stuff about a cousin

I decided my last entry sucked and maybe I will delete it.

Normally I would be at work but since work was cancelled I am chillin, much like a villan, less like a killin, right here on teee ohhhh deee.

On Montel they are talking about BTK, the serial killer that had a “30 year reign of TERROR”. He Binds them, Tortures them, and Kills them.

I had this cousin, his name was Chris. He was a cousin-by-marriage, and I remember I always made a point of letting people know that. Because, well, Chris had the worse case of ADD I had ever see, he grew up in a real fucked up home, and used to go to extremes for attention. One time I remember he threw up a handful of caramel popcorn and then ate it again, and another time I remember he pissed behind the couch. We hung out all while growing up, me, my brother, and my other two cousins who were NOT cousins-by-marriage but real ones. We used to beat up on him a lot. I remember one time my brother and my other male cousin punched him in the face in my bedroom and he bled, and cried, and he always threatened to call his Mom on us, but they would never let him. He was a video game genius and got picked on for it. The last time I saw him was when I was fourteen or fifteen years old.

I write about this only because I have been thinking about it so much. And maybe if I write it down, document it, I will relax a little and stop thinking about it. Because, I believe it was the day before yesterday, my Mom called me and told me that he died in a car accident on his way home from a camping trip. He was 20, the same age as me.

I read about the accident in their local paper and I guess a truck was swerving in and out of lanes erratically, going about 85 miles per hour, and hit them head on in their little sedan. It showed a picture, and the front of their car was pretty much ran over by the truck. Two of the boys died on impact, Chris included, and the driver survived until the helicopter got there but died on the way to the hospital.

I guess I should be contemplating my own life’s worth or something. I should be so tragically reminded that life can end. suddenly. I should “pray for his family” and grow closer with my own.

But more than anything it’s made me think about this kid. His life fucking sucked. Neither of his parents ever wanted him, everyone was constantly annoyed with him. He never had a set place to live. His cousins beat him up, belittled him. The one thing he was always passionate about, video games, seemed menial to everyone in his life and it wasn’t celebrated or respected. His Mom did drugs, was always on antidepressants, and tried to kill herself twice.

That’s a life though, right? Chris lived and died after twenty years of misfortune, never accomplishing any level of greatness. and I guess that’s what makes me sad.

my mom saw him a couple of years ago and said he seemed really happy. he was way into choir and had a crush on the same chick for like two years.

I guess what I am trying to say is, I want to know there were successes in his life. I am sure there were. I’m sure there were moments when he felt amazing things, he got recognition, no matter what size, for the stuff he was really good at. I hope he got to have sex. I hope there were great things for him.

I know this is all self analytical, neurotic bullshit and god how I love to write about deep, revealing muck and if I were you reading this right now I would be “so over” my self involvement

but I feel so fucking guilty for the shit I put that kid through. I was part of a “misfortune” that he had. And though it was the boys that caused the physical abuse, I DO remember verbally hurting him and never attempting to stop what was going on. We were kids, I know, but I’ll never forget that time he cried to us, begged us to let him call his Mom so he could go home. and I remember seeing North at the city cinema with him and my brother, and he saw some boys he know from school there and asked them if he could sit with them. and they said no.

I don’t know, man. It’s not like I miss him or anything like that, I didn’t even know him. Spawned a diary entry nonetheless.