Another Strand ©

As we were gathering Saturday for my Bbq another strand was unravelling 5000 miles away.
My father’s sister is lying in a hospital bed gravely sick.
She knows she is sick but doesn’t know why because over there they don’t tell the patient unless the family says to do it.
It is thought that they patient would only get worse if they know what is causing them to be sick.
In her case it’s cancer and her time is just about out.

I don’t think I would like to be kept in the dark about something like this and I would want to know I am at the end of my rope so I could enjoy what little time I have left with those I am leaving behind as much as possible until I am gone forever.

Like my last post this is just another aspect of a different culture where secrecy is prudent as opposed to being forthcoming and letting the one person who is most effected by these events to decide how they want to live the last few moments they have on the face of this earth.

The other side of this coin is that my father and his sister have not spoken in over 40 years because my father has disowned her for something that happened 45 years ago.
I remember she once came to Canada and showed up at our front door to see my father.
When my father open to see whom it was, he closed it in her face without saying a word when he saw it was his sister.
My mother did go out after to see her because she is or was married to my mother’s brother whom was murdered 3 years ago in the woods, that’s another story.

My aunt cried to my mother on the front steps until my other uncle came and picked her up, my mother then went in and she told my father he was being mean but he had nothing more to say on the subject and it’s been that way ever since.

Now his sister is dieing and even though he doesn’t say anything about it I can see his senses perk up when he hears her name mentioned and doesn’t say anything when my mother calls Greece to see how she is doing.
He doesn’t ever mention her name but I can’t believe he doesn’t care he is just letting his pride get in the way of family.

In fact pride is one of the most dangerous emissions we have.
As much as pride gives us inner strength it can also blind us to many things.
A lot of the trouble in the Middle East is due to pride.
The leaders may have an agenda but the people; the sheep in their countries are fuelled on pride.
Pride of family, country and religion.
Their mindset is founded in the past and refuses to adjust even for some human compassion at times.

My old man is stubborn; this is one trait I have inherited from my father, stubbornness.
When I cut someone off I rarely tend to let them come back, in fact in most cases they are pretty much dead to me as I have proven in the past but you really have to fuck up for me to get to that stage.
I just don’t believe in giving a person another chance to fuck me over.
It’s like if someone walked up to you with a gun and shoots you through the heart, when he doesn’t succeed do you allow them the opportunity to do it again?
I rather not know if they exist or not but I don’t know if I would be able to do the same for a family member.

Family is different, it’s something we can’t choose and are born with; they are part of us.
I can see not talking to one for decades and then reuniting but to let them die without so much and acknowledging them at the last moment would be even worse than death.
He would have to live the rest of his life with that open wound.
I know my father, he is a stubborn man who does what he wants, how he wants and when he knows he is wrong he would never admit it but defend his position even knowing he is in the wrong.
Pride, that’s what it is.
To proud to admit he was wrong.
To proud to look around something to mend fences between family, he doesn’t have to forgive her for what he has disowned her for, he can still shun her act for all eternity if that’s what he wants but he should not let his sister die without at least letting her make peace with her big brother.

This is not something new for me because I have seen it before, mostly from hardcore traditionalists from the old country.
I have seen sons and daughters shunned because they didn’t marry who they were expected to and never brought back into the fold but left out in the cold.
I can’t imagine how someone would go that far with family unless it was some evil deed they were being ostracized for.

My father does talk to her son when he is down there so it’s not the whole family he ignores, just her.
He had business dealings with her husband, my mother’s brother but he would never speak to her, NEVER.

What she did to warrant this treatment I don’t know and if I did I would probably not share it here but knowing the way they think down there I bet it’s something small and stupid.
Maybe it’s just his stubborn Greek pride that’s the cause of it all.

Growing up in Canada I have experience many different customs, cultures through friends and family and have noticed that most ethnic cultures, particularly from the old countries from a generation ago were this way.

Those of us of our generation especially in the new world countries have eliminated it for the most part, there still is some but as time progresses it will be all gone with every passing generation until it become an urban legend in the future but for now it looks like the old might win out and a life time of memories wasted.

Memories of little kids playing together.
Memories of war and hunger huddled together as death pounded outside the door
Memories of laugher and dance.
Memories of parents now gone
Memories lost forever.

Time does not heal all wounds, some remain to fester.

Have a nice day

Walker