Expecting to be met at Arrivals

[FarFarWay]

(OK, this a while ago - but |I have never cleared it up in my mind; I need other opinions.)

Travelling with an 8 year old, to meet people who I don't really know (even though technically family), and who the child has never met.

Two flights (one upgraded, the other downgraded, by comparison; no spare time in the airport in Japan, just a mad dash to find the plane!), about 22 hours in the air total, plus the travel down to Heathrow/check-in etc. (Also a week before Christmas). Almost the only child on the flight, and even though a "special meal", most of it was not to her liking - not fussy but never eaten sushi etc. So she was a bit hungry and tired when we landed.

The people we were to be staying with lived approx 40 minutes away.
Not only did a carful of people who my eight year old had never met, EVENTUALLY turn up - but we had to sit and wait for them to get there.

Before anyone says "Let it go....". The main player of that group has recently brought up the trip, and what a (not-quite-but almost-) disaster it was - but the then eight-year-old has never seen these (important, arguably) people ever again, and this is now being held against her by the main player.

Despite appearances, I am not a grudge holder but, in my over-thinking way, I have actually tried to figure out the actual science of this flight and how much time was needed for them to be there to greet us. And I am a bit pissed at the "they", as the delay was blamed on the wife element doing her hair, when she really did not need to come as well, as it made the whole thing into a bigger deal, when we - and especially my daughter - would have really appreciated it being casual and low key - let alone there actually be someone - anyone - present, when we came through the Arrival doors to ---- [crickets].

By my (bad) calculations, they didn't even set off until we landed.... but due to the time-travel aspect of hours behind/ahead, am I getting it wrong?

(PS - on the one hand, this light-hearted, but on the other - as I said, she has never seen them again, and so sometimes, it seems like it happened yesterday.)

@Pupinskipops

It was a precarious and fragile relationship, that is why it went the way it did. There were a multitude of personalities involved, which inevitably caused complications. I cannot help you to see it any other way, and it doesn't matter anyway. You have your view, that's fine.

[I am not being a snob about where they finally met us - but I know he was, and definitely wife was. We just sat there to wait as there were no seats in Arrivals, as most people just go straight through for one reason or another, like being MET. Anyway, we just didn't eat there - mainly both vegetarian-ish and didn't really fancy it. But father WAS snooty about it when they came. HIM - not me. He is a very very difficult man - I sort of knew it then, but I definitely know it now - from what his sons have told me]

The balcony/deck.... I tried to give context (too may words again) but essentially, he had even been (why, I don't know) where they had been living.
It confused me, and made me a bit sad.

Worse has followed over the years, of course.

missed words out (me???!)

"He had even been LYING ABOUT where they were living."

• which did puzzle me, as we had been in touch by letter.... or thinking about it, he wrote to me, and I called him.... so weird anyway.

And, for those who think THAT went on too long.... (I realise I may eb talking to an empty room)....

Apart from France (x 2), there was that trip to Naples, Florida. That went belly up from the very very start, before even getting on the plane (at least together this time)!

As they say, You couldn't make it up!
But would get accused of it, I'm sure.

This thread is one of the nastiest OP bashing threads in a long time. And I admit my earlier posts on this thread were probably a bit terse, especially before her back story came through.

The pile on's keep coming and coming though and OP has responded (in her flowery style) with restraint and dignity.

OP, have you considered writing a book for yourself on all this - might be cathartic...

@BoredAuditor

Thank you.... It's brought out the worst in some people, it has to be said.
I just didn't want to include the whole (still haven't anyway) back-story; I truly thought I could make myself understood, but not the case it seems, just got worse every time I posted more than a short paragraph. I don't mind being flowery or reading it either, but we definitely are not all the same, and the facelessness of the internet does allow people to be unkind more readily, whilst also being a bit intolerant and impatient and giving vent to that negativity.

If I ever had thought of writing a book, the reactions to what I have written on here would have make me pause on that idea...
Aren't most people's stories interesting only to themselves?

Oh just re-read, you mean a book for myself..... gosh no...
The Narcissist's raison d'etre is to be the star in someone else's life - and such a lot of the bad things in mine have been due to my father - certainly all main events; he even effed up my wedding! So the book would inevitably be centred around him, which he would - were he to know about it - love.
And he has had quite enough of my spiritual energy and in a bad way, defined who and what I am.
Oh to have had a father who helped me be a better person, not a worse one.
(Sorry for playing the victim - but it is a fact.)

Please don't write a book about this.

tbh plenty of people had absent and unreliable fathers.
do you speak in RL about this op

And if you do, hire a VERY good copy editor!

Nasty upon nasty....

For starters, the suggestion was that I write a book "for myself" .... to which I said that I wouldn't.

Like every other book in the world that you could choose not to read, you could easily choose NOT to read mine.

Heck, you didn't even have to read the thread, let alone make such a valuable contribution. There's a thought.

I actually made what I thought was a very thoughtful and reasonable contribution on this thread, days ago.

But the fact is that your writing style is unusual and difficult to understand.

Still no emery board story. I'm going to write my own: OP was accused in France in 2010 of taking step-mum's cheap emery board and sent away in disgrace after a mere day of seeing perpetually-absent dad. She didn't take it obviously.
In the second France trip, "jokes" were perpetually made about OP stealing emery boards. Not funny.
Am I close OP?

