My Dear Liar,

I won't get into the specifics here, but someone close to me has lied to me again. This is a person i usually defend to his parents and go out of my way to be kind to because i feel like he has seen too much unkindness in his life, especially at the hands of his extended family. He puts on a pretty good face of being a responsible person (i'm pretty sure he was, at one point in his life), and it was difficult to trust him again after the last time i caught him lying to me.

So what do i do now? I asked him a very straightforward question, and he outright lied to me. He's a big fan of playing with semantics and technicalities, but there were no semantics for him to play with. I don't know how to treat him now. I mean, i hate to sound like one of those "After all i've done for you" kind of people, but that's really how i'm feeling.

So, if you're reading this, i want you to know it'll be a long time before i trust you again. Don't you dare get impatient with me, because you've brought this on yourself. Don't ask me for anything, because you don't deserve it after this. Don't come crying to me about the injustices in your life, because you've just done me a great injustice yourself. And when you start feeling sorry for yourself, as you inevitably will, you'd BETTER remember that what's happening to you is all your fault.

Coulda, Woulda, Shoulda

So back to this whole Ryan business. I kinda sat back after he left and thought of all the things i SHOULD have done at the time.

I should have told him right away that he needs to introduce people when he brings them into our house.

I should have told them that Jim's hint wasn't a request.

I should have told them I was uncomfortable with their behaviour.

I should have flipped on the light and told that bitch to go home.

But i didn't... I honestly didn't know how to react at the time and as much as i wish i had my wits about me at the time, i didn't. I have always been great with imagining what i should have done at the time ten minutes too late. Gotta love that hindsight, eh?

So what i plan to do is this:

1. He gets a nice big lecture about permission. Also, how i expect him to conduct himself in the presence of friends in my house. After all, if we're too embarrassing to be introduced, then his friends really don't have any business over here in the first place.

2. He gets to have zero friends over for the forseeable future. That's for not satisfying the conditions of my permission before doing as he asked, and not having the courtesy to introduce them.

3. No more girls in the bedroom. That's for treating my house like a fucking rent-by-the-quarter-hour-no-tell-motel.

I know he's a teenager, i know he's exploring his boundaries or whatever. But as far as i'm concerned, he's not grown yet (as evidenced by his immature behaviour) and boundary exploration doesn't allow for nor excuse disrespect.

Abused Hospitality

I consider myself to be a pretty liberal person. I pretty much feel that as long as you're not hurting yourself or someone else (or putting anyone in danger of being hurt), and you're taking care of your responsibilities, you should be able to do whatever you like. I grew up with a pretty Nazi-ish father whose views were pretty much the opposite: Stay home and do absolutely nothing so that i can watch what you're doing at all times. I found that to be rather chafing at times, to say the least, and i figured if i ever had kids i wouldn't want to subject them to that kind of restriction.

As it turns out, i never had any kids, but i wound up with a couple of step kids instead. That suits me just fine. They have a perfectly functional father and (in spite of how i may feel about her personally) a servicable mother. With this in mind, i don't do much in the way of parenting for either kid; instead, i try to offer advice when they need it and leave them alone when they don't. My rules that govern my house are pretty simple: Take care of your responsibilities and be considerate. As long as both of those conditions are met, everyone pretty much goes along unfucked-with.

Now, we finally come to where i'm going with this. Last Wednesday, Ryan sent me a text message asking if he can have a friend over on Sunday. Thing is, i don't like having people over when the house isn't neat. The house wasn't a complete wreck, and since it was his guest, i figured he could straighten up. I replied "Sure, as long as you straighten up first". He replied "Alright".

Now, i'm not psychotic about how my house looks. I don't require that it look like a model home or unlived in. Just don't have shit all over the floor or dishes in the sink. Maybe wipe down the countertops and straighten up your desk. By no means am i going to come through with a white glove to criticize the job.

So Saturday, he asked what time can she come over (i learn now that the friend is a 'she'. No big deal, just info i didn't previously have). At this point, he hasn't done anything but take out the trash when asked. So i told him anytime after 11 am. I resisted the urge to tell him 'After you straighten up', because i didn't want to nag (which i'm prone to doing when people don't do what i want them to do when i think it should be done).

Sunday came around, and he still hadn't picked up. So i asked Jim if she changed her mind about coming over, and he said that she was in fact, already on her way. I was pretty peeved about that because Ryan still hadn't straightened up. Apparently, there was some confusion on Ryan's part about what qualified as 'straightening up', and Jim told him to come ask me what i needed. He opted not to do that, and instead elected to do nothing at all.

So this girl shows up, and Ryan takes her into his room. No introduction, nothing. Just straight for the room. I don't mind if the boys have girls in their room as long as the door is open, but i thought that not introducing someone was pretty fucking rude. I walked by, and they're just sitting in there holding hands and watching TV. Fine, i decided, i'd talk to him about how i felt later. Jim went in and tried to hint drop a hint and told them they could change the channel on the big tv in the living room. They said thanks, and didn't move.

