My Heritage - Family Ties Part III

My Heritage – Family Ties

Living on the Edge of my Teenage Life

Part III

 

Building their hopes on positive social projections and possible tangible and beneficial rewards in the future, my parents ensured we attended school as much as possible. Although neither engaged in helping us with our homework, they did encourage us to do it on a regular basis and cut our time in front of the television set for a significant amount if stretch between the hours of 5 pm and 7 pm.

Our television free time spanned from after school to 5 pm and from 7 pm to 8 pm. Then it was bed time and an early rise and shine in the next morning. Excitedly, Saturday mornings were our free time and we could watch as much as we wanted unless we went outside to play.

The neighborhood we lived in was mixed black and white and often referred to as the poor side of town or slums to put it bluntly. On some days, the mood was the darkest as it went without saying that there were always spill overs on the streets of the abomination of a hideous and hidden hate in our hearts and minds. Some would say it was a silly thing to say but to ignore the street justice and discriminatory practices on the outside of the house would be disingenuous to myself or others as it was a reality we all dealt with in a not so kind manner.

School was our sanctuary. The fact that virtually all the good times in my childhood came from those times spent in school, it didn’t matter much what happened outside of school or in the middle of the night for that matter. In the eyes of my mother and father, school was the most important thing.  We had to work hard not to disappoint them in their expectations.

My mother had a college education and spoke four languages fluently. Her well versed skill to speak Dutch, German, French and English was amazing. One has to remember that her native tongue was Malaysian dominantly spoken in the house so we kids could not know what they were talking about.

My father was employed as a warehouse worker. He worked hard and brought home a decent paycheck for those days but nevertheless, we were poor. My mother, forced to go to work due to finances and other desires she wanted, found an opportunity to put her cooking skills to work as a specialty chef for the Sheraton Hotel downtown Columbus where she was hired to make exclusive Indonesian cuisine and cultural delicatessens. This arrangement left us alone much of the time from sunrise to sunset and offered us an opportunity to socialize a little bit more than before. In fact, it gave us too much freedom.

Since we lived in a poor neighborhood, the expectations, projections of wealth or success and our destined futures was limited by the mere design of our society. We had no status as we never reached the middle class on income or the fanciness of our house. It was, after all, a shell of wooden panels covered with a dilapidated shoddily asphalt tiled covered roof on it that kept us adequately safe and warm in the winter and not so cool in the summertime.

However, since both were employed, the food on the table was plentiful and the clothes were becoming a little bit new than before. Still, no matter how hard my parents worked, we were socially still and yet, a step lower.

One of the things I remember most was my father saying that we were comfortable and had what we needed to be contented but this was unsatisfactory to my mother. She obviously wanted more as she was used to the finer things in her earlier part of her childhood with parents who were wealthier than most that lived around her.

Since my father was a soldier before the war, during the war and after the war, his occupational skills were limited immensely. Working in a warehouse as a common laborer didn’t bother him as much as it did my mother who looked down on this with her nose in the air.

 In the eyes of myself, I saw this as her seeing my father as a failure and not achieving any personal or social success working there like a common slave in captivity to the company that hired him. I know she talked behind my father’s back. I know she was disappointed in him and took it out on him with frequent fights about money and other things. After all was said, my mother was very materialistic in nature and that wasn’t going to change overnight. It was a constant struggle for my father to please her.

I remember when our baby sister was born, she was upset about the loss of income because she couldn’t work or make money from her efforts to cook, sew and do odd embroidery work for others. Whenever she was discontent, she took it out on the three of us. It was her way of dealing with her own stress and frustrations. There was rarely a gentle moment when she was stressed or filled with unknown anxiety. She ranted and raved and even threw things in the air to express her anger or feelings.

Once she was able to go back to work, she assigned my older sister, Natasha, to watch her and take care of her whenever she wasn’t home. This was not only unfair to Natasha but created a bond between my older sister and my baby sister that would later come back to haunt my mother’s will to discipline the baby girl who was a breath of fresh air for most of us except my mother. It seemed the unexpected pregnancy and the mood around it created animosity and more stress between her and my father who was overjoyed with his new baby girl.

Ohio was unkind to us in many ways. First it was the social status we were surrounded by and the poor employment opportunities for immigrants looking for a job. Secondly, because of the language barriers at first, we suffered in communicating and making friends socially but as we gained the upper hand on the language, we also realized that if we were to be poor in money and educational skills, we would be trapped in this disastrous cultural pit we found ourselves in at times. 

Even our parents realized this and pushed us hard to learn as much as we could in school and then find a job as soon as possible to earn our keep in the household. It was about to become a tradition and we never saw it coming. Even looking back at our limited opportunities and wealth, we had higher projections afterwards and saw these harsh and difficult times as a ladder of social and economic breaks to become better at what we needed to be in order to survive. I believe we got this from our parents but more so from our father.

