I Really Want A Father...

 -a post about surrogate parents for the newly orphaned at 30 and up. 

Update: this is ONLY an opinion post. All thoughts and views are mine and have nothing to do with Twitter or Blogger's opinions or views. 

Me, in 2015, WTC (Workforce Technology Center at DORS), in my dorm room, age 27. Three and a half years before my dad started getting sick with cancer. 

Please visit my Patreon for more of my creations: patreon.com/arachelbethahrenscreation 

Another trigger warning in effect. Some material may not be suitable for people who've lost a parent in death or in separation or being disowned due to certain circumstances. This is another mental health and mental illness post. 

Reader Discretion Is Advised. RAYOR. 

One evening as I'm fighting a migraine, because I cried way too much the other day from another debacle with my mom... I saw this and it reminded me of how horrible I missed my dad. And how I'm just horrible to think of sending not one, two letters, to the same celebrity, in order to show my support and to say I'm sorry I doubted you, because I am an embarrassment, and honestly, a tweet by his father says EVERYTHING about how GOOD of a person he is- 

Miranda was the officiant- at a wedding- in his own book store, for a lovely couple. After he and his father were BOTH vaccinated from COVID, including the booster. And worse, his father tweeted that the person getting married was close to his family, loved like a son. 

And it got me thinking- They are NOT reachable in ANY way. 

And last night, it made me so depressed that I will never have a dad. 

So yeah, I'm finished. I'm done trying to find a surrogate dad, I'm done looking up their tweets and profiles, I've completely shut off @Lin_Manuel's Twitter profile from my search history. I am ONLY a fan, nothing more. No more obsessing. It's over, I'm not going to talk about that subject of celebrities anymore. 

Rich people are scary, all of them. If I ever go near the Hamilton creator in question, in person, in New York or anywhere, I'll run away. I'm scared of him. And I adore him for being the sweetest person in Manhattan. 

I choose a solitary life in a teeny tiny family of only one mom and myself, no dad, no grandparents because they're all dead except for one grandparent who hates me to death because she thinks that if her own daughter and granddaughter "don't have Jesus- you're crazy and you will BURN IN HELL." My grandmother has also said to my mom, "I hate you," and she's also said on Thousands of occasions- "Oh I never said that!" in a tinny baby voice. Even my mom's sister refuses to talk to us, I haven't heard from my cousin Jacie in YEARS, and I never got to see my youngest cousin Josiah grow up. And pretty much all of my dad's family won't talk to us, not even so much as a thank you... 

Yeah, I'm finished. The Ahrens family is now the smallest family it's ever been. 

Ahrens Family, Population: TWO. My widowed mom Julie, and myself. 

New Update 10/23/2021- As of today, I am the newest member of the LMM Fan Group, and I plan on retreating there from time to time on Facebook. The folks there and on Twitter are SUPER nice and respectful, and I think now I think is the time to redact what I've said earlier, since I am still in the grieving phase at this moment in time. Please forgive my horrible mouth right now, as I'm still editing the shit out of this post and working on finishing another Eliza post in the coming days leading up to NaNoWriMo, which is only in a week away from Monday. 

Alexander's family is even smaller because his mom was pretty much born out of wedlock, and she still doesn't know who her dad is. And as of Inauguration Day 2021, Alexander has no grandparents, a widowed mom since '93, a brother, a few cousins, and family friends- nobody else. His family keeps getting smaller too. 

I feel sad by this because I'm an only child and I've always wanted a sister. I tried, I really tried to be an adopted sister with Tiffany, until she gaslighted and ghosted me numerous times over and over in the last seven years, and dragged my ex boyfriend into this too, and towards the second half of our relationship with the man I used to think would be my future husband with the big noisy family I always wanted- Anthony ghosted me too, abandoned me when I begged him to let me speak my mind and open my heart to him when my father is dying- and he just said "Goodbye, Rachel, I never want to talk to you when you're like this, not until you grow up. I'm gonna go away now, see you later." And he ran away with a tail between his legs. That is why we broke up and it's over now. 

My mom and I still want closure with everyone we used to be friends with and now are just people who hurt us. But every time we talked about it, it brought us both to tears. Because with all these epiphanies we both have, even long before 3 a.m., it kills us both and breaks our hearts. 

So yeah, I'm done. I'm finished my search for a dad type. I already know that no one was going to replace my daddy, Bob Ahrens, but I was hoping for at least a father type figure that I could look up to, someone to at least be friends with, and eventually give his help to both me and my mother to help us get to the next chapter. Maybe some father figure type to walk me down the aisle if I marry Alexander, the love of my life??? A person to honor my real dad??? 

No??? 

I GIVE UP. I am losing it. 

