realizing this is like a trail of breadcrumbs

a history, a story, a written document of what happened, of how things were. So that people in the future can see at least one auntie's view of how things went down. Why do I feel like I'm on a sinking ship and have to leave behind a diary, a memori-whatdoyoucallit - anyway, something to show how I saw things, which I feel sure is quite different from how everybody else saw them.

I feel as if I am outside, an observer, trying to remain - what - univolved? No, not so much that - more like I just don't want to get caught up in the pattern that I see as being so destructive, so damaging to future life and happiness. And of course there's only so much I can do, I'm not really 'outside' the pattern, I'm part of it, just as much as anybody is. I can try to distance myself from it, and come back in only when I feel strong enough to resist the pull - but then, I'm still doing the dance. Sometimes it seems like disengaging completely is the only way. But then I feel like I'm abandoning my nieces - or am I really just being selfish? Is seeing them really only for me? I have to hope that it does some good, that it helps them see another side to things, another view. That it offers them hope, an alternative, an escape from the parental prison (or at least, that's how I see it. I guess I can't honestly wish that level of despair on children so young. They're not ready for the mantle of such heavy emotional responsibility, as my youngest niece showed tonight at dinner. It's so hard to know what to do when there never seem to be any actual adults in the room...including me...)

And again I remind myself that I don't want to be 'holier-than-thou', that I'm somehow 'better' than my sister-in-law, or that I would be a better parent - fer cryin' out loud, I can't even manage enough of a relationship with a man to have the just the two of us be together, let alone a whole frickin' family...and of course that's a whole other story. (I actually don't feel like that's a failing on my part, just FYI for anyone who might be reading this :-) It's more like a choice, the












lesser of two weevils, or something. Sad attempt at humor, I know. Best I can do just now.)

Mostly I just want them to know that, in this world full of power battles, winners and losers, there's somebody on their side.

It's amazing how oblivious parents seem to be to the effects of their behavior on their children (and I hope again that they will be ok with what I said tonight - the kids, I mean - that I didn't just make the problem worse).

It's as if the parent sees the suffering look on the child's face, and instead of seeing the suffering, instead of empathizing or sympathizing, the parent is suddenly reduced to the position of feeling like a small child herself, and inflicts upon her own flesh and blood the same brutal and insensitive behavior that her own parents before her did.

So when she sees the howl of pain, she distances herself, and offers no comfort; or when the child gets that taunting grimace of 'back-talking', the parent wants to smash her down, this small and, really, helpless and utterly dependent being. What rears up inside her is the anger at how she herself was treated as a small child, the feeling of utter powerlessness, and she wants to smash it - smash the feeling, smash the parent, smash the voice. But what she ends up doing is smashing her own child, perpetuating the pattern yet again down another generation.