Monday, January 28, 2008

Birthday Blahs

Two days before my birthday my cell phone rang while I was lounging in bed with B. I picked up the phone and saw that it was from an "unknown" number, which usually means my sister. So I answered it happily only to hear that it was my dad on the line. I don't talk to my dad. It's a long story, but believe me when I say that he is a troubled person who made my life very sad and I've done much better since I decided to become estranged from him. Anyway, I answer the phone and he says, "Happy Birthday!" My immediate response is to tell him that it's not my birthday yet, but I hear the argument that will ensue play out in my head ("Oh Jesus Christ, can't you let anything go? Come on, do you really think I don't know when your birthday is?(Yes, actually I do.) Give me a break!") So I just say "Thanks," instead and he asks me how I am and I say fine and then he switches into his casual, "I'm not doing anything unusual, just having a breezy once a year or so conversation with my daughter," voice and asks, "So, hey, I need your brother and sister's addresses because I sent something and it was returned." And I say, as usual, "Ok, well I'll ask them if it is ok to give it to you and get back to you." (We are all estranged from my dad, by the way.) To which he replies, "Oh, you have to ask them?" And I patiently reply, as if we haven't had this conversation twelve million times, "Yes, I will ask them and then get back to you." He then says in a pissed voice, "Well then, don't bother." I point out that he has my brother's phone number and he can call him, but my dad says that he needs my brother's address, not mentioning that he has called my brother and my brother refuses to return his calls, tells me again not to bother and gets off the phone. Lovely, right?
I have a brother that has a birthday the day before mine. I think my father got confused and thought that my birthday was the day before my brother's, instead of the day after. Oh well.
I wasn't going to mention this and was trying to pretend it wasn't a big deal, but I've realized that things like this send me into a bit of a depression, so I thought I'd address it and maybe then I could move on.

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