A Fine Example of Douchebaggery

as of saturday, my dad is in the hospital. he had been in a lot of pain since thursday morning, but he stuck around with us until christmas was over and didn't complain once to any of us. i didn't even know he was in pain on christmas day, but i remember teasingly pointing out to him that i didn't think i had seen him smile once that day, which he answered with a big, cheesy grin. he helped my grandpa move their heavy TV and replace it with another. i didn't know that he was hurting at all until he left for the emergency room saturday morning. his face was red and his voice was strained, but he was still trying his best to hide from me that he was really sick.

after blood tests, x-rays, and a CAT scan, the doctors found a two-inch abnormality on his colon. this could be an infected scratch or hole, or it could be cancer. they're doing a colonoscopy today, and the results should be in around one o'clock. the doctors say that he's really young for cancer, but there's still that chance. and if it is cancer, that's the very thing that killed his father a few years ago. grandpa had throat cancer from chewing tobacco, though, and we got dad to quit chewing so that he won't die a similar way: too early, too painfully.

i'll admit that i really haven't been concerned at all until today. i hadn't cried at all until i started typing this up and after i realized that he really is trying to be strong for all of us even when he's probably pretty scared. i just told evan yesterday that i wasn't too worried about dad because he's a strong guy and i'm not all that close to him, anyway. what a horrible thing to say! i don't know what i was thinking. i love my dad, and i would be devastated if something happened to him. our whole family would. i would have to be the strong one while mom cried and cried. i would have to take over the chores that dad does every day without once being asked. i would end up chopping wood for the fire, endlessly cleaning dirty dishes, cooking, cleaning, all the tedious things that dad has to do for us without any appreciation. i know that he feels that we're not grateful for him, but we are! we would be nowhere without him. i would be nameless if he hadn't adopted me way back when. my older brother would be, too, and that's where the title of this post comes in.

the majority of my readers know that my brother, eric, and i were legally disowned by our biological father, rusty rauscher, when i was nine and eric was thirteen. lyle hannes married our mother and gave up all of his freedom in life to take us in and help raise us, no matter how disgruntled we were about some strange man taking over our lives. we treated him horribly, and we still do, but he's been there for us and hasn't given up. well... he hasn't given up on me, at least, but eric is a lost cause that we've all given up on. rusty didn't want anything to do with us. he didn't want to have to pay child support, and he didn't want to have to spend time with us for just a couple of days a month.

i know for a fact that rusty wouldn't have disowned us if it weren't for me, and i guess i feel kind of guilty for being the cause of eric's abandonment, but it wasn't my fault. maybe you don't believe me. maybe you think i'm being melodramatic, as i am so apt to do, but mom herself told me that eric was rusty's favorite, and when i asked her if rusty would have kept eric if i hadn't been born, she gave me kind of a sad look. but even still, rusty disowned eric! he willingly gave him to lyle, and he just as willingly signed the papers that stated that he would not be in any sort of contact with us until we were eighteen or unless we sought him out. only eric would be careless enough to leave our whole family to go back to the man that didn't want him. it pisses me off, it really does. guess where he's going right now, before knowing dad's test results? that's right; he's going to cedar rapids to be with rusty, and then he's going to fucking mardi gras.

eric lives in a world all to himself now, hitchhiking around with no connections to anybody. he's more selfish and narcissistic now than ever, but if rusty was in the hospital, he would be there. he doesn't give a flying shit about our real dad, and he won't let mom show him the proof that rusty has been lying to him about what happened. our dad could die while eric's away, and he wouldn't come back. when grandpa hannes died, eric stayed away. he never showed any sort of sympathy about it, and he more or less told mom to fuck off whenever she brought up the funeral.

what did we do to make eric into such a terrible person? mom tried her hardest to raise her all by herself for so many years, and she did alright for a single parent. i'm okay, aren't i? i haven't touched drugs or alcohol. the only times i'm even exposed to such things are in my own house when eric comes back to "visit." evan and i came into the house at ten-thirty last night, only to find eric and his buddy zach matson surrounded by giant bottles, hooting suggestive things at us. mom told me that it would be best if evan left and i went straight to bed so that eric and matson wouldn't mess with us at all. we did as she said, and everything was fine. honestly, though, i have never been around any underage drinking except for in my own house, and that's unacceptable.

eric believes that society is ruining our society. does that make any sense to you? he thinks that we should all question everything that goes on, but then we'd all end up questioning everyone else's questioning. questions would go unanswered forever, and we'd all die unsatisfied. being suspicious doesn't get anything done, it just makes us paranoid and unhappy. if you're part of this society, accept that and get on with your miserable little life.

to put it all bluntly: my brother's a dick and i often want him to die a gruesome death.

i still think that my dad's strong enough to get through this. it won't be cancer, and he'll be fine. i'll post the test results when i've learned them.

