The Audacity of Caucasity

For a long time I fought with myself about whether I'd write again. I always wanted to, but I never felt capable. Truthfully, writing is a soul-wrenching occupation, and no matter how fictitious (or not) one's works may be, there is a certain level of self-evident truth one has to wrestle with internally. I always aspired to "Edgar Allan Poe it"--there's a certain level of inspiration one can receive from psychedelics, but I'm too poor for pure opium, and marijuana is not yet legal here in North Carolina. I will always say deactivating this page in 2012 was absolutely the worst thing I could have ever done--even if I still have the encrypted pages. While young-minded, they were pure, unadulterated thoughts. Genuine. Sincere. A version of myself that I can only struggle to remember.

Truth is, I was abused. For a very long time. I thought I was stronger than my abuser, but lo and behold, I was a victim nonetheless. I don't say this to acquire any pity--I've never been one to enjoy people feeling sorry for me. Like most victims of abuse, the abuse I endured was my shame. I hated myself. I loved my abuser. I wanted my abuser to love me. Value me. See me. But when they looked at me, they didn't see a person. Even though they gave me life. My abuser could not fathom my humanity. To them, I didn't deserve it--no matter how hard I tried to earn it.

Sometimes I fought back. I'd hear the words, "You're not doing anything with your life. You're weak. You're a monster," and I'd say, "If you keep this up, the kids and I will be GONE. And there will be nothing you can do about it!" I hoped bartering the future relationship with my children would mean something to them, but either they didn't believe me, or they didn't think it was worth it to not risk it. I gave myself month after month of tasks to fulfill. Deadlines for applications. It was a hell I couldn't escape, and the devil was having the last laugh. For every friend I confided in, there was a shred of disbelief, "You don't really think your mom hates you? Do you?" They'd ask. And I'd side-eye the fuck out of them. "Well, just move out," they'd say, from their full-time jobs with husbands and boyfriends and baby daddies who actually paid their child support and their bills.

It was part of the reason why I was so jealous of my last boyfriend--he had parents who were overly involved in his life. They loved him without a fault. They supported him and encouraged him to no end---even when he started his own semi-pro baseball team. They went to his games when they were able, they checked in on us and the kids at the house from time to time, and we had Sunday dinners religiously. It was my first time seeing a nondysfunctional family dynamic, and I was stunned. Sometimes he'd take advantage of that love and support, and I'd resent him for it. Even he couldn't stand living with my mother. Her psychosis knew no bounds. Within six months of dating we had our own house, but then I started college and that triggered the end of our relationship cuz the crash of '08 happened. I hated him for giving up on us, but I had school to focus on. So I moved back in with her. She was never all that dependable, but she paid her mortgage on time and she was my mother. Of course, according to her he was the enemy because "How dare he kick a woman with three children out of the house," but I didn't realize it was because she saw me more as her problem than as her child. I mean, this is coming from the same person who begged me to move back from New York after I was brutally raped and beaten (see Fictional Nonfiction I, II, & III). She always said I was too independent, too fearless. She said she would support me in going back to college to get my bachelor's degree. I would be the first person in my immediate family to do so--all while having two young sons. Until I found out I was pregnant.

I will never forget that day. I had only been back in North Carolina for 30 days. I went to my very first boss and picked up my uniform shirt after begging him for my job back. I just needed something to earn money cuz I ordered a brand new 2008 Hyundai Elantra GT something or other, and it was delivered to my driveway all the way from Savannah. It was the most glorious powder blue color. It was sleek, and it had a 6-disc in-dash CD player. I came upstairs to tell my mom that I got my job back, laid back on her bed, and felt my youngest flip inside of me. I immediately grabbed my stomach and said, "Holy shit!" I was horrified. She rushed out of the bathroom to me and asked what was wrong. I said, "I'm pregnant. Oh my god. I'm fucking pregnant!" The horrified look on her face told me she understood. I was pregnant with my rapist's baby. College would have to wait while I figured out what I was going to do about this kid. That would also be the last time I remember her showing me any sort of empathy. By the time I was able to see a doctor I found out I was far too pregnant to consider termination, and although I am pro-choice, I didn't see it as an option for me anyway. I considered adoption, but I didn't want to break my family apart. The one thing I had going for me was the father would not have rights as I was protected by the state of New York with a five-year domestic violence restraining order. Now that I knew I was pregnant I could have even stuck him with rape charges, but I felt that would be too much stress on the baby and me. I just wanted to cut all ties and move on. 

