20 May 2019
Childhood for me was an intermittent horror show.
The Thug was born in 1953. I was born in 1956. For most of our time growing up I was his favorite punching bag. In 1962 our mother remarried (after divorcing our “boring” father) and began thirty-five years of excitement under the dominion of The Submariner. Fortunately, lacking vaginas, my brothers and I weren’t all that interesting to him, so his attentions, when we did receive them, were delivered with his fists rather than his ecumenical erection. Our baby sister, born later, was not so lucky.
Those who believe that I can’t admire the accomplishments or desire the cool stuff of others without resenting them, will likely also suspect that I was cheered by the prospect of The Thug’s coming in for “his share” of physical abuse. Sorry, but I don’t “envy” that way. Just because The Thug could delight in my pain, I was unable to appreciate his. Or our other brothers’. Or even, much later, our sister’s, whose suffering may well have eclipsed all of ours.
I may take righteous satisfaction from the punishment of the guilty, but sadism and revenge leave me cold. Yet another of my defects (just like my lack of jealousy, resentment, loneliness, or boredom.) But making everything WORSE for everybody (beatings all around!) didn’t make anything better for anybody. Except Mom, maybe. The serotonin must have been especially rich for her to forgive his raping her daughter. My greatest regret is not killing him (The Submariner, not The Thug) when we lived together all those years ago. It probably would have been easy. Just jump on him from off a staircase or rooftop or tree, land on his shoulders, and quickly slit his throat, and my sister could have been saved. But I’m a sniveling coward, so I didn’t think it through. Upon reflection, most likely the State of Connecticut wouldn’t have gassed a twelve-year-old boy.
update 210107: I neglected to mention above that killing The Thug might also have been a kindness. Or redundant. As an enthusiastic bully, he was also, naturally, a coward, and quite possibly a sociopath as well. He hanged himself in 2009, leaving his body for his wife and dogs to discover. Abusing and betraying those weaker or dependent on him was perfectly consistent with the rest of his miserable life. I was sorry for his wife and his daughter and his grandchildren and for our Mom and for our older brother, whose birthday he picked to do himself in. I am less sorry for him than I am relieved for those he can no longer hurt.
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