The Envious Sourpuss: That's Me!

every day, i'm finding more and more that i am the most jealous person i know. if someone does something right, i start sending off sparks of fury. the people that make me angriest in this way are those closest to me, of course. evan, my brother eric, and bethany especially. because i don't want to fill everyone's twitter pages with my ranting, i'll ramble at you, blog friends.

evan is good at mostly everything. he's a prodigious musician, as you probably all know. he can sing like no other, and if you hand him a strange instrument, he can learn how to play it impeccably it in a matter of weeks.
he's handsome as sin, as well. sorry to hint at my sexual behavior, but his entire body is my favorite work of art. his eyes are somehow green and blue at the same time, with just the right amount of freckles in them. his fucking eyelashes go on for longer than the universe itself, and his lips are shaped perfectly and are always juicy and nice. there isn't a single iota of chub on him, and, in my opinion, he has just the right amount of muscle. he's just strong enough to lift me (and let's face it: i weigh a helluva lot more than he does), but not so strong that i'm afraid of him. how could anyone fear someone so sweet, anyway?
which leads us to another factor of my jealousy: how can someone so fucking talented be so humble and kind? until i started shooting darts of adoration his way, he was the most insecure little bug i knew. but he's still modest, even with me mumbling constant compliments through just as frequent kisses to his rock-hard abs.

now, onto bethany. (i promise these paragraphs will be far less sexual. i can't promise they'll be less cheesy, though.)
i met bethany in fourth grade. i knew of her existence before then, but i was always afraid of her. envious of her. everyone knew that she was the best singer in our class, and i hated her for it. in fact, i still hate it. when she has a solo at a concert, i can't help but let a big, proud grin spread across my face, but i still envy her voice. mr. hosbond, her musical theatre director and the one teacher i wish i could impress, thinks that she's the best soloist he's ever heard. i used to think that i had a chance at being a great singer, but insecurity has prevented me from trying.
and bethany, you're beautiful. i've always envied your hair for its amazing growth rate, and it's always so smooth and soft. your eyes are like, BAM! and, whether you'll accept it or not, your skin's fantastic. you somehow manage to look lazy and still oddly pretty in pajama pants and nerdy-as-hell t-shirts. you're the perfect example of a desirable nerd girl, which you know i wish i could be.
you're a great writer and an even better artist. you've got more of a personality than i do, which i always thought was a difficult feat to accomplish. mr. hosbond says you're a character. you're better in school than i am (doesn't take much, but still), and you're one of the reasons why i've never tried for speech team. you and ashley are too good, and i don't want to have to compete for the stage with you.
doubtless you'll retaliate to this whole post with, "don't envy me! i envy you! you're better at drawing than i am and you've got boobs and great eyes." thanks, but i've heard it a hundred times and i don't feel any differently.

and lastly, stupid eric.
my mom just worships him. i don't know what happened. i used to be the good kid, the smart one. now that he's away, she sees him as a fucking genius, and oh, isn't he cute in his hobo clothes? christmas is already hell for me. the relatives that we barely know are down, and they've never met eric, never heard his disrespectful comments, his hypocritical notions of peace through force, his suggestions of smoking pot to achieve happiness. the stories mom tells are all so admirable, enviable. don't you wish your kids were like eric is? he doesn't care for material possessions, you know. oh, no, he's never asked us for money. yes, he's in california right now and he hopes to eventually go to normandy to be an organic apple farmer. he says the apples there are great, but he's never tasted them. he's so silly, our son.
nothing is mentioned of the drugs, the alcohol, the sleeping around. no one hears of the story where he left the Hannes family to go back to the father who knowingly and willingly disowned him seven years ago and attempted to murder his mother. no one hears about the things that he screamed at mom, the false accusations, the lies spread from father to son. no one knows that eric asks for money regularly, nor do they know that my christmas money was taken from me so that mom could send it to him.
how can someone so utterly horrible be so well-liked? eric always treated us like shit. are people forgetting this just because he's too far to yell at us? i was on the B honor roll for the first time since middle school, and i got nothing more than a, "did you know?" out of my parents. eric refuses to go to college, and he gets over five hundred dollars from his family members.
i finally got a higher chair placement in band, i'm in select choir, and i'm in the advanced group in my composition class. i don't ask my parents for a cell phone, i told them not to get me the car they got me, and i don't want them to buy me excessively flashy things. i do the chores i'm asked to (most of the time), and i try not to mouth of too much of the time. but even with all of these things going for us, i am their nobody child. i'm not doing anything exciting; i'm just here. i guess it's understandable that they're not jumping up and down with pom-poms and screaming my name.

i suppose i'm done ranting for now. i envy many, many more people, and i'm obvious about it, but i envy these three the most of all.

oh yeah.
merry christmas?

