If I had to be extremely specific and wanted to get right to the point, I'd have to say that this whole thing is my English teacher's fault. Now, how is he connected to this? Lemme tell you.
So, in school, we're reading "To Kill A Mockingbird" by Harper Lee. It's a pretty good book. So, Mr. B gave us an assignment to do over Thanksgiving day break; interview an older relative about the Great Depression, to get a better idea of the time period.
I was really interested in this project, so I interview my grandfather. He told me a lot of interesting things, but here's the thing that made me open my big mouth yesterday.
"When I was a kid, everyone worked and brought money into the family. We didn't really save up money for a bike like you kids do these days. All the money we made went to the family, so we could get groceries, pay rent, etc."
And, of course, it's coming up to be Christmas time, and I've only got about fifteen bucks to my name. So, how the hell am I going to buy gifts for my family?
Ever since I stopped believing in Santa Claus and since I started to realize that money is tight in the family, I’ve been looking less and less forward to the holidays every year. Why should we spend so much money on gifts for each other when we need to pay taxes?
This year, I decided that I didn’t want much of anything. I only want some things that I need, or that would be really helpful for me, like a few more pair of jeans, a flag pole and silk to practice with during the off-season, and a new cord for my laptop, and some upgrades that my grandfather already has and just needs to install (it turns out that only the cord for the laptop is broken, but I need to get an entirely new one.)
Now, you’re probably wondering why I don’t just get a job. It’s because I’m too young. I turn fifteen in February, and then I’ll be able to work. But since I have a disability, I might have to file a bunch of insurance stuff, might get paid less than a normal person my age would. Because the world sucks like that.
So, yesterday, I was talking to my mom about this, but I had no idea that things had been shaky between her and my dad that morning. More stuff about finances. Over my tea, I was telling my mom about how I wanted to get a job outside the family so that I could bring money in. “Don’t try to tell me that I shouldn’t worry about the finances, because I know that money’s really tight, and I think I should help out.”
My mom and dad both thought that that was really generous of me, but then my dad used what I said as an excuse to yell at my mom.
You see, she’s in between jobs, substituting at the local middle school sometimes, but because of her back, she isn’t able to do much. So my dad was basically yelling at her to get a job, and she was yelling back, saying that she’s trying, and that he shouldn’t be bitching at her and what was wrong with him that morning, blah blah blah. I really don’t know much more, because I ran up to my room, sobbing and screaming into a pillow.
“Make it stop! Just make it ******** stop!! Please, just make me deaf for a while, or make them mute, but just make it stop!!”
Eventually, a higher power heard my pain and made the yelling stop. They were discussing things quietly in their room, and I couldn’t hear, and I don’t want to know what was going on.
What I THINK happened was that they heard me screaming into my pillow and took pity on me. (The pillow was fairly thin.) There was no more yelling for the rest of the day, and when I came downstairs, my mom simply said, “I’m sorry Kate.” and then we went onto a different subject. I pretended to act normal, that what happened didn’t happen, and stuff like that. Then, later, before I left the house with my dad to go down to the boatyard to winterize the engine, he said, “I know you hate it, but Mom and I argue sometimes, but that doesn’t mean we don’t love each other.” I just said that I knew that, and I didn’t want to talk about it. This wasn’t the first time that this had happened, but it was the first time it had happened this bad and so recently.
There was no discussion of it all for the rest of the day.
Oh, and just in case you were wondering where my older brother was when this was all happening, that lucky b*****d was working at the high school’s pool, life guarding, and then he had a tuba lesson, and then an air soft game.
*sigh* So I don’t know what to do. Yesterday, I seriously thought that my parents were going to be planning for divorce, it was so bad.
And I realize how sheltered I’ve always been.
So I guess I’ve got some maturing to do before I assume that I’ve got more common sense than my peers.
I’ve also realized that I’ve been seeing the world in black and white, and that I haven’t been seeing the gray areas that I claim to always recognize.
*shrugs*
Life’s just a learning experience, after all.
Next time: Probably just some normal social stuff, maybe I’ll have suddenly won the lottery or a million dollar poetry contest. Actually, I’ve seen those advertised on Deviantart, but those are just bots trying to scam me into giving them a poem to steal.... Damn bots....
Oh, and next week, I get to do some band stuff! Woo! There’s going to be a holiday parade, and the ELVB is participating in it again. So I’ll be spinning in the cold and Dave’s mouth is going to get frozen to his tuba.
Yay band.
Katie Sea Community Member 
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