Halifax

2003-06-07 - 9:59 a.m.

I misstepped myself with my stepmom at dinner the other day. Here is the conversation:

Sister (in the voice that only a ten year old can make that signals that the grownups have talked about this subject enough, thank you, and she just wants the matter to be settled and over-with so that she can tell us about Card Captors or Digimon): Is that war still going on?

Dad: Well, it's mostly over (pause). The bombing is over...

Step-mom: That's right, but they haven't done everything they wanted to do... (at this point I thought she would mention rebuilding Iraq, preventing a hunger crisis, helping the civillians avoid undetonated bombs, radioactive material, death-from-neglect...) They still haven't found Saddam Hussein.

(Because obviously, finding a single deposed leader who has little chance of ever regaining power in a country unless the people are fed up with the state of affairs is -so- much more important than reparing any damage an illegal war might have caused.)

Sister: (In a voice of "They keep saying it, so it must be true, but I am -soooooo- bored now!") Because he's living in Luxury?

StepMom: That's right. He's living in luxury somewhere with his buddy Osama.

(Oops.)

Magus: Actually (<- probably said in an insuferably superior tone of voice), Osama and Hessein weren't really friends. They were kinda, almost enemies. I don't think they're living together. (Besides, isn't Saddam shacked up with Satan or something?)

Step Mom: Well, I guess it all depends on what news you read.

Magus: True, true. Of course, if you read the news based on actual facts, you'd know they weren't friends at all.

Okay, so I don't think that's the exact wording I used, but it's pretty darn near the sentiment. I was mainly caught off-guard. I hadn't been expecting to be present during a discussion of world politics with my sister, and when I heard what I consider to be thoughtless propaganda being told to her, I saw red. I mean, raise my sister however you like, but if I'm in the room, can you please not trash everything about me? I know that you don't like my long hair, my vegetarianism, my unwillingness to get a car, and my silly ideas about taking money from the rich and giving it to the poor, but don't assume that I'm going to let you trash things that I believe in in front of my little sister who currently adores me, but may lose that when she reaches adulthood.

I still need to apologize, because I overstepped the rules of courtesy. But still.

So, other than the fact that almost everyone in my family is suddenly nurturing their own inner Conservative (Step-mom has a new SUV, Mom is on the "Grafitti Gone" board to eliminate street art, brother hates bums), things aren't so bad.

I guess I always get too frightened about how things are with my father. Whenever we're actually together, things are fine. We have a strikingly similar sense of humour, one that often depends on the wry and absurd, and everytime I visit, I discover something else we have in common. Last time, we found out that we both hate gatherings of people and would rather sit by ourselves, or at home, than be forced to socialize. This time we discovered that our jaws crack when we chew in the same way. I figure that in twenty years or so, we'll have long conversations about all the things we have in common: agoraphobia, cracking jaws, arthritis, enlarged prostate, near-sightedness, far-sightedness, broken hip, being bald....

And, I finally came out to my sister. She took it okay, but she thinks it's "weird" and can't understand it. She actually already knew, but she won't tell me whether it's because dad and step-mom told her, or if she suspected by her own means. She kept asking about Pookie all weekend, so I guess she likes him, which us understandable, since she is a mammal with higher brain functions. I'm glad I did it...it means that I can start talking about Pookie in a more familiar, honest way. He isn't a friend or a roommate, and his student loan debt is -our- student loan debt. One day, with any luck, he'll be my husband (or whatever term we decide on).

I think that I'm going to have to talk with Mom, about the sudden differences in our politics (I can't believe that I've changed so much...it has to be a collaborative effort). I suddenly feel like the "hippy son" character in some sitcom, the one who's ideas are so "out there" that no one takes him seriously, but they love him because he's so darn earnest.

I feel kind of adrift.

The only other thing to note is that Halifax is so strange to me now...it seems so run-down in some ways, maybe even a little more frightening. Every single family member has recounted horror stories about drive-by shootings, random beatings, guns and metal detectors...

The only things that are the same, it seems, are the ocean air, the sun, the smell of the city. I hope those things never change.

I can't believe I'm saying this, on the verge of 26, but I feel like I'm growing too fast. Or everything else is. Childhood is a different country, now.

Cheers,

The Magus

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