...i said i was gonna write about the reasoning behind the estrangement between me and the evasive ronnie, so let's see what i can come up with today.
so we all know (if we don't, welcome!) that he was incarcerated from about january 1987 until roughly may 2009. i don't know exact dates because i can't keep up with that shit dates that well.
from what i remember, he was released in 1994 in late april. this release was short lived, mainly because when you take someone who is programmed to do the wrong things, it's only a matter of time before they do (what?) the wrong things. again.
he was apprehended a day before my 8th birthday. i didn't find this out until i was much older, and for a good reason. because clearly.
he stayed in for 15 years after that. if that's not missing your only child's childhood, i have no idea what is.
upon his release, i planned to drive to harrisburg to visit him and maybe spend some time with him. at this point, i was pretty open to getting to know him and making an effort towards bridging this huge gap creating a relationship from scratch with him. he seemed pretty open to it as well.
i drive to harrisburg, and instead of us just spending what i consider "normal" time together, like having lunch or sight seeing, he wants to go to walmart. i'm like okay, well he probably needs food and there were no walmarts when he was a real citizen an adolescent/young adult, so he might be intrigued.
we go to walmart. we spend approximately 2 hours in walmart going up and down each aisle and picking out random crap. when it was time to check out, he had some money, but he was short about $50 bucks. guess who got the honor of footing the remainder of the bill? me. it was fannnnn *wait for it* tastic! spending $50 on things i will never eat for a person i have no relationship with, who i just drove over 200 miles to see is something i always want to do with my free time. especially on independence day weekend. that always feels so good.
i shrugged it off and paid the $50 bucks so he could have all of his unnecessary food. i guess he didn't consider the fact that he lived in a rehab home as part of his parole contract, and would be sharing a small refrigerator with other people, as his things took up most of the space in the fridge, and he *boop* didn't know how to cook any of it.
once that was done, i had to leave, because he had a curfew. a really early curfew, because he was a newbie. so it was a pretty pointless visit. i went back to my hometown and partied with my cousins.
the fall comes and so my mom and i decide to go for a visit because there's some kind of parade going on in harrisburg, and that's way better than going to walmart for 2 hours. at this point, homeboy's got a job, so he took us to ruby tuesday for lunch. then we went to the river (where the parade was happening) and walked and talked.
i hate to sound mean, but this kind of thing is something that should've been done when i was about 5. not eleventy-two (read: 23). at any rate, it was a nice day.
a couple months pass and he starts to become the awesome person he is today.
okay, so i started dating this guy, right? i lived in richmond (va), we met through mutual friends (via work), and at the time he was living in columbia (sc), but he was preparing to move to charlotte (nc) a few weeks later, putting us at 4 hours apart. not horrible, but not a trip you make every weekend, either.
so i went down a few times just to get the hell away from richmond. and i had a great time. lo and behold, ronnie asks me to come visit again.
my first reaction was, why don't you take a bus down to visit me instead, and you can stay at my apartment? it's senseless for me to drive 200+ miles to visit you for 2 hours since you have a curfew, and then i'd have to turn right back around and drive to stay at my mom's house (in annapolis) for the night, before making the 2+ hour trip back to richmond. just kinda pointless to me.
and the guy i was dating had this really nice, really comfortable condo in a quiet neighborhood, and all i had to do was show up and he'd take care of the rest of the weekend. that sounds a lot more promising to me, than spending most of my weekend in a car.
so i told him i had plans to go to nc that weekend, and this guy flips all the way out, says i'm boy crazy (mind you i am 23 and the columbia/charlotte guy was 25), and that i'm selfish.
*brakes screech* i think selfish is expecting me to drive 5 hours to pay for $50 of your groceries again.
i think selfish is when you don't offer gas money or to travel down to see me, since i've made the trip to see you twice already.
i think selfish is expecting anything from me, when you've done nothing.
no, i think that is a sense of entitlement--something i don't now, nor have i ever, tolerated.
needless to say i didn't go visit. he had an attitude about that for about 6 months (additional time wasted).
jesse convinced me to go visit, so we went together. it was a fun time. this time, ronnie paid for lunch. *shocked face*
we really only had time to eat lunch and talk a while before we had to leave. at this point, he'd moved to his own room at a boarding house, so there was no curfew.
but there was also no space, so there was no way we could stay if we tried.
the rest of 2010 was spent arguing. i gave up for what i thought would be the last time in april of that year.
boy was i wrong.
i get a happy birthday text on my 24th birthay, after telling him to lose my number. guess old habits die hard. i deleted the text, but jesse convinced me to contact him because maybe he was extending an olive branch.
things lightened up a bit for a few months. and then bam, back to the attitudes and the arguing.
