my childhood

i just discussing my first car with a co-worker. it was actually my parent's car, a 1988 Ford Taurus. my parents were pretty good about letting me use the car. a lot of my friends parents didn't let them just drive at any time any where, but i had pretty much carte blanche. if my mom didn't need the car, i could have it. day or night. rain or shine or snow. i was 16.

after driving the taurus for several years, it developed an issue... the throttle would stick. so here i was, at the corner of algonquin and roselle in palatine, wondering why the damn car isn't slowing down, despite my standing on the brake with all of my weight. finally i popped into neutral and the damn just about red-lined. wtf? i told my dad about it when i got home and he seemed unconcerned. he probably thought that it was something i was doing wrong. so they let me to keep driving the car.

it kept happening. a sticking throttle is nothing to fuck around with. but i guess my danger was little to worry about compared to having to drive my ass around with my dad's car, which i couldn't drive because it was stick.

this was my childhood in a nutshell.

unless i was actually bleeding, nothing was wrong. today, i am seeing all these pictures of kids that are going off to yet another school year. i don't think my parents ever took one picture of me on the first day of school. i think my sister has one, and that's because she was sporting a super-cool smurfette backpack.

my parents let me go out at pretty much all hours of the day. i remember driving to a friends house while it was snowing like a motherfucker. seriously, i think school was canceled the next day. oh, you wanna go to choir practice out in the country? sure! fine! no problem. i remember once i sprained my ankle on a rock outside a neighbor's house and i couldn't walk on it. i was crawling around the house because it was so swollen. did they take me to a doctor? nope. i think my mom wrapped it up in a 10 year old ace bandage and left me to my own devices. when i was 5, i had to walk to school by myself. a mile. i also flew on an airplane by myself when i was 5. who would do that these days?

and maybe therein lies my issues. i want someone to care, but not so much as to interfere with my independence. but they have to care in a certain way. don't act like my dad, like you know better than me. like you're smarter than me in all things about life, when clearly you are not. and don't act so surprised when i'm right. don't tell me what to do. i am an adult, i am going to do what i want to do whether or not you agree with me. and stop explaining yourself. because i'm tired of explaining myself. i am just so tired. so very tired.

pay attention and don't condescend. don't brush me off. don't make me tell you 5 times. don't act like i never told you. i'm not wrong just because you didn't listen to me.