Abyssinia: slang from the 1920s-1930s for goodbye
hello there.
usually i’d make a return post to this blog. something upbeat, like “Hi! Everything is going well! Catch you all later!” and then go missing for three years.
this blog’s not gonna be one of those. this is really a serious post. if you’re seeing this, you got linked by my facebook post, so you were meant to see this, more so because you’re either family or mutual friends.
today i officially cut off contact from my mother and father. i have a litany of reasons why i made this decision. some stemming from my parents’ mistreatment of my fiancée, the mother of my daughter, the love of my life. others coming from decisions and statements they’ve made. i won’t go into too much, simply because i know in my head and in my heart that this post will eventually make it to my parents somehow. the grapevine grows and twists ever slowly, you see, and i will not give them any reason to come down on others. i also know this will be taken as proof to them that they were right. that i am but a petulant child, complaining about how easy i had it when i was growing up. i promise you this is not the case and that i had given them chance after chance to converse and to fix where our relationship as parents and child fractured. i cannot be responsible for those who cannot be open and understanding.
instead, i want to grieve.
i grieve for my daughter and future children, who will never fully know my parents. sure, they met in the hospital, and my daughter has met my father once afterwards. but they’ll never know the good side of the parents i had growing up.
they’ll never know the kind heart of my father, slow to anger, slow to judge, who taught me how to be a gentle and good man in a world full of andrew tates and donald trumps. a man who showed me wonders and marvels and flourished a love for the art of the comics at a young age. a man who i was proud to call dad.
they’ll never know my mother, my mother who survived the loss of her father. my mother who gave me life and taught me when she could have
very well sent me off to public school. my mother who eschewed the love of a god and his son. my mother who took the kind courtesy of sending my fiancee flowers when she found out we were having a baby.
but.
they’ll never know my father, who judged me, judged their mother. they’ll never know the man who made jokes at my expense, never apologizing. they’ll never know my father, the man who, in the end, turned down a chance to make things right and know them. the father who decided a baby shower was less important than a play.
they’ll never know my mother, a self-righteous woman who judged my fiancée from day one. the mother who makes horrible statements about races and communities i care about. the mother who told me directly that she “hates that pronouns crap”. the mother that came to a shower celebrating her family and the soon-to-arrive granddaughter and yet didn’t participate, only making her distain for being there known.
my daughter will never fully know the people who raised me to be who i am, both the good that i saw growing up, and the bad i see now.
i grieve for the memories and interactions they would have had. getting to go to grandma and grandpa billings’ house, like my siblings and i got to travel to my great-grandparents’ house in indiana. getting to know my parents and getting to see their love for my daughter and for those children that may or may not be.
i grieve for the happy family we once were.
on some small level, i still love my parents. I love the memories i have of them and of growing up having them lead me. but i cannot love what they have become. how they have treated my fiancée. how they have treated me. i have to protect my family. i have to protect them. I have to protect my peace. I have said what i have wanted to say. i will say no more.
we will never see eye-to-eye on anything. I am sure i have never been a perfect son. i am sure i have done wrong. i’m sure there is something they use to justify their actions. i take responsibility for my wrong doings, and for that i apologize. but i will not apologize for loving and protecting my family. i will not.
abyssinia; i first saw this word because of a show my parents loved that they passed down to me. it means “goodbye”; if you pronounce it ab-ee-SIN-ee-ah, it’s like saying “i’ll be seeing you”.
abyssinia, mother.
abyssinia, father.
“what is love, but grief perservering?” ~vision, wandavision
~nate
p.s.: please do not harass my parents. they will more than likely ignore this, and i know the level of harassment on this will be low but please don’t add any more fuel to the fire they’re throwing on me.
