Dirty Laundry

 The other day my sister Sara called me up on the phone accusing me of harassing her ex-husband & supposedly trying to pry into her life.  That's not at all what happened, but I knew better than to try and explain it to her. She had her mind made up, so I just let her say what she had to say & then used some colorful language of my own & hung up the phone on her before she could say anymore. 

At this point in my life, I don't care anymore if I'm made out to be the bad guy in our situation. 

Here's what actually did happen...

Back in May of 2018, I attended my nephews graduation party. His father, Sara's ex-husband Eric was there. I always liked Eric. If you're curious to know, I've always liked Steve too. Like I said to Eric not too long ago, I don't like Sara, but I've always thought she had good taste in men.  I told Eric at the graduation party I was glad to see him & that I always thought a lot of him.  He gave me his phone number & then added me to facebook.  We talked about getting together sometime. 

Over the past few years, I've always meant to go down to Moline & have a beer with Eric.  Just because he divorced my sister didn't mean that I had to dislike him.  That's one thing I really wanted him to know.  So many in my family are so critical & judgmental.  I'm not sure what he thought everyone else felt about him, but I wanted to let him know that he didn't need to feel any animosity from me. 

I messaged him a couple of months ago, just to see how he was doing. It took him quite a while to get back to me, but when he did, he said that he still saw a lot of Garrett & that he talked to Sara quite a bit too.  I didn't quite know how to take that.  It really surprised me.  He said that he had a near death experience, had to be air lifted & have a blood transfusion.  I told him that I was really sorry to hear all of that & then he told me that Sara had come to visit him during this tough time in his life.  That really shocked me.  Of all things Eric could have told me, I don't know if there's anything else he could have said that would have thrown me more off guard.   Then he told me that my sister was the best thing that ever happened to him & that his biggest regret in life was letting that marriage fall apart. 

See I never knew why Sara & Eric got divorced. All I knew is that I sorta started to notice that Eric wasn't around at family get togethers & when we'd visit Sara, Eric never seemed to be there anymore. They had already been divorced for quite sometime when Grandpa Harry informed me that they were no longer together. 

With Eric now opening up to me about all of this, I couldn't help but wonder if pressure from my mother might have lead to their divorce. My mom never liked Eric.  She always thought Sara could do better than Eric & that Sara deserved better than Eric. It's not all that much different than my relationship with Ashley. My mom does nice things for Ashley & she would tell you that I'm wrong, but my mom has never liked Ashley.  My mom thinks I can do better than Ashley & that I deserve better than Ashley.  She's been very persuasive & manipulative in trying at different times to get me to breakup with Ashley. 

So my curiosity got the best of me & I asked Eric if my mom had anything to do with their divorce. 

I guess Eric must have taken it as me having some sort of an agenda or something. Like I was trying to get information out of him to use against Sara. That wasn't at all what I was doing.  I was just wanting to see if my mom had anything to do with their splitting apart, because if it did, I wanted to console in someone who had gone through the same something difficult that I was going through right now. 

Eric told Sara all of this & that's when she called me. 

My anger over the situation is more geared at Eric than it is anyone. I was so pissed off at him that I felt like driving down to Moline & beating his scrawny ass.  Here I was trying to be a friend to him, and he was taking it as me trying to pry information out of him for some sort of a agenda.  It's everyday, nothing new news with my sister, but I wasn't expecting that from him.  I sent him a message saying that if he didn't want to talk to me, then he shouldn't have.  If he would have asked me to not bother him, I wouldn't have bothered him.  "F you" "F you" it isn't complicated. I gave him my word I'd never bother him again & I won't. 

This is always how it is with Sara though. I'd be lying if I said it's been that way our entire lives, because we've had a few good times, but not many.  Throughout most of our lives we haven't liked one another. 

I think it all started with our parents. Especially my Dad. He made the two of us so competitive with one another. I can't remember a time when he ever liked both of us at the same time.  I can remember times when he didn't like either one of us. I can remember a lot of times when he liked me & he didn't like Sara. I can remember times when he liked Sara & he didn't like me.  But a time when he liked both of us?  Maybe when we were really, really little but that'd be it. 

Notice how I was specific to use the word like & not love. I hate it when I tell someone that my Dad doesn't like me & they fire back, "your dad loves you very much."  I didn't say a gawd damn word about love. I said like. I know my father loves me. I've never doubted that in my entire life.  I also know he doesn't like me. 