As time went on, they went from sitting and holding hands to laying together under the covers in bed with the light off. I was so uncomfortable! I didn't even want to walk past the room to go to the bathroom. It was getting pretty late, and Jim and i were hungry. I was pissed off, and didn't want to cook for this girl i didn't even have the priveledge of meeting, nor did i want to go out to get something and leave the two of them anymore alone than they'd already made themselves.

So about 7:30, she decided to leave. They came out of the room, and walked right out the front door, without a word said. Ryan strolled casually into the kitchen and asked what was i cooking for dinner. It took all my self-control to not blow up at him. I was seething.

So am i overreacting to this? Or is it reasonable to expect that if i put a condition on permission for something, that the conditions be met before the permission is taken advantage of? Am i old fashioned for wanting to meet people who walk through my door for the first time? And if someone says to me 'friend', am i being prudish for being shocked at them taking this 'friend' to bed half an hour after they arrive? Jim has left what's to be done about this in my hands. But i'm already running late and i don't have time to go on about it now.

Doesn't That Just Figure?!

So after all the agonizing, the stressing, the threats and the ugliness, Robbie made the decision himself not to come with us. He came this weekend to spend the night and did really well on Friday. He slept over with no problem, and things looked like maybe he'd grown up a little bit. Saturday night rolled around, and he wouldn't go to bed and insisted he go home. Jim (and Kristi, to her credit) explained to him that if he couldn't spend even two days here, then he wasn't going to make it for fourteen. He agreed, and told Jim he didn't care about vacation anymore, he just wanted to go home. So Jim called Kristi, told her what happened, and she agreed (FINALLY) that maybe he wasn't ready. So he extracted the agreement from her that Robbie wasn't going with us and she wouldn't try to conceal Ryan from us. I'm SO relieved! I'm a little annoyed that she had to go to such extremes to get her way, only to have Robbie decide in the end that he didn't want to go (which says to me he never really wanted to go in the first place, he just didn't want Ryan getting something he wasn't going to get). But i'm mostly relieved.

Jim still wants Robbie to come over on weekends though. At least during the day. If he doesn't come over, the same thing will probably happen next year. What i'd like to see happen is he learn to be here at night, and then maybe we take a day-trip some place, and then an overnight stay some place, then a weekend trip some place so that we can work him up to coming with us next year. Next year we're probably going to Arkansas for a week to see Jim's mother, and i know Robbie'd want to see her and it'd be sad for him to miss out on that.

Give Me The Strength To Accept What I Cannot Change

And so it's happened pretty much the way i thought it would. She made her demands, we made our feeble protests, and in the end, she got her way. I'm still angry that we didn't pursue the legal recourse that was available to us, but i understand really that this is the best way for everyone. Once i'm not angry about it anymore it will be easier to accept, but i'm still very, very bitter about it right now. I guess i could make this a private entry and stop being oblique about everything.

Here's what happened: We're taking vacation in a week to go see my parents in New Mexico. We were going to take Ryan with us and leave Robbie at home, since he's never been able to stay over without having to go home to his mom. Besides, Robbie has only seen us a handful of times for a couple of hours at a time since Christmas, usually to come over and ask for something. He's a very materialistic child, and when he can't get what he wants from us, he by and large has no use for us. Naturally we didn't want to take him with us. Well, this is unacceptable to Kristi because if we do that, we're taking away her free babysitting and she'd actually have to spend the money she receives for babysitting ON babysitting ("Oh, no! How completely unfair!", i'm sure you're thinking to yourself). So she tells us if we don't take Robbie, we can't take Ryan. We were like Whatever, we're not taking him. So she threatens to take both kids out of town so that we can't take either one if we refuse to take both, and here's where the struggle begins.

The basic problem (for me) is this: She's always made these sort of demands for her convenience, and just with held the kids from us when we refused to accomodate her. Now that we have a court order protecting our rights with the kids, i thought the days of these demands were over, but apparently i was wrong. The solution I wanted to see: Call the police and have them put out an amber alert (after all, let's call this what it really is- She's threatening us with kidnapping). I'd have love to have seen her go to jail for this just so she can see that she can't get away with this shit just because she thinks she's "In the right". I really wanted her to know that No, she is most certainly NOT in the right, that kidnapping is NEVER right. I also think Robbie needs to know that no means no, and we'd already told him we weren't taking him.

The fallout of this would be bad for the children though. They wouldn't benefit at all from seeing their mother go to jail. This would have also bred serious resentment issues from Robbie towards us in several ways. One, for sending his mom to jail; two for objecting so strongly to having him around us; and three of course, for not giving him his way. I can personally live with being resented for the first and last reason, but i really don't want him feeling like we think having him with us is the worst thing that could happen. It really isn't his fault that he's been spoiled so badly, and on the positive side, i think time with us away from an atmosphere where he gets whatever he wants will really benefit him. Hell, maybe he'll come and enjoy himself and realize that with us he gets a lot more freedoms than with her and he'll actually LIKE being with us. Stranger things have happened.