I'm sorry your parents didn't bother with you OP. That is their own character failing and not yours. Cut them off now, stay focused on your DD and friends who might have more normal emotions.

@GRex Hm, no, not very close I'm afraid.

The emery board happened in New Zealand.
I remember that when we arrived, we were told never to leave anything on the solid wood coffee table that sat in the angle of the corner shaped sofa. The table should not really be touched, let alone have anything go near it that may scratch it. (I had no idea of it's value or importance.)

I, and my daughter, respected the instruction..... BUT, I did have an emery board with me and, in my boredom, would file my nails (longer and stronger then). One time, I left the emery board on a cushion on the sofa.... and later, returned to find it snapped in half and left neatly on the sofa itself. Sadly, I knew who had done it.

There, the emery board "story".
I hope it's short enough.

The other France story may follow.

so what relevance is the bit about the coffee table ? to do with an emery board on a cushion on a sofa ?

thus the emery board story actually goes like this...

I had an emery board with me and, in my boredom, would file my nails (longer and stronger then). One time, I left the emery board on a cushion on the sofa.... and later, returned to find it snapped in half and left neatly on the sofa itself. Sadly, I knew who had done it.

interesting that the amended version is less than half what you put...

I would have said:
"Dad did aggressive weird stuff to unsettle me, for example once during the NZ trip I left an emery board on the sofa and came down to find it snapped."

No table, no nail filing, no assumptions about who did it, now impact focus. Could be step mum being referred to rather than dad, I've no idea. Anyway, sorry you felt they were deliberately trying to upset you OP, that must have been hard. I hope amongst all this that you've taken on board the advice to block his number and detach from your own side.

Because - suspect someone had put on the precious coffee table , and he thought I had, and so broke it and left it for me to find. I don't think he broke it just for shits and giggles.
No scratches to be made on the table - that's why it's relevant to mention it.

You are being deliberately obtuse, I'm sure.
Am I to ration words to help you understand something that's clear anyway?

OK - so here's France #1 for your consideration and criticism....

I hardly knew my father when he returned to live in the home town where I had lived with his parents from the age of three. I don't remember how he ended up living far away in Cornwall, and then marrying his third wife, but after they had been married for about a year, that's when he reappeared in my life. I don't think he liked me very much, and I did not know all that had happened in the marriage with my mother, or the second failed marriage.

That's back-story to explain in part why I was a little unsure around him. nevertheless......

...off we went, on a holiday to Spain, to Sitges via the Pyrenees, I think. They were still in the honeymoon period; I cannot imagine why they took me (one of those crumb-tossing occasions I suspect - or trying to do ""the right thing"). I had one quarter of the back seat; the rest was piled high with camping equipment. He was driving.

The first place we were to stay and pitch the tent was in the grounds of a small chateau. It is relevant to explain that I was shy, ugly, probably a bit chubby, bespectacled and very very unsure of myself. As we stopped at the reception room (just a small part of the chateau, maybe an outbuilding or something), he insisted that I go and ask the teenage boy [I had no experience of boys either, let alone French ones] if they had a facility for freezing the freezer packs for the cool box.

I don't remember that I objected strenuously, but I did have some reluctance.... and he went ape-shit on me.
Before I knew it, he had gone off to the office to call home, and tell my Grandmother he was sending me back that night, on the first available flight! I absolutely believed that he had called her, and was absolutely broken-hearted, AND worried that I would be in trouble back home.

Guess what? He didn't send me back. But the rest of the trip was so weird, that i almost wished that he had.

So that's France #1.
Obviously no point going into the whys and wherefores, and I have used as few words as I can.
(No-one's forced to read it by the way.)

Your dad asked you politely to do something that needed doing, you refused and wondered why your dad disciplined you for it? And you still hold it against him now?
It's irrelevant whether it was a teenage boy working in reception or a middle aged woman. You didn't do as you were asked.
But I suppose you're going to drip feed that while he was in the office you put up the tent and cooked dinner all by yourself.

So you don't know whether someone had put it on the coffee table or even who snapped it yet your using that as a reason why visiting your dad was so shit?
Could it be possible that as you'd left it on a sofa someone sat on it?

I wouldn't have had the confidence - I was 10/11, so it made talking to a teenage boy extra-intimidating - to talk to anyone. He also said, "Go and practice your French" - I had had about two lessons!

No I'm not.

And no they didn't.

Have a lovely day!

🥰

TLDR version:

I hadn't seen my feckless "dad" for around 7 years from ages 3 to 10, when he turned up with a new wife (#3) and took me camping. After being squashed in the back seat with camping stuff for many hours, we arrived and he told me to ask a teenage boy where we could freeze the freezer packs for the cool box. I was much too scared and refused, so dad yelled at me and pretended he was sending me home to his mum. I'd hoped to know him better, but the nastiness from him instead of love, and the trauma of realising he could and would just dump me again so quickly etched that one small incident in my mind forever.

Sorry your dad was awful OP.

I said it a couple of pages back but honestly I don't know why you still speak to him at all. He will never be what you wanted him to be. Free yourself!

Define "normally"...