DEFINITIONS and villainy

Note: highly unedited.

I've been mentally going over a few things today, and is often the case I haven't gotten any closer to understanding them, so the next logical step is to write about 'em. It's just the way it's always worked with me.

Home.
Family.

Above are the concepts I've tried to get a grip on today. To many, they're nouns not concepts. They only became such to me recently.

I first asked my parents (and some of my friends if anyone remembers this) where they feel their home is on July 16, 2011. My mom said (basically) that home is where you are so comfortable that you are content. She also said home is where my dad is, which after 32 years of marriage (at that point), is something that both amazes me and makes me want to cry haha.

At the time, I was unsatisfied with this answer. It just didn't resonate with me I guess. Since leaving Miami, I lived 5 places:

1. Livingston Campus Quad III (Piscataway, NJ)
2. 30 Easton Avenue - New Brunswick, NJ 08901
3. 509 79th Street - Brooklyn, NY 11209
4. 264 E 2nd Street - New York, NY 10009
5. 153 Avenue C - New York, NY 10009

I had lived on Avenue C for a year when I first asked the question. I loved that tiny apartment. I loved the view out the front windows of the community garden shaded by big, old willow trees. I hated how often I had to clean bus exhaust off the windows to see them. I had become very jaded from work; I had a very love/hate (for lack of something better than an idiotic cliche) relationship with New York in general. I wasn't making much money, I had no health insurance, and the immense gap between rich and poor disgusted me. Wouldn't it great to be rich and have health insurance and a nice big apartment I could call home? And then I saw...constant abuse of free medical "assistance." 'Maybe I should just develop a drug habit and let out all the fucking crazy and not give a shit about anyone but myself and collect disability and social security as well as receive free medical care.' Anyway - I was annoyed and angry a lot. I'd walk to work ready to fight someone. 

I wondered if Miami would always be my home. Every time I'd visit, that was the impression that I got. But this can't be true, said 25 year old Amanda said, for someday I will live somewhere for longer than I ever lived in Miami, for in a bigger sense - I only lived there 20 years. Grammar notwithstanding, I'm starting to get a better grip on this. I've now lived in New York for 5 years (which is 1/4 of the time I lived in Miami) and I'm beginning to see how I may soon understand although it all comes in very vague and foggy. It's not something I really preoccupy myself with these days, the second thing I mentioned is what really took up my thoughts today.

Family.

I know my blood relatives. They will always be my family, always my #1s. That April Fool's joke my parents played on me 7 years ago? I won't get into it, but I think that is as sure a testament to the sincerity with which I say they truly are my #1s. They need me, I'm there. No questions asked. Whatever I have to do, if they really need me - I will be there.

I've been dating Dave for nearly 5 years. I've known his family almost as long and they have always been incredibly warm, welcoming, and inclusive. I've never once felt like an outsider - like I had to watch what I say or ask for permission for anything. They've done more for me than they ever had to. If I ever asked for anything, I got it. I didn't ask them to come to my TOPs graduation, but they were there. 

When someone treats you in this way, you reciprocate. When they need you, you are there. When there's a family funeral and they need support, you are there. When a hurricane destroys the house beyond anything I experienced in Miami, you go clean up. When a difficult time arises, you are there. I refuse to treat someone any other way than I have been treated.

I have friends that are as close as family, too. Very few these days, and these relationships are not to be squandered. It's very difficult when a situation arises in which you must choose between two or more types of family. There's pressure from all sides, and you just can't win. You're the villain no matter what you do, babe. The best you can do is say, 'i wish things were different; i wish they were simple; i wish they were 'oh, no problem, of course'; i wish i could be in two places at once.' This is the best you can do, yet still it's shit. In the end, you still have to make that decision and live with it. This fucking bed I made - I laid in it, had restless sleep and twisted sheets when I awoke. 

I wish I could ask for some slack, but who says I deserve any of that?
I just apologize and accept that not everyone is like me.
And maybe we can say thank god for that.