When we were in junior high & high school I was the one Dad liked & Sara was the one Dad disliked.  I was the B honor roll, liked well by my teachers, three time hardest worker of the year Captain of the wrestling team. It's not to say that my Dad wasn't exceptionally hard on me & still rather critical, but at least at the time he liked me. I was the one that was gonna go off to college & become a somebody in life.  He would brag about me all the time. Even to the point to where other people didn't like me & thought of me as being arrogant and cocky, because of how much my Dad would talk me up. 

His feelings on Sara at the time were completely different. Sara was a wild child. From his view, a fuck up.  I know & I'll say it because I was there. I had to listen to it every night.  Sara partied, Sara drank, she hung out with hoodlums. "You just watch. Sara will end up dead, on dope, in jail or pregnant. You just watch."  I can still hear him talking about it now. 

Considering Sara got in three drunk driving accidents, I feel fortunate that dead wasn't what we ended up with. I don't like my sister. I want nothing to do with her & I want her out of my life the rest of my life.  That doesn't mean I wanted anything bad to happen to her though.  I am glad that with the options my Dad laid out in front of me that pregnant is what she ended up.  It's the best of all the options. 

He was pissed about it though, and I mean PISSED. Sara wasn't around for him to yell out when he found out, but I was. He sat and shook in his chair & screamed at me all night until his voice finally gave out.  "She ruined her life!"  "She won't amount to jack shit!"  

I remember my wrestling coach telling us that whatever was going on in our lives outside of wrestling practice & competing, we had to leave outside of wrestling practice & competing. There were so many nights like this when I'd be kept up till 1 a.m. listening to my father's anger & then be expected to not have it effect me at all when I had to step out on the mat the next day for a dual or a tournament. Just another failure of the long list of failures I have in my life, cause I wasn't able to do that. 

I guess this is where a lot of Sara & I's inability to get along stems from. 

In reality, Sara had to completely change her path in life. The dreams she had, were now replaced with being a mom & taking care of a son. And I have to commend her on it. She did a great job with raising Garret & she's done a great job with Addison & Norah too.  I'll always say that Sara is an excellent mother, because she is. 

Our lives turned out the complete opposite of what my Dad thought they would.  Sara was the one that ended up the major bread winner. The one with the brand new vehicles & the one that ended up with the $500,000 house.  I've been the one who has lived in cheap apartments, done jobs my Dad doesn't respect & the one that has struggled. 

And again that's where Sara & I have an inability to get along. 

In Sara's estimation we both my mistakes & we both suffered for those mistakes. I don't see it that way.  Yes, choosing to go to Northwestern College was one of the worst decisions I've ever made in my life, but I didn't know that going in. There's no way I could have known going in the horrific experience it was going to be for me. There's no way I could have known that I was gonna have a girl cheat on me & then when people made her feel bad about it she was going to make up a story that I had been beating her.  You can't equate that with getting plastered drunk & getting into three drinking and driving accidents.  You know that when you are inebriated that you shouldn't operate a vehicle. You know going into it that it's the wrong thing to do & that it will most likely result in dire consequences. You know this.  So no, the mistakes Sara made in High School were a lot different than the ones I made in college.  They were a Hell of a lot different.  For Sara and my Dad to not grasp that, is frankly bullshit in my opinion.  Absolute bullshit. 

Sara likes to talk all the time about how she went out and got a real job, while I did the kind of jobs I did while still chasing a dream.  Yeah, when you do something practical, something safe & concrete, you're gonna get somewhere a lot faster.  Chasing you dreams is a risky proposition. I can admit that. It's why they call it, "struggling".  Struggling writer, struggling pro wrestler, struggling actor, struggling.  

You see when Sara was younger she wanted to be a fashion designer. How good was she? How realistic was this dream? I don't know. I saw some of Sara's designs for clothing & I always felt she had talent. I always felt that her ideas were as good as Ralph Lauren or Tommy Hilfiger. It wouldn't have surprised me any if Sara had gotten on somewhere as a fashion designer & helped design clothes for a major designing company.  

That was the plan. She wanted to attend Black Hawk community college to get a degree in fashion design.  That was her dream & getting knocked up in December of 1999 but an end to all of that.  

Sara never got to chase her dream & she has held a vendetta against me ever since because I've gotten to chase mine.  

When I was going after my dream of one day going out to Hollywood & really trying to make a go for it as a screenplay writer/actor, she would get infuriated.  I'd talk about learning the craft of screenplay writing to one of my relatives & she'd respond with something nasty like, "sure wish I could waste my time taking courses like that instead of having to actually work for a living." 