So even though our lives were dark, very dark, and maybe even black, we struggled to meet life head on and became stronger at this test of wills to survive. It became obvious to us that if we remained inside these darkest times too long we too would become dark as blacks and live in the back of society’s tenement rows so often the place where the poorest end up at best.

We lived, we laughed and struggled but we persevered to see the end come sooner than expected. Times were changing and we did succeed a little bit at a time to move on up in the better neighborhood of this town. I must have been sixteen and there was this one girl with whom I don’t even remember not liking from the moment I saw her. A redneck girl, dressed in blue jeans and tight tops and long auburn hair that always had a white bow in the crease somewhere to keep her bangs out of her eyes.

She was white. A white girl with hillbilly manners. Tough and tomboyish at her best behavior, she was not only attractive, she was just plain sexy. I was immediately attracted to her magnetism and showed it with a constant flirtatious smile that tried to win her over.

She left me speechless at times and even without talking to her, she made me nervous. Whether it was a pure sexual attraction or just puppy love kind of thing, it drove me crazy not seeing her as often as I could. I understood I had to work and help the family but my mother seemed obsessive in her ways to make me work more hours than I wanted to since I still had school work to deal with between sleep and going to work.

I recall many struggles with my mother who had a premonition that this girl was a slut and not good for me to hang around or get involved with. Call it a mother’s intuition, I looked at it as a means to cut me off from my own happiness and how this girl, Kathy, invaded my space and time away from going to work. Perhaps, my mother was unacceptable of this girl because she knew I really liked her well enough to play hooky from school and cut back my hours to work so I could spent more time with her.

My mother’s jealousy made me vomit. It was sickening how she acted whenever I brought her to the house and spent some quiet time with her. She would burst in unannounced or rudely talking to us as we were talking and did everything she could to cause us to feel uncomfortable and leave the house so we could find some solace someplace else.

It also seemed my mother was hung up on a social status thing with her. She was white but considered white trash because she also came from a poor snowy colored family. There was something rubbing her the wrong way about Kathy and she was trying to be coy about it.

Even my brother and sisters noticed the brush off she got whenever she came over. I didn’t understand too much of it all because I seemed to be blinded by the lust and emotions overwhelming me. Perhaps it was my carnal desires to have this girl and take her all for myself as the actions of her parents and my mother drove us closer together.

Seems no matter how nice Kathy was to my mother, she was looked down and never good enough to be seen with me. In my head, I was trying to figure out what insanity drove my mother’s obsession with this girl. It must have had something to do with her own childhood because for all the wrong reasons, she hated that girl. This was certainly something I remember vividly, everybody looked down on everyone. Since we were from a foreign country, it was understandable but even those who were raised and born here in this very same neighborhood were targets of hate and wrath that was unexplainable and not for the lack of trying.

I was outraged by the manner my mother mistreated Kathy and it drove me away from the house more often than I care to remember. Even on those days when everyone sat home and spent the time talking as a family, I found excuses to leave the house and find the time to work on my real relationship with Kathy as that mattered the most to me at the time.

So it seemed that the time with Kathy was squandered as my mother so eloquently put it, she was “wasting my time” and only wanted me because I had a job and money to spent on her. For the lack of making me angry, the silence between us drove us farther apart. Regardless of what the truth was or how things appear to be bearing on the reality, the times squandered was well worth the sexual awakening and the thrill of adolescence as this girl woke up something inside of me that would take a very long time to dissipate or diminish inside me. It sounded like love, it felt like love and for the thrill of it all, it was a very sexual love.

Working on this relationship drained my energies to go to work and often left me wondering why I had become so fanatical with spending so much time with her. This addiction to her was driving me crazy. Between going to school and working, I kept finding shortcuts in my schedule to make time for her. Always sooner than later was my effort to be with her. Time and time again, I found myself clamoring, lusting, and filled with sexual sensations that drove me crazy. It sounded and began to look like a cabaret or a sound of music, but in all reality, this was a real thing.

This relationship didn’t just happen. She didn’t suddenly appear in my life as I saw her often but in the end, she disappeared from my life quicker than the eye could see. Approximately eighteen months of bliss turned into a nightmare when she stepped out with my best friend and engaged in promiscuous behaviors that ended up with her being pregnant and moving away to Florida to hide the shame she had brought upon herself. I was petrified and stunned. On the other hand, my mother was in the best moods ever as she couldn’t hide it any better than singing around the house and telling everybody, “I told you so.”

 

Yes, that is how it ended. A love affair that tore my heart apart. In my mind, I kept saying to myself “That did not just happen.” Her sudden departure created a sudden inferiority about myself. I thought it was something I had done to let somebody else steal her affection. I tossed and turned at night trying to recall all the words said and actions done to make it end like this. Suddenly, almost overnight, the realization overcame my senses and I realize it had been destined that I taste the flavor of love but not keep it ever lasting.