back to the bull shit you know what, yes bull shit. that's what it was back to.
i tried again to smooth things over by visiting him in that awful place i told you about in my 100 boring things...you know, that place where i was born? yeah, that god-forsaken place. so boring. *yawns just thinking about it*
jesse and i traveled north, yet again, from richmond, for one birthday dinner. that weekend i was a bit under the weather, i had to sing in a concert in my hometown, and i was between paychecks. you know what that means. that awesome point in your week where you are so stoked to find a dollar under the seat of your car. yeah, that point.
i wear a sundress and sandals, do my hair, and go. we take pictures. i was in a good mood, but my sarcasm shined through marvelously. luckily, people laughed; typically, they stare. i'm fine either way, as long as i laugh.
we head over to my cousin's restaurant and have dinner (at this point, i'm celebrating me, so i get a hennessee on the rocks). he doesn't pay; my cousin comps the bill, although i offered to pay for it (my cousin wouldn't let me). fine, right? great freaking day.
my 25th birthday rounds the bend. as far as i know, i've had the same birthday since, well, birth. july 30. it never surprises me (though the age does, every year without fail), so i don't see how a date that comes around every single year, surprises anyone.
it's whack. i created an event on facebook and invited a bunch of people, but left the event open so that anyone who wanted to come, could come. he sends me an e-mail about a week later that said yeah so i'm not gonna be able to come to your little birthday thing.
*blank stare* awesome. because it would suck if you could.
he said something about having to work that weekend and that he'd taken off too many weekends before, blah blah blah. but really? he could've taken off work if he wanted to take off work. it's not like he is a freaking CEO of anything but poop.
he works as a steward at a hotel. a steward, you ask? someone who does all the dirty work no one else on payroll wants to do. a chef doesn't take out garbage, clean floors, wash dishes, does he? no, that's what the hotel pays a steward to do. but let ronnie tell it, he is a multitasker.
*pause* when did they start hiring for those?
i forgot to mention he has a crum-snatcher girlfriend who he spends most of his time with. she is 4 years older than me and doesn't have a high school diploma. as you can see, he is fully of the classy. she lives with her mother, doesn't know her father (hmm, maybe we do have something in common), and doesn't have a job. she was fired from her job and because she has no real skills or education, no one else will hire her.
i'm pretty sure they're a match made in heaven.
so cheers to you, anal fissure. you officially, royally, and completely suck.
this weekend was a doozy for my eyes. a doozy, okay? it was awful.
i seriously considered getting lasik eye surgery for the first time in my life.
now, i talk a good game when i'm irritated with something (read: lack of eye sight), but usually it fizzles out within one or two days.
this time *blank stare* no, i am really considering lasik.
how about i totally forgot i had to have my pupils dilated at my eye exam on saturday? now, the last time this happened was about 2 years ago and i felt like i had my eyes wide open but i was blind. very much so an oxymoronical situation, very much so unappreciated. i had to have my homie claire drive me home and had to be hand walked into my apartment. i almost fell twice--once out of her lift kit jeep, and we all know i am a klutz, and once into my doorway.
this time, chelsea had to pick me up from the optometrist. i love my sister, but she is a newbie driver. she was my only early morning option, and she is always biting at the chance to drive someone somewhere.
i've let her use my car before and i've rode in the car when she drives, but not being able to see properly puts an entirely different spin on the experience.
i'm sure she wanted to eject me from the car.
the drive from the eye doctor to my house is approximately 5-7 mins. apparently, that is long enough for me to have a heart attack, stroke, and panic attack. really ridiculous.
so it all started off with me being reassessed for contacts, just because i was on a trial basis with them for the past 2 weeks. i ordered 2 pairs of glasses and a box of contacts. my eyes get dry quickly and when they're tired of the contacts, i would still like sight.
then, the doctor puts these drops in my eyes and says, "follow me." i felt like i was being led to a white, window-less van. i could see nothing and he was walking too fast! i had to stop and hold onto the wall. it was then, i thought he's drugged me. those drops were to blind me and he's going to drag me off in a white, window-less van and have his way with me...
then miraculously, i was seated at a consultation desk.
so much for my auto-biography, right? *sigh*
but i digress.
my eyes feel worse and worse for about 30 mins, then the doctor drags me back into the exam room and makes me look all over the place and says "everything's fine."
*pause*
clearly it isn't sir, because i feel like a vampire. the lights were way too bright. it was like a case of a hangover + sleeping in a coffin for 5 days + migraine + agoraphobia.
after they took my money for my sight, i went outside and put these ridiculous sunglasses on my face. definitely looked like an old woman with cataracts. not a good look for a hot 25 year old.
when i was making my way to the exit door, chelsea pulled up to the entrance, as if she was going to give me valet service. but no! alas, she drove away from me, to the parking lot, parks, and proceeds to laugh at me. it was no discreet effort, let me tell you.
i feel around by way of dirt, ditch, and tree to get to my car, and when i open the door, she is still laughing. annoyed at this point, i flail my arms around for emphasis, which makes her laugh harder.