I Adore You, Blue Lava Lamp.

man, if i could stay up for all hours of the night, it would be so wonderful. maybe i would get so bored that i would have no choice but to do my homework. maybe being an insomniac would give me some extra hours to get motivated and get stuff done. all that extra time would also force me to actually think. i try to distract myself from thinking about important things, like college and career choices and the possibility of settling down one day. i guess i'm counting on my charm and wit to get me out of those situations somehow. i know i've got to get my shit together and start doing well in school so i can get into a good college and get a good job and live a good life, but knowing you have to do something and actually doing it are two entirely different things. eh, i guess it doesn't really matter, anyway. it's not like i'm failing or anything.
on an entirely different note: i can see why my friend evan is so tired all of the time. he wakes up at the crack of dawn to do some stupid-ass extracurricular activity, he sticks around after school to do more stupid-ass extracurricular activities, and to top it all off, he has been listening to a lot of Mogwai, which is some indie instrumental band. i've been listening to Mogwai radio on pandora tonight, and it's so mellow and relaxing that i kind of want to go to sleep and maybe wake up in some serene, silent place where i can proceed to go back to sleep in the soft grass. i'm enjoying it. i'll probably definitely use Mogwai as a sleep aid tonight (if my homeless older brother doesn't show up and take the laptop from me), so maybe i'll sleep tight and be bright-eyed and bushy-tailed tomorrow.
i kind of don't know what i'm doing right now. with anything, i mean. i'm just floating along, observing the speech team, which is all stressed out about state, which is this saturday. it seems a bit silly, really. everyone's so determined to get me to join speech team, but watching them just makes me want to stay away. they all hate each other at this point, because they want their groups to be perfect, and if anyone's flawed in any way, their team gets all pissed off and snaps at them. bethany never liked her musical theatre group much, and we could tell, on stage. i don't think the audience (the audience that knew the actors and actresses, anyway) would be surprised if someone wigged out and punched a co-star in the face. and it's all about blaming others at this point! everyone's all, "oh, so-and-so doesn't even care about this group," "so-and-so is ruining this whole act," whatever. i'm not pointing fingers at individuals, because it seems as if the majority of people in speech team are doing it. i'm not irritated by it, i guess, because i understand that they're all really stressed, and when it's all over, they'll be good friends again. but i don't want to be that chick that gets blamed for the lameness of a team, you know? the newbie who hasn't had a voice lesson or acting lesson in her life, the insecure spaz who freaks out when asked to do anything at all. i would blame me, sure! it would probably definitely be my fault if the group i was in sucked majorly. oh, well. i guess i'm expected to be that chick next year, because i signed a contract.
i don't know what i'm supposed to be doing. am i supposed to be in a cutesy little relationship right about now, making cutesy little plans for prom, buying a cutesy little WAY TOO EXPENSIVE dress? am i supposed to be looking forward to valentine's day? i mean, i've no reason to. i, um, disposed of my one main suitor, and though i may have a couple of others, i don't expect anything from them. they're a couple of my better friends, and i don't think they would try and be all mushy with me. am i supposed to be looking forward to my "sweet sixteenth"? it's on the nineteenth. seven forty-five A.M., to be exact. sixteen, man! i should be getting my license, driving out to pick up my friends and have a grand ole' time, but i've only driven twice, so obviously i haven't taken driver's ed. eh, driving isn't really something i want to do. it would be fun to be able to go anywhere i wanted at any time, but i would get creepy or something. i would probably drive to peoples' houses and leave things on their doorsteps. i'm sure i would get my revenge on bethany for giving me a can of (whisper) peas for my fourteenth birthday... anyway, what's so "sweet" about being sixteen? it's half way to thirty-two, which is half way to sixty-four! sixty-four is old! i don't want to be old. old people are gross. ack! at this pace, i'll have a mid-life crisis by the time i'm twenty.
what's so freakin' exciting about prom, anyway? i swear, if i hear one more word about that silliness in my history class, i will turn around and punch the speakers in their perfect, smiling mouths. i guess prom is alright this year, because it's at the new civic center, and the theme is marti gras. but still. what is prom for? do the girls imagine that they're Cinderella, that they're beautiful for the night but after they've changed out of their dress and face paint, they'll just be their regular old selves again? ugh, i can hardly stand looking at some of the makeup that chicks wear to prom. it's funny when their face is a completely different color than the rest of them because of their foundation. and i don't know, i think my eyelashes would fall off if i coated them with so much fugging mascara. what ever happened to natural beauty, anyway? i don't think i look bad when i have no makeup on... i kind of think i look like a trollop when i've got blush, mascara, and lip junk on. i can handle a little mascara every now and again, and a little bit of lip junk. but i cannot stand blush. i mean, i blush enough as it is, naturally. and if i was really that worried about looking drained, i could pinch my cheeks every now and again or go outside in the cold for a bit. that'll turn your face red, no problem.
what's so romantic about prom? tuxedos are sexy, sure, depending on the man that's in 'em, and how comfortable he is with being so formal. i don't know, i think most of the people at prom just look awkward. no one is dressed according to who they are as a person or anything. men just shove themselves into identical tuxes and chicks try to outdo each other with insanely poofy dresses. everyone seems so uncomfortable, so out of their element. i don't know.
yeah, my homeless brother wants the laptop. i guess i don't get Mogwai tonight. thanks, homeless brother.