I'm supposed to feel bad for Sara & have empathy for her that her choices to screw around in high school, barely get by with C's & go out getting hammered every weekend, led to her not being able to go after being a fashion designer.  I'm supposed to be understanding and sympathetic to that. But when it comes to me not being able to make a real go at Hollywood, because my student loans financially crippled me, the response is, "Hey buddy, you made poor choices." 

It was even worse when I was trying to make it as a pro wrestler.  The six years I traveled all around Iowa & other parts of the Midwest performing as a pro wrestler, Sara hated it with a passion. Watching me chase this dream was absolute torture for her. Absolute torture. 

It's not any different with my goal of being a writer. It's worse. She hates that I'm still trying to make as a writer & it bugs her even more because writing doesn't have a window.  The window of time to make it as a pro wrestler is very, very small.  You have a a few short years while you're in your twenties, maybe your early thirties and then it's over. Hollywood ain't a whole heck of a lot different. I think the window is a tad bit bigger for an actor than it is for a pro wrestler, but the fact of the matter is the ship sails fast & once it's sailed, that's it. It's done. It's over. 

I'm never going to perform in a WWE or AEW ring. I'll never have a run in New Japan.  I'm never going to head out to L.A.   My dreams of being a big time pro wrestler are over. My dreams of trying to make it in some capacity in Hollywood, are dead.  This makes Sara happy & she wishes it were like this for my writing too. 

For those that side with Sara, I'm supposed to see where she's coming from.  I gotta understand that she didn't have a choice. She had a baby when she was young. She wasn't able to be exploratory. She didn't even get to try at her dreams. 

Look, I wish Sara had gotten a real shot to make it as a fashion designer. I wish things had been different for her, but here's where & why those that side with Sara on this can kiss my ass. 

There's nothing more that Sara would rather see for me than to either fail or give up on my dream as a writer & if there shoe were on the other foot, I wouldn't be that way.  I wouldn't be jealous, envious or angry. I might be bitter about my situation, but my attitude wouldn't be, "I didn't get to chase my dream, so she shouldn't be able to chase her's either."

Let's put the shoe on the other foot.  If I had fucked around in high school, been a screw off, & spent all my time partying & drinking, while she studied hard, got good grades & worked her ass off at sports/theatre/ect, I think I'd be upright about it. I know I would be because fairness is more important to me than anything.  

If I had knocked up a girl & suddenly there wasn't going to be pro wrestling, or acting, or writing, I'd accept my fate because I would feel that I deserved it. I didn't do that though & I don't feel that I've done anything in my life to where I should feel a need to where I should have to give up on myself as a writer.  If I had knocked up a girl when I was 17 & Sara had been the one to go off to college & she was out there trying to make it as a fashion designed, I guarantee you that I wouldn't be wanting her to fail or give up.  I'd be happy for her.  I'd want her to succeed. 

And that's what it comes down to for me.  We don't get along anyway & we have a million other things we can't stand about one another but that's the number one thing for me. That's why I won't talk to Sara anymore. It's why I want nothing to do with her.  Being a a writer and making it as a writer is a very important thing to me.  She made it clear as day to me on April 4th, 2020 that she didn't want me to succeed. That's all I'll ever need to know about Sara again.  

There are those of you that don't believe that, & think I'm full of shit. I know Sara would roll her eyes and try and convince you she doesn't feel that way either. Try and gaslight me as if I'm crazy.  I'm not.  I've been dealing with this for nearly 20 years.  If Sara were to find out that I closed my microsoft word & I threw away my notebooks, it'd make her happy.  While when in a state of depression my first hope is that no one I care about ever feels the pain I do, Sara wallows in her misery wanting the rest of the world to feel as shitty as she does. 

This hasn't been going on for a few months, or even a few years. That's why when people say to me, "have you tried talking to her about this?"  or "have you tried to fix it?"  I just can't help but grit my teeth and laugh.  Of course I've tried to fix this. I can't tell you the number of times I've tried to fix this. It's the same with my Dad too. I don't like not liking my sister. I wish we could get along. I can't tell you how many times since I was in the 7th grade I've tried to make peace with her.  I'm 38 years old. Damn near 40.  I've been at this for a long time.  Way to damn long & I don't owe it to anyone to keep trying. 

Sara and my Dad are exactly the same in this aspect. They only give you one of two options. 