*sigh*
on the way home, there are stop signs, stop lights, yields, no turns on red, left turn only, speed traps, picture-taking lights...you name it, we encountered it. thankfully, she did everything legally, minus the fact that i almost died.
when your pupils are dilated everything is bright and blurry--2 things you do not need in your life when in a car. every other direction we took was accompanied by a stop! or a slow the hell down, chelsea; i can't see! it was awesome.
we got home and my armpits were soaked. i needed a drink, she needed a tissue from crying laughing.
and this is when i decided i would see about lasik eye surgery. i'm not doing that again!
i accomplished this! yes. it was so hard challenging for me at first, and i even had to delete some sentences because they seemed so harsh without my beloved "lol" but i made it through.
monday-tuesday were probably the hardest days, mainly because it seemed like i was not doing the funny things justice without using "lol"...the funny things seemed really mundane and boring when typed, and so i had to find other ways to express how humorous a situation was. some of my favorite lines were:
i am really struggling not to use an acronym right now.
this is definitely "laughing my a** off" worthy.
#dead
*flatlines*
and my all-time favorite:
okay, that just took me out of here.
i had to be extra creative to get an "lol" point across without seeming corny i struggled with this, too or crass it didn't always work out.
wednesday morning, looking back, was probably the most ironic of all. i *ahem* got into somewhat of an argument with the infamous ronnie (my biological father).
now, for those of you who know this story/saga/mess, you understand why this is really nothing new. but for you new buddies (welcome!), i'm going to rewind a bit.
skip all the way past my childhood, because that isn't what this is about (long story short, he was incarcerated from when i was 5 months old until i was almost 23 years old). let's get right to the nitty gritty. since his release in may or something of 2009, he has been a like an upper respiratory infection in my life. not serious enough to kill me, but definitely annoying for a few days here and there throughout the year. and if you're anything like me, you get these about once every season or quarterly. oh, and if i don't see a doctor (typically my mom, in the case of ronnie), things get that much worse because the irritation festers.
on tuesday evening, he e-mailed me offering to give me a cd/radio console for my car. now, keep in mind my car is less than 5 years old and everything in it is directly from the manufacturer, including the sound system (which comes with an ipod/mp3 player plug-in and a cd deck). a big bank still technically owns my car since i still make monthly payments, so i'm not trying to do anything too permanent to the car before it is totally all mine--which would, even then, only include speaker enhancement and maybe a slight tint on the windows--just in case i trade my car in next year for a new one.
it took me a few hours to decide i wasn't going to take something from him, just because he offered and it's free. i flat out didn't need the unit and wouldn't use it, so the next morning, at the crack of dawn, i replied with my answer.
after replying, i checked facebook. now, the previous day i'd told him to stop poking me (gross, right?). this had to have been about the eleventy-ninth time i've asked him to stop. not to mention i've ignored him and he's still done it. i've also put him on limited profile where he was unable to poke me.
then facebook changed the privacy settings and i started getting poked again.
*pause*
*taps foot*
so i got agitated. this is one of the many examples of this guy not respecting my wishes, not listening, not understanding. so i told him "enough with the poking, okay? who pokes?! sheesh... :)" now, this was during my "don't use lol" week, so i couldn't use it to lighten the load. while i was dead serious, i meant no harm...i just wanted him to back off listen and understand.
instead, i get a smart ass reply that said "i don't know, there's a lot of don't do this and don't do that, but you can't even answer a question. a simple yes or no would've sufficed, but anyway, how are you?" now, i rephrased so that it sounds coherent, but this same message was typed with a lot of internet lingo and southern slang. so much, that the sentences were almost unrecognizable.
this is when i lit him up. i went back to the e-mail and asked that he check time stamps before he opens his mouth about someone not replying.
needless to say, i haven't received a reply, which is probably for the best, since i have a really tough time holding my tongue with this guy.
i may even post an entry about the estrangement stuff later, because i need to get a lot off my chest and i just flat out hate don't like this guy at all. there are no appealing or redeeming qualities whatsoever that make me feel any differently. *shrugs*
but i digress.
that was my only adverse event in my quest to not use "lol" for an entire week. mostly everyone else didn't notice or just didn't mention it. i had a lot of fun with it...i think.
for humor's sake: lol.
have you ever tried to stop using some of the humorous acronyms? what were your tragedies and triumphs? do you have any hilarious stories from moments where you had to catch yourself before using it?
i make it sound like drugs.
