Radium Girl

Disclaimer: I started writing this entry before I went to work this morning and I'm just now coming back to it after a marvelous shift spent laying on the floor of my supervisor's office while the nice EMT tried to get me to drink water and take my pants off. More on this later. In the meantime, forgive any disjointedness. I'm still semi-comatose. 

 

 

I would say "fuck it" and just not speak to them unless spoken to from now on (which isn't so far from our current policy, actually) except that would be a very Melinda-esque thing to do and I really have no doubts that the uncle in question adores me and would have loved to see me. 

 

I'm so sick of the family drama though. I try so hard to ingratiate myself to my aunt and my cousins. I get alot of brownie points on virtue of whose kid I am. My dad was the second-born of seven kids, and he was the "hero", I guess, if we want to apply broad stereotypes to him and his siblings (which is appallingly easy, actually). He lied about his age and joined the Air Force when he was seventeen. He flew cargo planes in Vietnam.  I grew up to stories about his plane, nicknamed the Road Runner; how it was shot down, how Dad came home in a body cast, how he threw a bedpan at the doctor when he was told he might be in a wheelchair because of the shrapnel in his legs and hip. 

He wasn't. 

He married my mother, who was beautiful and not-on-parole at the time and he got a good job working on airplanes and "always took care of his family. Always. Always." my uncle says. 

 

Aka: he bailed their asses out of jail when they needed it, took their kids in when CFS took them away, and made sure his mother had heat in the winter because the rest of them were too busy polluting the gene pool to bother. 

 

And then he died. 

 

So, as the offspring of dear Saint Charles, my brother and I definitely get allowances and respect that I think other cousins don't. Even when I was little and he was still alive, we were always seen differently. There was never any doubt that we would go to college. Why? Because Charles said that we would.  We also lived in New Jersey for the first half of my life, and only saw the relations in the summer. We didn't have the thick Pittsburghese accent (yet). We had no interest in hunting, only marginal interest in fishing, and had no fear about taking a bus or a train somewhere and (GASP!) sitting next to a black person during the trip. Thus, we were vaguely exotic creatures. We were poked and prodded and gawked at and picked on, sure, but it was always friendly. We were still part of the fam. 

 

After Dad died, that sentiment seemed to evolve. My brother and I became these holy items, these relics. We are Charles' flesh and blood. Suddenly, we were scrutinized not for our alienness, but for our Charlesness. I have his chin. I have his nose. I have his hands. Chuck has the nose, the chin, the sense of humor. We both have his temper. These things became sacred. They were fawned over and encouraged and we were loved because we were Charles' children. 

 

This has been the case for almost ten years. But slowly, things have changed. I feel like another evolution of sentiment has happened right under my nose and that somewhere along the line, we because somewhat resented. Oh, we still have that diplomatic immunity that comes from being Saint Charles' spawn, but beneath that, there's this sense of obligation(?) towards us. We aren't precocious kids from that foreign realm of New Jersey, and we aren't these troubled pseudo-orphans anymore. We're adults in our own right. And rather than point out all those traits that we share with our late father, over the past year or so, I feel the attention has been shifted to the ways we "dishonor" him. 

 

My brother is now twenty-two years old. He still has zero interest in hunting and less of an interest in fishing, guns, or cars. This would almost label him a girl in our family, except that the women tend to be just as passionate about those things as the menfolk. My tattoos, my Catholic boyfriend, my impending move to Michigan; these are black spots on my pedigree. I am no longer this little four-year-old that hoards pennies in my change purse. I've struggled for awhile now, trying to reconcile who and what I am now with who and what I was and I think that my uncle and aunt and cousins are finally starting to do that too. 

 

I was shocked and hurt to basically be told not to come to the hospital. My aunt called me yesterday morning to tell me my uncle was being released today. I have a hard time talking to my aunt under the best of circumstances. She's a very rough, very practical, very traditional mountain woman. I once visited the fam after a job interview and I was in a suit and heels and black pantyhose and when I walked in the back door, she stopped kneeding the bread she was making, looked my get-up up and down, and said, "I wish your daddy was still around to explain you to us because I just don't know what to make of you."
 

Yesterday's phone call was more painful that usual due to the circumstances. She mentioned Michigan and said, "Its a shame how small this family keeps getting."

 

"I'm pretty sure that moving to Michigan doesn't rewrite my DNA."

 

"What the hell are you talking about?"

 

"I'm still in the family. After the move."

 

"Not really."

 

Oh. 

 

So going to the casino in hopes of becoming well-financed individuals seemed like a great idea to Chrissy and I. Especially since parking is free and we're both hella-poor (as usual) and hey, maybe we'll win!

 

I managed to stretch my twenty bucks into four hours of playing, but in the end, I went home empty-handed, as did Chrissy. 

 

 

"My daddy called me his princess all the time." 

 

Whatever. I justify it with the argument that we don't really have anything that compares. I mean, no one cares when the presidents' kids get married. One of the Bush twins got married a few years ago and it was like, a 30-second blurb on the news.  Chelsea Clinton got married and the only thought I had was, "To a guy? Really?  I thought I read somewhere that she likes girls?"

 

Yeah. So. I liked Kate's dress. That girl needs to eat a sandwich (or three) though, seriously. I keep calling her "Princess Skeletor" in my head because I'm an awful person. And she needs to eat a sandwich. Several sandwiches, in fact. 

 

Camilla looked good. There. I said it. I really liked her everything though. The coat. The hat. The hair. Gold star, lady. 

 

Posh Spice and David Beckham are scary looking. My landlord and I had tea together tonight and she said that she thinks they're androids. I think they are too. I couldn't even look at pictures and be like, "David Beckham is so hot" because all I was thinking is "David Beckham is too hot."

 

Also? I really liked the Spice Girls when I was in 4th grade. I cried when they broke up. CRIED. I was also eleven. My dad laughed at me. 

 

In conclusion, Harry is cute and I want to go get drunk with him. He's also older than me, which surprised me, because I thought I was older and felt like a pedo every time I thought, "You. Me. Royal pub crawl."

 

And then I watched The King's Speech and was all inspired and shit. Every time I watch historical dramas, I have to remember that (delightfully paraphrased) quote from Elizabeth Barrett Browning, "Every age feels unheroic to those who are living in it."

 

In conclusion, Happy birthday, Sammich Winchester. I was going to write you a story, but I got distracted by CNN and "Ding Dong, Osama's Dead" and trying to figure out whether I should pull out my tiny little American flag and start USA chanting or wring my hands and try to figure out if my joy makes me a barbarian. 

 

 

Here, have an adorable kid to ease the pain:

 

 

There have been companions both before and after Sarah Jane's departure, but to me, personally, even though I came into the show through the new series and, admittedly, have watched only pieces of the classic series, to me, Sarah Jane Smith was THE companion. She was Every(wo)man. During her time on the TARDIS, she became more than a damsel at a time when women needed to see that on their televisions. Later, when she resurfaces decades later in the new series, we see something that the classic series tended to gloss over: life after the Doctor. There is a reason why the Doctor cannot fall in love with his companions. There is a reason why he has to let them go. Sarah Jane's reappearance in the series served to remind us of that, and the Doctor, of the maelstrom that is his entire existence, of the bittersweetness he leaves in his wake. 

 

To travel with the Doctor would be an amazing opportunity, but it wouldn't come without consequences. 

 

Goodbye, lady. You were brilliant.