 

In the meantime, my family was recovering from illness and bad health. There were all kinds of things wrong with my mother’s head and heart. She was falling apart. I noticed she had found several cousins who lived in the USA. She found one she grew up with and invited her to stay with us for a very long time. She had a son who was a little bit older than us and was cool to us as he had all the right clothes and music we liked. He was about twenty years old and just returned from doing a stint in the army. A fresh cousin, someone who could relate to my brothers and sisters frustration, he was a breath of fresh air in our household.

 

It was through his stories to tell us about the older days. He repeated stories told by his mother and gave us a glimpse of the past as he told stories of the islands where we all lived at one time and of course his livelihood spells in Holland were he found his interest in the underground teenage clubs most exciting. He told us of the camps they lived in; how his mother and my mother worked feverishly for the underground relaying encrypted messages from town to town riding their bikes unapproached and unrestrained past the occupying Japanese troops guarding the streets and fields around the cities.

 

From him we learned more about my mother’s family members. It seemed from the stories told, they were the Dutch mafia engaged in illicit trades and behaviors that would have made them lawless and criminals in many ways but never arrested or challenged by the police as they were successfully bribing these agents with funds that gave them a pass to continue the trading and selling of black market groups while gathering the riches. Ironically, in one of those towns, my grandfather was the chief of police and I found it hard to believe he didn’t know of these dealings as the knowledge appeared to be more common than it was surreptitious in nature and hush hush around the children.

 

He too talked about his voyage on a ship. He said he was less than ten years old when he and his mother came out. It was described as chaos as they and their father were separated and later found to be living in Singapore where he fell in love with another woman and left them behind. I asked him if he had plans to search for his father and he nodded his head and said that he had no such plans but that he was going to stay close to his mother and help her any way he could until she died.

 

A novel concept indeed. I wish I had such strong feelings for my mother but I didn’t. When we moved from Holland to the USA she changed. It seemed that when she left her wealthy parents behind, she became bitter and envious of others coveting what they possessed and what they wore. Perhaps her projections and desired destinies were driven by the wrong factors or so it seemed as she never seemed happy enough to smile like she used to.

 

A tragedy was happening I feared. I saw a relationship crumble. My father worked hard and nothing he did was unnoticed by us but totally ignored by my mother. She talked to him like he was a servant. He talked to her like she was a princess, a queen or even the royalty she pretended to be. It was a bizarre relationship; something I never could quite understand.

 

She showed us many mixing patterns of moods and behaviors. Her heart was broken and her blood pressure had climbed so high she had to be put on medication. She became stressed at work and took time off causing us to fall behind on the bills and my father worked overtime to make ends meet but it never met her level of pleasure. Seeing this made me very very angry. I saw what she was doing to my father.

 

Staying home, she developed a sense of entitlement. It seemed that everything in life was harder to get and throwing fits with emotions uncontrolled and violent behaviors becoming more common by the day, we tried to hide and stay awake but the disaster only got worse as she turned angrier and meaner as time went by. I was beginning to see the creation of a monster, a very evil-minded monster.

 

I didn’t know if it was jealousy, a lack of social status, envy or just plain nastiness. It was then when I nicknamed her “Hitler” for a reason. Her treacherous mannerism were betraying all signs of goodness inside her. I was beginning to doubt her mere existence as my mother was flawed and deceptively wicked in nature. This mixing of moods and behavior patterns was throwing me into a lapse of confusion. I began to wonder what evil spirit possessed my mother’s body and mind that caused her to be so despicable to my father and others.

 

Certainly, her behavior of the past, present and the future was most unsettling. I had a very hard time correlating the personalities involved and evolved over time that made my mother so unapproachable and unwanted around us. Her mere presence caused bad vibes or feelings and it was best to stay away from her to avoid her wrath that she threw around like hot coals tossed from a blazing furnace made in hell, spewing hate-like sentiments with likewise burning sensations.

 

It was like dealing with the unexpected. My siblings grew weary of the trouble and strife around us and the moods at night caused the silence to be even stronger. There were no nice comments, just soft sighs and frequent whispers. Some watched television, some talked on the telephone and some read books. We all found an escape from the reality around us.

 

This silence was deafening as it took its toll on all of us. My cousin had stayed with us for a couple of years and the secrets he had divulged were enough to make us shutter and wonder who our mother had become. The chores in the household were limited but well regulated by my father as we all took turns into doing what needed to be done to keep the house clean.