A - They will sit there and tell you everything wrong with you and your life. How much of a fuck up you are. All the things you did wrong in your life. All of the things you're currently doing wrong in you life. How much you suck at life. How much you'll continue to suck at life. How much of a loser you are.  Just putdown after putdown after putdown. Nothing but negativity and you just sit there and you take it. 

Well I'm not going to just sit there and take it. This life is challenging enough as it is.  I don't need someone telling me how shitty of a job I'm doing or trying to convince me how terrible of a person I am.  

One of the last things Sara ever said to me was, "you sure do think a lot of yourself."   And that's when it dawned on me. That was the real issue that both her and my Dad had with me. They thought so lowly of me. So negatively of me and that was their problem with me.  They wanted me to feel the same way they did. To see me in the same light that they see me.  I don't.  There's a lot about me to improve. A lot about me I want to fix & make better. But I like me. Me's ok. 

The other option with my Dad and my sister is...

B - you dish it right back to them. I opened up about some of my sister's mishaps in life, but honestly I really don't like doing this.  I have to admit sometimes when my Dad or my sister is laying into me, doing all they can to make me feel like shit, it does feel kinda go to fire back at them. I have plenty of ammunition to where I could literally tear either one of them apart. But I don't wanna do that. I don't wanna make them feel like shit. This isn't a life I wanna lead. 

So I can't do A & I can't do B.  So what am I left with?

Well in the minds of those who don't know the situation & don't know the longevity of how long it has lasted, I guess there's an imaginary C.   The C that I've tried so many times to find, that just plain and simple doesn't exist.  The whole, "how bout you all get along & no body bashes anybody."  

There is No C    I wish there was.  The 17 year old me wished there was. The 18 year old me wished there was.  I looked for it, worked for it, pleaded for it, begged for it, I an agnostic even prayed for it up until I was 35 years old.  There is no C.

So what does that leave me with? 

D as in DON'T talk to them. DON'T have anything to do with them. 

Guilt trips. Trying to make me feel like I'm a bad son.  Like I don't appreciate anything & everything my Dad did for me when I was younger.  I appreciate all that, but I don't owe it to him to think so lowly of me anymore. I don't owe it to him for him to have such a negative image of me anymore. 

He found a way to forgive Sara for everything she did, but not me.  I went to college, I got a degree & I didn't become a huge success afterwards. He'll never forgive me for that. Ever.  

I was watching a documentary on Jeff Dahmer a few years back. It dawned on me that Lionel Dahmer thought more of his son than my Dad thought of me. Lionel Dahmer, the Dad of a serial killer, liked his son more than my Dad like me. 

I've had various friends over the years that I've introduced my Dad to. Girlfriends. They all get the same impression. I remember the first time I took Ashley over to meet my Dad. We sat and talked for about 20 minutes and the first thing Ashley said to me when we got into the car.... "Sheesh, he doesn't like you does he?" 

I love the guilt trips people try and lay on me.  I wanna say that my Dad began to dislike me when I broke my back in 8th grade & it led to my athletic career going down the drain. I'd say that's where it all started, but I know my Dad hasn't liked me since 2007.  

He'd criticize me and degrade me every time I came to visit him. Yet every time I came back to Sigourney, I'd stop over at his house anyway.  It was always how I didn't have a good job, I wasn't driving a new enough car, I didn't have a house.  Every time I'd visit him, I'd drive away feeling like shit. Yet, I'd go back anyway. Every time. 

I did this from April of 2007 until March of 2020.  I think that's long enough. 

When I moved out of my mom's house & began life on my own in August of 2009.  Between Iowa City & Des Moines I lived in 7 different places until March of 2020.  You know how many times my Dad visited me?  Twice.   Two times in 11 years.  You wanna know how many times I visited him? Every time I went back to Sigourney.  Every single time.  How many times has he visited Sara over the years?  I don't know. I guarantee you it's been a Hell of a lot more than two times in 11 years though. 


Sometime in late 2019 or early 2020 my Dad called me up on the phone and told me that he was selling his house, building a new house and that if I wanted my stuff to come and get it.  "Hey, I'm getting a bigger place, with plenty of room to store the small closet full of belongings that have a lot of meaning to you, but if you don't want me to pitch it, come over and get your shit."  No, my Dad didn't say it this harshly, but it sure did feel like that's what he was saying. 

