Obligations...

I picked up my phone and said, "Uh oh." Brent asked me what was wrong, I told him, "I have a family group text waiting. Family group texts first thing in the morning are never a good thing."

And it wasn't. It was my sister letting us know that my Uncle Denny had died the night before. 

He and Aunt Carol were my parent's best friends. Not family by blood, just by choice and years together. We did holidays together, went to the same church, just part of each other's circles. So no blood relation, but closer in contact than any of my parent's siblings. 

Ashley said right away that she would be flying back for the funeral.

I didn't commit. 

I already knew it would depend on when they held the funeral and how much the flights costs. 

Which, of course, started my mother hissing in my ear about family obligations. 

But with the house this year, as I've written about, everything was more expensive than we had planned, everything took longer which then ended up making it all even more, more expensive as prices would climb between first and second estimates. And as some of you might have read about, Intel is doing the cost cutting measures that a lot of other big companies are currently doing. 

Cost cutting measures always sounds less harsh than mass layoffs. Which sounds less harsh than firing a lot of people. 

Now, we should be fine. We've been through this a few times with Intel and we've always weathered it in the past. But always in the past doesn't mean always and forever. And should be fine doesn't mean will positively be fine. So we've put big spending on hold for awhile. There were a few projects we had already started that we will finish but other than that we are going to try and rebuild the reserves a little. 

So price was something I was going to look at before committing. 

And it was really expensive. Just the flight was a lot. Then adding a car and hotel room to that it got to be crazy. And it would just be me. The big cost was only for me, the timing of the funeral didn't work with Brent's schedule, and to be fair he would have moved things around if I had asked him to, but it would have been a struggle and a trade off for already scheduled time off to enjoy a semi-vacation at home when Katie came up for the holiday. 

Also, as a crazy bit of pricing, it was the same price for Ashley AND Ann to come in from Florida as it would have been for me to fly from Portland. Now, granted, I didn't want connecting flights with all of the cancellation issues we've been seeing and they are doing three connections, but still. One ticket vs. two. Florida vs. Oregon. 

But anyway...once the day was set and I saw the prices I made the final call not to go. Which made my mother very unhappy. 

Arguing with a dead woman is always fun. 

She pointed out that I should go back for Carol. I countered with Carol's sons would be there. And Susan was there. And she and Susan were the closest. I would just be there out of obligation to my mother's memory. Not really any help at all. And besides, the boys hadn't come back for either her or Dad's funerals so it wasn't even a real obligation. 

Mom pointed out that I should not live my life by what the boys choose to do or not do and that she did notice they weren't there for Dad so did I want Carol to notice I wasn't there?

I countered with she of course would notice, but it wouldn't actually make a difference. I would send a card and make a donation in Denny's name to the VA or something. 

She is still not happy about it, but the good thing about arguing with a dead woman is it is a little easier to win. Not easy, but easier. Eventually you just have to say, Well, you're dead so I'm going to do what I think is right and you'll just have to not live with it. And then you laugh and laugh because you realize you are arguing with a dead woman and making corny jokes about it and aren't exactly sane.

But it was actually more of a challenge than I thought it would be. Not the arguing with a dead woman part, the what I felt was the right thing to do part. 

And here is where things take a turn. 

I didn't like my Uncle Denny. We didn't get along. Growing up I thought he was mean and I didn't like the way he talked to Aunt Carol or to his kids or to me. My mother used to tell me that she thought he liked me best because I would argue with him. I told her I was pretty sure he liked me least because I argued with him. He would tell me that children should respect their elders. I would tell him to be respectful and I would. He was so different than my father and it was jarring to me. I thought for a long time that I was just too sensitive and he was just old school and sort of a crank like everyone else kept saying but then the first time Brent met him he was like, "he's really mean isn't he?" Thank you!

When my Dad died and I was back home we were all sitting in my mother's living room and the TV was on in the background, some home shopping show was on. Denny changed it to Glenn Beck. I just rolled my eyes. My mother actually was the one to say something. Now it wasn't a full throated rebuke or anything, but basically, "You know she doesn't want to watch that" which Denny replied that he did know that and that's why he put it on. 

We had a challenging relationship. 

So you can see that going back for his funeral would be only for Aunt Carol. Because I know she is devastated. I don't understand why she loved him like she did, he wasn't my cup of tea, but she did. They have had to have been married for over 60 years. As challenging as I found him she found him to be adorable. He was her world. And I know funerals are for the living, but they are also to honor the dead. 

And I would be lying if that hadn't figured into my reasoning on if I was going to go or not. 

It's mostly the money and the uncertainty of what is coming down the road for us. But it's also about the relationship and how long I've been away from being the good girl and doing what I was supposed to so the family didn't think badly of me. Or more accurately, about my mother and how she raised me.

I know most of my family already thinks a certain way about me. I made my peace with that a long time ago. 

Mostly. I mean unless you are a psychopath you don't actually want people to think badly of you. I just remind myself that the things they think badly about me are some of my favorite things about me. We're just very different people with very different beliefs.

And I also know that going won't change that. 

All of this is part of being semi-estranged from your family but not fully estranged. Fully estranged means no obligations at all. You don't even get sent the message when someone dies. All ties are cut. In a way it's easier. Or at least it seems like it would be easier. But semi-estranged is different. I'm the outcast and black sheep but how far out am I? Do they have to include me in things or don't they? Do I have to participate or don't I? 

I saw it a lot when Mom was still alive. She would talk about "the kids" and "me." Like plans were being made to see the kids about something and she would be telling me about it. Sometimes I'd say something. Sometimes I wouldn't. I got it. I wasn't there. Everyone else was. So I wasn't going to be included. 

When John and Ann moved to Florida she was fairly bent about it. She told me she understood them wanting to be closer to Ashley but she still didn't like the idea of her kids being so far away. Even as old as they were. I just told her I could imagine it would be hard. I don't know if she realized what she was saying or not. I think sometimes toward the end of her life when she was talking to me she forgot who I was and thought she was talking to her sister Dorothy. I'm not sure if that made it better or not, but I had been gone a long time by that point and though I know my mother always loved me I also know she didn't always understand me and it was probably easier to think of the older four in one way and me in another.

It's not always easy to be the black sheep. It's not always easy to know what your obligations are. It's not always easy to decide what the right thing to do is. And I also know that if I asked 10 of my friends I'd probably get a 50/50 split on what the right call would be. So this is the one I made and I'll argue with a dead woman a few more times over it, but I also know it's probably the right one to make. For a few reasons. 

But I do have to say, he got the last laugh. 

When I asked if Carol had an in lieu of flowers preference she said..."Make a donation to Ridgecrest."

The church I grew up in. 

The one I left.

Well played, Denny, well played...