house one afternoon in 1996, and the only other person in the house at the time was my stepfather. We started talking about mundane things, and then the subject of my brother somehow came up. He said, "I wonder if (brother) can join us for dinner tonight or if he has a date with his boyfriend?" He said it very nonchalantly and with no malice---in fact, he had a little smile on his face. I stopped in my tracks, looked at him, and smiled back. I said, "I don't know. We'll ask him when he gets back." I asked him how long he'd known, and he just laughed a little and said, "As long as I've known your brother." My stepfather was a good man, and Mom didn't give him enough credit.
Oh, and apparently me being bi has never been a family issue. I guess it's because I dated guys and married one, but for some reason, Mom doesn't think that's scandalous. :shrug:
|