"I'll tell you everything, and you tell me everything, and maybe we can get through all the piss and shit and lies that kill other people." Claudia Wilson Gator in Magnolia 1999
As children, we're all taught not to lie. Or I should say we're taught that we are to always tell the truth to our parents. The subject of not lying is fundamental to the Ten Commandments. I woke up early this morning thinking about this very deeply. Then I started thinking about individual family members; who is still alive, who is not. And out of the ones who remain alive, who is well liked and who is not. And I went through the Ten Commandments, one by one.
And I found a very disturbing connection.
The popular family members are the ones who had created some problems for those who are not alive anymore, or not well liked, by lying. I'm not talking of the family members who died from old age, but the ones who died too young. Kind of like Billy Joel's song, Only the Good Die Young. And I'm not talking about little white lies. I mean lies that were destructive and deeply rooted. And also the lies that a few of my family members perpetuated were entwined with the Ten Commandments.
Yes, we were taught not to lie, steal, cheat and that commendable traits were valor, bravery, honor, loyalty and honesty. Punishment was prescribed if you lied about something or someone, stole or 'borrowed' something and didn't return it in a timely manner, or if you cheated in any way. I focused so much on the lying and stealing that I forgot about cheating and its full definition and I must admit I should have gotten into trouble for the times I cheated, both as a child and as an adult. But then again, I wasn't explained that cheating is when you don't give someone or something its' full measure or what a person is fully entitled to. So I became somewhat obsessed with monitoring others and the truths of their acts and words, and found that not a day went by when someone I knew boldly and blatanty lied. It's disturbing to me. I'm disturbed with my own behavior.
When I was young, and would disclose a family members mistruth to certain family members and want to discuss why they had felt compelled to lie about a situation I would be told not to say anything, they would go to extreme lengths to keep the truth from being known. It appeared that they would put more energy into keeping the truth from being known, than correcting the situation at hand. And especially to weave a whole new set of lies to keep the truth from being talked about. Did they really think that there was no one who didn't know the truth? Or atleast had suspicions?
My father's father became a victim to his father's lies. Back in the very early 1900's it was not fashionable to be homosexual. In fact, it was a huge liability. I'm not saying that there was no homosexuality, but it was unmentionable. My grandfather was a homosexual. At the age of eighteen, he married my then sixteen year old grandmother to disguise it for the sake of his career, and they produced two children one after the other. When the children were young, he maintained custody of the children and sent the young, obedient wife away under threat. The two children suffered emotionally from the so-called abandonment as witnessed by mental illness in the girl, and addiction problems in the boy. The girl was eventually committed to a state mental institution as a young woman after she had produced a couple of children of her own, was deemed schitzophrenic and had a lobotomy to immobilize her. If it was in today's times, she would have been viewed simply as young, artistic and eccentric, certainly not a mental case doomed to a dungeon in the state mental hospital for life. State hospitals were a repository for families and husbands to place their family members who did not conform to their wishes.
My own mother used to go to great lengths driving me to the gates of a mental hospital, threatening to leave me there, simply over my voicing an opinion over her treatment of me. What was I supposed to do? Let her beat me with an umbrella and allow my father to turn the hose on me for punishment? Upon learning of a great move of deceit on my husbands part and subsequently smashing a half pint of milk on his head, he drove me to USC mental department, insisting the orderlies to take me away. Of course, they didn't.
When an argument ensued with Joseph over the custody of Veronica, he insisted that my mother to take custody of her; upon reaching a stop sign, I got out of the car (no it was NOT moving), he promptly went to the fire department and had me "captured" while I was in the police department trying to call my mother to come and get me, and he told them that I was suicidal and jumped out of his moving vehicle. I was tackled by three men and placed in a straight jacket (yes, I was screaming and kicking at that point), placed in an ambulance and driven to a hospital 60 miles away for a 72 hour hold. Sitting in a room for 4 hours waiting for a psychiatrist to release me was not my idea of a way to spend a Friday night. The psychiatrist came in, and one look at me he released me and paid my cab fare home, which was Joseph's house. I would not be released without a home address. He had in the meantime, burned nearly all my possessions and gave everything else to Salvation Army. All because he didn't want a three year old in his house any longer because I refused to make her sleep on a chair so he could rent out her room to a stranger. Needless to say, I did leave, never to return. Veronica and I moved in to my ex sister in laws house, exchanging my services as a housekeeper and nanny for rent on a potting shed converted to a place to sleep and keep my "stuff". But that's getting ahead on the story.
My father, as a young man was left on his own and became part of a gang in San Francisco, The Turk Street Boys, where he drank heavily, used drugs freely and fought brutally and sometimes to the death of another. He was a former Golden Gloves boxer and always carried a lead pipe. Later in life he had an extremely strong work ethic, never missed a day of work and supported himself and eventually his own family, comfortably. But all through his life, he concealed his anguish over the truth of his father, mother and sister by remaining under the influence of either vodka or amphetamines, until his death at sixty-two. He was distraught over the fact that his father had lied to him. My brothers actions pushed him over the edge.
In 1961, when my brother was on leave from his tour of duty in the Navy SeaBee's in Port Hueneme, California, he came home, rounded up a few friends and caught up on old times by hosting a dance in our garage. He had a faithful girlfriend, Carol Lacaduc, who was very well liked by my parents. This young girl of sixteen didn't know however that my brother was not yet ready to be tied down to just one girl; he had several girls waiting in the wings. It was then that he and his friend Dave Nordstrom and Joe Silva were introduced to a couple of girls who had taken up residence in our small town. My brother was barely eighteen and the girls were sixteen and fifteen years old, and they all drove to Tijuana to have some tuck and roll upholstering done in his five window Ford coupe. My father didn't know his son was taking his entire shore leave funds and some girls with him to Tijuana. Two months later, a girl entirely unknown to my family calls and announced boldly that she was pregnant with my brother's child. I clearly recall the shock and anguish on my mothers face. Later on in the day, one of the girls that my brother had been dating comes by and also tells my mother that she too is pregnant with her sons child. A double whammy on the same day for my poor mother. I clearly remember my father coming home from work, my mother taking his aside, then going to the garage, taking a sledgehammer and smashing the windows out on my brothers car, and then slicing up the new upholstery. It was the first time I had seen my father enraged. My mother called up the Commanding Officer and requested an early discharge for my brother.
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