So even though we made the decision to take him with us in spite of everything that could go wrong, i still feel like the decision was already made for us and we're being forced to do this. I really dislike being forced to do ANYTHING i don't want to do, and this is very hard for me to swallow. Not misdirecting my resentment towards her at Robbie is going to be a major challenge for me to overcome, and knowing this makes me feel like i am a bad person for not being able to intellectually acknowledge it isn't his fault and treat him accordingly without forcing myself to moderate my behaviour.

Here are my fears: I'm afraid she'll think that all she has to do is make her threats and we'll just roll over and give her what she wants. I'm afraid she'll be right about this, since that's the way it's worked out for the last four years in spite of the assurances i've been given to the contrary. After all, i've been given these assurances before and they haven't worked out for whatever reason. I'm afraid that Robbie will see that he's gotten HIS way once again and feel he can act however he wants and get away with it. I know Jim won't allow that, but i don't want to see him punished, nor do i want to have to tolerate his inevitable fits since he's completely unaccustomed to being told no. I'm afraid he's going to ruin the next two weeks. I'm afraid i won't be able to not resent him every time he opens his mouth and compares us to his mother (his mother, of course, being the superior example we're supposed to somehow naturally want to live up to).

We aren't getting the shaft completely. This is Jim's counterdemand to her: If we take him on vacation, then we get our visitation time with him whenever it comes up. No more Robbie choosing to be with his grandparents or his mother over being with us. No more choosing to come over only if we're going to do something that interests him. No more only coming over when he wants to ask us for something (and then leaving when he is told no). We waited for him to decide he wanted to be with us, and it apparently wasn't the right thing to do since that choice never materialized. When it's his time to be here, he'll be here whether he wants it or not. My hope is he'll learn the lesson Be Careful What You Ask For, You May Just Get It. I am also hoping that he'll learn he won't always get what he wants. I'm hoping he'll learn to treat Ryan respectfully for a change (or at least that he can't walk all over him and expect applause for it the way he does when he is with Kristi's family). I'm hoping his exposure to us will help him not be so spoiled. I'm kind of thinking that she's going along with this demand until after vacation, and then once we're back she'll make herself and Robbie unavailable to us when we're supposed to have him. Jim says he'll call the police if that happens. He says that missing a weekend with the kids is better than missing our whole first family vacation together, and i agree with him.

I'm also grateful on some level for the opportunity to FINALLY develop a relationship with Robbie. I got to know Ryan over a year ago, and i cherish the relationship i have with him and the dynamic of the family relationship between him and me and Jim. He's the kind of kid that makes me feel like maybe motherhood wouldn't have been so bad...i mean, really a stellar person. I'm hoping that my relationship with Robbie will be equally positive, though i know it won't be the same and that i'll have to continuously work at it. Robbie isn't like us, he won't click as naturally with us as Ryan did, but i want to have that relationship.

I'm praying for the strength to accept this thing that i can't change and to become a better person through this trial. To those couple of you who can read this and decided to, i'm sorry it was so long, but it was mostly written to organize my thoughts and feelings about this problem (catharsis, come to me!).

It will be interesting to see what happens.

Reaching Out

We all have one of those friends who, when you're with them, is peppy and laughs a lot and seems happy enough. Then you get a glimpse of them when they think you're not looking and they seem very much not okay at all. So then you wonder: What's wrong? Of course, you ask, and the predictable "Oh, nothing!" and a smile is all you get. "Okay", you think to yourself, "Maybe i just interpreted it wrong". But you keep seeing signs that something just isn't right, and your friend is hurting beneath the surface. You want to ask what's wrong, but don't want to pry or be nosy. After all, you've already asked (a couple of times, in fact), and they opted not to share the problem(s) with you, thus making it none of your business. You want to keep trying, but you don't want to alienate them, so you let it be and look on and feel helpless struggling with the desire to be helpful. So there's my problem. How do i reach out when "What's wrong?" isn't enough?

Kristi- You're A Cunt

Well, that pretty much says it all. But i have a bit more to add anyway (in case you're reading this). As much as it sucks to be you, and as unhappy as you are with your lot in life, get over it before you grow into an old, bitter woman that only other old, bitter women like. And please, quit spying on us. Not only are we none of your business, it's really rather pathetic. You're like that guy at work no one likes who's too busy worrying about what everyone else is doing when he SHOULD be minding his own business. Focus on yourself (that should come naturally enough... you've been doing it since birth and expecting everyone else to follow your example, after all) and you might actually find a little happiness. So, in closing, quit being such a hypocrytical super-twat. Start behaving like that good christian you claim (but happen not) to be, and forgive...turn the other cheek...whatever your church tells you that you should be doing, but aren't.