Not long after I found out I was pregnant I was placed on bedrest because I was spotting and suffering from severe cramping while standing up at work. My boss even let me take orders in his office instead of at the front desk because I needed the hours, but soon that was still too much and I had to just bite the bullet for the rest of my pregnancy at home reading Charlaine Harris books and the final Harry Potter release. All the while I was completely unaware my mother had a drinking problem. I thought she was just crazy--or at the least an overbearing, condescending, never satisified mom. Looking back she seemed to be happy preparing for a new member of the family; she was definitely a textbook functioning alcoholic. But then I became the source of all her problems in life. I never asked her for anything but somehow, to her, I was demanding too much. She's always been stingy so I try to exhaust all other resources before I'd ask her for anything financial--or I'd just suffer without until I could make it happen for myself. I learned that from dealing with my father. I had never felt so responsible for someone else's misery when all I wanted was a mother who could see past my shortcomings and support me. She trash-talked me to her "friends." I say "friends" because she doesn't really have friends, she has coworkers who she overshares with and thinks they are her friends. One of these friends called herself "telling me about myself" while pregnant with my youngest, saying how dare I come back to my mother's house and make her responsible for me and my kids when she was the one who asked me to move back home in the first place! Needless to say I cussed that bitch out and told her where she could go with her opinion. And I was crushed. I was crushed that my mother would let an outsider speak to me, her only living daughter, that way. It took years before I would even speak to that woman--she worked at the unemployment office so sometimes I had no choice, but every time I saw her fat, squashed face I wanted to punch her in it. She got in a couple car accidents after that and my mom would come to me telling me how worried she was, and I wouldn't respond. She'd say I was evil and heartless because I told her the bitch was lucky her ugly ass didn't die. "Kita, that's my friend!" she'd holler. 

"And? I'm your daughter." Shrug. Pop a grape or some water in my mouth. Walk away to my room and close the door.

She'd steal from me. Look me directly in my eyes and lie about it. I remember once she stole my colored contacts (I always thought I was an improper mixed girl cuz I had dark hair and brown eyes quite unlike the mixed girls I saw on TV with light hair and green eyes). My mother, if you don't know already, is the Karenest of Karens. She is the epitome of reverse racism whiteness. She is the reason black women shun mixed kids with white moms. If you look up Caucasity in the dictionary, there is a picture of her face. She won't ask for the manager, she always calls on her big brute of a black daughter for that. But she is the quintessential walking tether of a human being--passive aggression and microaggressions fuel her alkaline bloodlust. Confront her head on and she'll wither away like the crust on a croissant. She plays helpless to manipulate people. And that sweet, eyelash batting southern charm is a fraud. She's from the mountains of Pennsylvania. When I was little, she hated her mother, now that I'm older, her mother can do no wrong. Talk about mixed signals. But one day she was on her bullshit. I'm in college, it's summertime, health insurance be damned, and I needed some contact lenses. I can't afford to constantly replace them so I wore the same pair over and over until they tore, stretching out the life of the pack as long as I could. I keep a mental inventory of everything because, having suffered a childhood with her, I know she will go through my shit uninvited, and start throwing my things away for no other reason than she felt "I didn't need it anymore." God forbid I set boundaries on my stuff because, at the end of the day, it was in her house. 

So I notice I have contacts missing, and I ask her about them. She blows me off. I ask her again. We're outside arguing. I look her dead in the face, and I am about to completely lose my shit because this bitch has one GREEN EYE and one blue!!! Her eyes are naturally an ice blue--so blue in fact her corneas have scratches in them where the blue is fading. I remember when she pointed it out to me one day when she said her eye doctor was worried about her vision. I was angry. THE AUDACITY. Not only did she unapologetically steal from her own kid, she lied to me on top of it. Isn't that the most disappointing thing you can do to a parent? Lie to their face? But here she is, lying to me in MY face, like she isn't retired military working for the state with a full salary AND Blue Cross Blue Shield health insurance and a vision plan. If she needed contacts that bad, as a US Army retiree she could literally get them FOR FREE. SO WHY DID SHE HAVE TO STEAL FROM HER DAUGHTER, A SINGLE MOTHER OF THREE IN COLLEGE, WORKING PART-TIME WITHOUT A POT TO PISS IN OR A WINDOW TO THROW IT OUT OF? I never got an explanation nor an apology.