the drama minor

I had a self-centered dream in which my parents got divorced and I cried, so hard I couldn't breathe, mostly because I now no longer had a touchstone for such matters as the family unit, marital success, etc.

The sadness of it was overwhelming. I could see their individual pain but could not come out of my own ball of misery to help. There was a ridiculous, awful rehearsal dinner for my own wedding that they had to deal with, without reaching out to one another and without any help from me.

Ugh.

When I was little, I thought it would be neat if my parents got divorced. Everyone else's were, it seemed, and they led such interesting lives. Two houses? Step-siblings? Interesting fights where people threw things and said bad words? I also wanted braces, a twin sister, and a plethora of other things, which, had I had them, would have undoubtedly been years' worth of headaches and not at all the endless entertainment I imagined.

When my parents hit a rocky patch and did start fighting (though they never threw things), I was terrified. When I moved out on my own, I could barely juggle my own time at home with the guilt trips I would get about not visiting home (The Original) enough (which, mind you, is 10 minutes away), and that's Me vs. Them, not even Me and One vs. Me and The Other. Braces? It took till I was 28 to enjoy wearing glasses - and that's only because I could finally afford decent frames and so could stop resembling Harry Potter. (I resembled Harry Potter before Harry Potter even existed!)

Anyway, I woke up and laughed at my younger self, the one who wanted divorced parents and several stepsisters. I am not made for drama. Especially domestic drama. I am happy to report that while we make a career out of driving each other as far up the wall as we can, my parents hit 32 years this past August and that tonight, I am driving them to the airport so they can fly off for their first European vacation since the '70s.

Yay parents. Yay marriage.