After his house was complete I went over to see it & to let him know that I was leaving to head to Florida.  Wanting to see his new place, I walked all through it.  The entire thing. Every room. Twice. You know what I saw all over the walls? Pictures of my Sister & her family.  Photos of my Dad's girlfriends kids & their significant others.  There wasn't one picture of me anywhere in that house. Not a single one. 

"Good luck, you'll need it." A tone that said you'll most likely fail. You don't have what it takes to make it down in Florida.  These were the final words my Dad spoke to me. 

And this is really where I get bitter. Where I get angry.  Where I wanna go toe to toe with someone. Let's knock out some teeth. Let's lose an eye. Let's see some blood.  I didn't deserve to go through what Jason did to me. My Dad, my sister, anyone can believe what they want to believe. Believe that it served me right. That I deserved to go through What Jason Janes did to me. That there's a price for chasing a dream.  

My Dad has the satisfaction of knowing it all blew up in my face just the way he thought it would. My sister does too.  But I'll be damned if I'm gonna let them rub it in my face.  This isn't experimenting with drugs. This isn't getting plastered every weekend. This isn't driving while severely intoxicated. This was knowing a guy, trusting a guy, thinking of this guy a a good friend, as a brother for 10 years & having the guy turn out to be a con artist. I can't stop you from thinking what you think anymore than I can stop my Dad or my Sister. I can choose to ignore though. 

2007....2007....2020. 

It's never gonna end. It's never going to be different.  My sister will only be happy with me if I fail or give up on my writing & figure out a way to be as negative, bitter and unhappy as she is.  My Dad? I honestly don't know what the Hell he wants, and I'm finally done trying to figure it out. From the time I was real little all the way through my mid 30's, the only time he ever seemed to be happy with me was when I was doing well as wrestling or bringing home really good grades. Other than that, nothing I did was ever good enough for him. I could never please him.  Sara never tried.  She never worried about pleasing him.  If she knew what would upset him and piss him off, that's what she did. 

It's like he and those who look at it strictly from his vantage point always want to point out all of the sacrifices he made for me & all he did for me while I was growing up.  They want me to only look at the positives he did for me.  

Nobody ever wants to stop and think of the sacrifices I made for him. How hard I tried to satisfy him and be what he wanted me to be. 

My senior year there was this girl I liked named Kelly. I asked her out. She said yes.  A friend of mine told his Dad about it & his Dad told my Dad.  How did my Dad respond? He responded by yelling at me about it. He said some pretty choice words about Kelly, letting me know he didn't think to much of her and her reputation for being "friendly."  Just sat and bashed her.  What did I do?  I worried about upsetting my Dad.  So I completely ignored Kelly, made an ass of myself & when I tried to talk to her about it later, she did what she should have done.  

Faggot, queer, gay, I got called a lot of these names. I heard the rumors.  When someone like Ben Hammes calls you a faggot, you don't think much of it. He didn't like me. He never liked me. So obviously him calling me a fag was simply him expressing that he didn't like me. No big deal.  But it was different when people who didn't have anything against me wondered if I was gay.  My Dad never stops to think about this or how much it hurt me during high school.  I wanted to please him. Make him happy.  I knew that getting sexually involved with a girl, even simple kissing would upset him, so I didn't do it.  I had one girlfriend during high school & we made out one night in my car. The windows fogged up.  Was my Dad pissed about that.  It reminded him of Sara getting pregnant two years prior & I got to hear another 3 hour lecture till midnight.  I broke up with Shelly a short time after that & that's all fine and dandy.  I just wish my Dad would realize I made a few sacrifices too.  Shelly wasn't the only attractive girl who liked me.  I could've gotten lucky a time or two.  I didn't though because I wanted to please him.  Probably sucks a lot more to spend a small fortune sending you kid to college only to see him not amount to jack shit.  Right? No use seeing or thinking of anything else other than that, even if it did suck to not be homosexual, but have others, even some of your friends wonder if you were. 


It's 2:30 a.m.   I started working on this about 10 till midnight.  There's so much more I could say and so much more I could elaborate on, but is it really worth it?  This wasn't rhetoric.  You went into this the exact way you're gonna come out.  Perhaps you've gained a little perspective & perhaps it has enhanced or lightened it one way or the other but it hasn't changed it.  If you came into this understanding & respecting my decision, you left understanding and respecting my decision.  If you came into this not understanding and thinking I'm wrong  & that I should continue to have my sister & Dad in my life, then you still think that.  If you went into this indifferent, you came out of it indifferent. 

To Those who get it, no explanation is necessary. To those who don't, no explanation will do.

I could have just said that too, but anyway...