 

Certainly, our house had become a different story – it was nothing at all like it was once in the past. A hell-hole, a place of hatred and sorrow, I couldn’t wait to get the hell out of there because of the uncomfortable spirits around me. Looking forward to getting out of the house only made matters worse for me as time stood still and my life was dominated with school, work and nothing that included any sense of pleasure.

 

Fortunately because our cousin had a set of wheels we had a means to escape the drama. His contribution to our eventually sanity was provided by the freedom given by having the means to go where we wanted to go and do the things we wanted to do unless we had chores to finish or get started.

 

His car was a brand new Chevrolet convertible hat was our vehicle of pleasure. Uninhibited, somewhat out of control and prompted by the pure desire of finding exciting things to do, we often left early on weekend mornings and dabble and drag out the day finding places to go where we had never been before. We saw more of Ohio landscapes with Olaf than anyone else who offered to give us rides of unbridled freedoms.

 

Freedoms of what were unaccustomed to being with our parents. Two people who managed to raise us well but for some reason, didn’t have the ability or time to understand us as we grew up. Parents, swallowed by the hustle of working hard and steady unattached or connected to their children who deserve the proper attention but who bucked every effort to be loved or wanted due to the uneasy and tension in the environment that caused them much pain and sorrow with unexplained mood swings that later came back to serve us notice that we were just as dysfunctional as all the other families and maybe even more so because of the cultural, societal and personal strains of relationships and a lack of understanding.

 

Nothing here was implying we weren’t normal. Nothing was present that created a malicious drift or stormy emotional distress cluster of waves pounding against the walls or surfaces of the environment we lived in. moving through adolescence was difficult for all of us, including our parents. The turmoil never did subside and go away – in fact it kept growing each and every day.

 

Personally, I became a high risk for aggressive or delinquent behavior with my clearly in the open not misunderstood explosive personality disorder. I would hit walls, break object out of frustration and smart off to others including strangers over various times at different places where my mood swings with regards to happiness, anger, sorry or anxiety were never subtle and defeated but rather loud and obnoxious in manner.

 

Turbulence seemed to follow me. Volatility, unpredictability and the unrestrained and unstable moods caused hardships in gaining friends and social partners. This alienated me from many who didn’t understand my ways and opted to stay away from me, rather than deal with my tirades and out of control emotions. It seemed my coping abilities were being tested; my mental faculties never buckled under the stress and my perseverance opted to remain at my side as I slowly climbed the ladder out of this social cesspool, the environment had created and intensely offered resistance to any future improvements and success.

 

My cognitive abilities were strained and often at the rope’s end to solve many of my emotionally related problems. I was sure my emotional development was impaired to some degree and making it hard for me to cope and function like many other teenagers around me. I compensated for anger and frustration with my participation in sports especially football.

 

Beyond the fact that I got to hit people, it gave me a release that would allow me to escape the inevitable challenge to butt heads with authority figures or other maladjusted people just like me. Slowly, this allowed me a method of adaptation I still use to this day.

 

Biologically, I developed into a strong young man – I had a great deal of strength and athletic abilities that prompted me to participate is contact sports and other challenging activities.

Certain, the fact that I had experienced bad love and breakups contributed to my anger and vengeance but in all reality, the entire problem of my behavior was internalized and as I struggled to get a better handle on my ability to control my passions, deal with my conflicts and generally learn to become more adaptive in ways to deal with my personality and mood swings.

 

I have to confess and concussed my own injuries because of my immaturity and inability to remain calm under stressful circumstances. Denying any mental illnesses, I was aware of my explosive personality disorder and with the exception of an occasional rage or vent, I found my behavior in line with others the same age or similar circumstances as an adolescent growing up fast in a rapid moving society.

 

I found out some things about myself during these turbulent years, I found more calmness by working hard and long as much as I could or time would give me. I found the rewards of independence were based on financial abilities and earning power giving me time to prepare for better things in life.

 

Although scary for a young person to deal with such emotional and intellectual growth, it made ends meet and settle an uneasy and potentially scary situation into a calm induced mood that was manageable and more pleasant to be around as stabilization came around with the patience and time permitted.

 

I had learned the best approach was patience. The best tactic was calmness. Practicing these two principles ended up giving me more calmness and calmness was the driving factor of my decline of mood variability more than anything else. Whether or not I experienced severe or mild mood swings depended on my ability to contain my emotions and self-control. I learned from positive experiences, which was the way I was going to dodge any negativity in life and for the first time in my life, I found time for myself and lessened my worries that all things would work out fine.

 

Sadly, my parents never gave me the attention I needed or deserved to help me find this calmness. If I was calm, composed and patient around anyone it was because I worked hard to be that way and found interacting with other moody people an opportunity to test my own tolerances and beat someone else at self-control, showing positive consequences for such efforts and not having to feel remorseful later on as I reduced my fear of offending and fighting everybody with time and caution giving me successful traits and social development opportunities.