Keeping the Peace

Keeping the peace was, primarily, I believed, my job, as a child. My mother called me the little peacemaker. To this day, I cower at confrontation and will work hard to smooth things over between warring friends or family members. Maybe I should be some kind of mediator when I grow up.

We each had our labels and role in our parent's world. Clem was a hell-raiser. Camp was a perfect child who loved to keep house (her way and just so). I was the peace maker and social butterfly. Jem was the quiet, artistic one. Cepe was the prim and proper one. And Spec well, Spec was the baby, Mom's cherished one. Mom liked to have us pigeon-holed so she could understand us in her own delusional way. Mom's childhood was emotionally and psychologically disastrous. Dad's was physically, emotionally, and psychologically complicated. To make matters worse...Mom has MS and Dad is an alcoholic. Both are abusive in their own special ways. I won't go into those, as the depth of the abuse is irrelevant to my story.

Which will be continued...some day. I am going to try to do better...writing REALLY helps and it is something that Clem encouraged me to do.