My mom and I both have trust issues, it's true. Because my mom was a child of the 1970s where nobody cared and no adults EVER had a BRAIN (like my brainless spineless heartless narcissist senile lying bitch grandmother "Grannie Joan" I'm calling her from now on)- My mom has it the worst. I worry about her every day, from the second I get up in the morning, to the moment I go to sleep. I don't want to lose her. 

Unfortunately, it's a double edged sword here, because I had a dream the night before where I almost woke up screaming: Dad was coming home from the hospital, and he told me, "I never got to kiss mommy goodbye... My sweet sweet Julie..." He was in tears. And suddenly, I remembered, my dad is not really there... Dad's not breathing, he's not in the wheelchair anymore, he's not playing D&D with his friends in the next room- My dad is GONE. 

And I realized- if my dad's gone... and he just told me my mom is dead too... I guess that makes me an ORPHAN? And I have no relatives, no family, no family friends to take me in- and none of my current friends will want me living in their house, I'm sure, because everyone I know who lives in Maryland is married and getting pregnant or already have kids and have no room for me to sleep over... 

And my mind went to the Darkest Place- "If I have no mom and no dad, and all my relatives hate us anyway, especially Grannie... and nobody wants me to live with them, and I have no money, no career, no job, no husband, no next of kin, and no prospects... I'm homeless!" 

I almost wake up hearing some noise in the background, until I hear the huge banging sound overhead on my ceiling. I scream bloody murder into my pillow, and my entire body is shaking from the cold underneath the warmest emerald green Irish crochet blanket I've ever made myself. 

That is how scared I am. 

This is what PTSD looks like. I'm so sorry if you're reading this and you're crying too. Gimme a hug, sweetheart. I love you. 

I think I finally understand how Michael Banks felt after losing his wife in Mary Poppins Returns, which was one of the very last Disney movies I've ever seen with my dad before he passed on. 

Let me debunk this little myth that Lindsay Ellis said about Disney's Mary Poppins franchise: The whole thing about children holding onto money, and embracing capitalism "is what Disney strives to stir into children and adults with this Disney sequel" is a myth. The Banks' children were going to LOSE THEIR HOME. They had NO mother- she died! There is no woke-ness about the Mary Poppins sequel, and it's absolutely true to the P.L. Travers series, especially if you rewatch Saving Mr. Banks and look at it from Walt's point of view while he's talking to Ms. Travers. Walt Disney was really a humanist person, and Michael Eisner's idea of monetizing sequels and Disney remakes was NOT everybody's idea of making movies. 

My take on Lindsay Ellis, my opinion on this- I agree with her on several Disney remakes, including Aladdin, Beauty and the Beast (hashtag #BeastForShe, ha ha, love that!), and definitely Dumbo because the original animated version from the 1940s during wartime America in World War II definitely made waves and was a total tearjerker with many Disney fans and kids MUCH BETTER than the live action directed by Tim Burton -- Why Tim Burton, why did he have to direct it and show the horrors of bad circus people showing how awful animal cruelty is?!?!?! The live action version of Dumbo made me sick- I don't want to see animal abuse and definitely no child abuse in the theatre. I'm done. Lindsay, you hit it out of the park with "Woke Disney", bravo! I actually borrowed your video clips and episodes on Disney to help with my PowerPoint slideshow project for my economics class, in which I got an A for showing the dark side of Disney and Disney + in my presentation, using annotations and research. THANK YOU!!!! 

Spoiler: But here's where Ellis went a little bit too much, and it was on grounds of Mary Poppins, in which with the sequel, she missed the point- The Banks family was just about to lose their home, roll over and give up on it, when they should have realized that the banker at Fidelity Fiduciary was behind all the crimes of stealing people's income and their homes, everything. And also, she missed the whole thing about Michael's children, especially because I feel for poor Georgie- Where Georgie says, right before Emily Blunt as Mary Poppins starts to sing, this line really killed me: 

"I miss mother." 

THAT, my dears, is the entire point of Mary Poppins Returns! The movie is about expressing grief during a period of bereavement, especially during a time like COVID19 (only a hundred years ago in the 1920s, the epidemic that killed millions was the Spanish Flu, according to Wikipedia- Mary Poppins Returns is set in England in 1933) or worse of the worse, since the movie is in the 30s, we're actually calling it the Great Slump, in Britain. Here in America, the 1930s happened a lot sooner in 1929 with the Stock Market crash, and we called it The Great Depression of the 30s. Everybody was hurting- EVERYONE. People's families were dying, starving, living out of dumpsters, living out of their cars, you get the idea. 

America could have been like that in 2020. Kinda didn't happen, though... We may be in a recession, but to me, we've been in a recession since President George W. Bush was in his second and final term. It hasn't really stopped, even when Obama was President. Not to me anyway, because I've always had trouble finding a job. After Donald Trump (Scrump the Loser) left the White House (and about time too), 2020 was not only the year of COVID19 the medical disaster, but it was also the biggest year of people leaving their jobs, which is why the economy is in free fall. My boyfriend is calling it "The Great Resignation" in which people are leaving their jobs in droves because they are DONE with sitting at home doing at-home jobs, people were tired of working part time or even going to level-entry minimum wage jobs, sitting around waiting for the perfect opportunity to happen. And it's happening everywhere. That's why I feel sad for all those people in retail, restaurants, and food service industries selling products and services, because the anti-vaccine people are giving them a hard time when they're just doing what they're told, because the manager put up a "We're Hiring" sign because the manager just got a job they've always wanted... Oh. Joy. 

Meanwhile, here I am in JoAnn Fabrics, holding on to my purchases for dear life, hoping the nice cashier will give me a discount, even though the prices on yarn went so high it's like the store chain is committing robbery, and I don't have enough money in my bank account because nobody wants to hire me... Even though I have to remind myself, the retail industry is at their lowest most desperate point, and they're fighting to stay alive- 

And even though I know that my economics 201 teacher Professor Cramer was right, that when the economy is in free fall, and we need socialism to help out the customers, and the government is total capitalist and hates socialism- guess what (he always said)- People starve, their wives divorce them, and you lose your house, your car, your kids, your pets, and your money... 

And then he brought up the subject of being diagnosed with cancer, and what the economics behind cancer was, and if you actually beat cancer with the money you owe the bank for your house (guess what)- you go bankrupt because you used the equity line and the return on investments to buy chemotherapy and radiation to get your health back- you get evicted, and your neighbors have a shopping spree on your stuff... 

And what I'd still like to say to him is- Sir, what happens if you DIE of cancer, what happens to your house, your family, and everything you own? What about the wealth of the widow? What happens to the widow or widower who now has to buy a coffin or urn, then pay for the funeral or memorial service, all the hospital bills, the lawyers, the deed to the house if there's a last will and testament- WHAT THEN, HUH? What's the economics of when a person dies? 

I really, really wanted to tell him all that I thought that semester, because I had just gotten the news that my dad had cancer that spring. But I kept my mouth shut, yet I still took it personally, I packed all my things, and I bolted out the door in heavy sobs. 

That's where Ellis went wrong. Mary Poppins Returns is not an economics movie, it's not a woke Disney movie as it were, it's all about grace under pressure, and feeling empathy for the children who are growing up too fast, faster than their father or Aunt Jane ever did when they were kids in the nursery with the same nanny. Most of all, it's all about the importance of LOVE during a crisis. The Banks and their kids were about to lose their family house, their home, and if they couldn't make the money to pay back the loan, they'd lose a part of their souls that went with Michael's father's house, which was also in part, part of his wife Kate, who died before the movie even started. You hear it in the song "A Conversation". The poor man is tormented by the death of his beautiful loving wife. 

I cried at the part where Emily Blunt as Poppins sings "The Place Where the Lost Things Go" because of what she was talking about- the children losing their home, part of themselves, and for sweet Georgie's sake, losing their mom. 

By the way- That song, "Place Where the Lost Things Go"? That was my eulogy. I sang that song a capella at my dad's funeral 10 months ago, almost to the day. And I broke down in tears, grabbing my boyfriend Alexander, at the end in which I said, "Find dad in the place where the lost things go- I miss my Universe." 

Losing a parent is a similar feeling to me as the Banks' children losing their mom in the Disney film and the death of Yondu Udonta in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 combined. That is what that movie was trying to show you, in the time of a terrible crisis, including the 1919 Spanish Flu, the 1929 Stock Market crash and Great Depression/ Great Slump, and the worst of the worst (in my opinion)- the Corona Virus World-Epidemic and Great Resignation of 2020 and 2021. 

I got no words for you now. 

I just feel really depressed tonight and I want my daddy. 

2020 is not here yet. And 2021 never started either. It IS still 2019 all over again. It never ended. This is the Year With No End. 2019 is the worst THREE years of my life. This is the worst era to live in, the worst time for humans to live in, and sadly, the horrors are never going to stop. 

My mother just asked me to stop watching the news for 24 hours starting tonight. 

By the way, guys... 

My mother, Julie... her birthday is tomorrow. 

That's why I've said it before and I'll say it again. I have no dreams, I only get nightmares and they won't stop. I'm living in a nightmare right this minute. It never ends, it never stops spinning, it never turns off. 

Dreams don't come true in Baltimore. They just don't. Not in the entire state of Maryland anyway. I have nowhere to go but down. 

Get. Me. Out. Of. Here. 

I guess that's the end of the post. I'm sorry I couldn't post something happy. I'll try something happier next time. Something about Eliza. I love you guys, na night. 

Love, Rachel, Lady in the Blue Box