For My Cousin...

I've been struggling to find a way to connect with the recent death of a distant cousin to whom I am closely related. I visited his facebook page last night to see what people might be saying. That's when I decided that I had something to tell him, too. This was going to be a lot shorter, and just get posted on his timeline. But as I began to type, I realized I had a lot more to say "to him" than I wanted to simply post on his profile. And the more I wrote, the more I needed to write.

If you are related to me, please forgive my bluntness as I write my cousin. If you can help it, try not to repeat the patterns of gossip and slander that (y)our family has become so proficient in. If you are on "that side" of stuff, keep in mind that, just like my father, I have feelings and emotions. I've had them the entire time. And despite the attempts of some to silence a voice that challenged their own, I have grown more and more stubborn, and less willing to go unheard. Even where you wouldn't hear me, I have found ways to express. You are probably one of the biggest inspirations for the music I create. While some have tried to seal me, the heat caused pressure to build inside, and the seams are finally starting to come loose. I'm (a little) sorry if the steam that jets out is scalding. And I know I'm nowhere near done. 

Without further ado...

To Phillip Parker:

I know I'm supposed to say something nice. I'm supposed to call everyone and ask them how they are feeling, console them, pay my condolences. I'm supposed to be sad. But when I found out you had passed, I didn't know how to feel.

I'd been trying to get a hold of you. Why wouldn't you respond, cousin?

I have so many awful memories of you. The last time I really saw you, I was visiting Sacramento for a few days on a trip I made for my 21^st birthday. I’d told you I was not smoking, drinking, or smoking pot. I asked you over the phone to please help me out with that. “Please don’t smoke pot around me,” I implored. And I asked you not to smoke cigarettes around me, too. You assured me it would be cool.

But I remember, like it was yesterday, coming down the escalator at the airport. I saw you and a couple other people standing below, waiting for my arrival. You had that pack of Marlboro 100’s in your front pocket—the entire red top was sticking out in a way that blatantly signified your intent.

We made our way to the car, and before we got out of the parking lot, a lighter began to flick repeatedly. This wasn’t the couple-of-flicks made when trying to light a cigarette, but that light and relight action I’d become so painfully fond of. This was pot, in a pipe, being passed around the car.

I honestly don’t remember every bad decision I made that trip. I know I didn’t do anything that most people would consider “too stupid.” But I remember afterwards, hearing from my mom, your story was that I had “brought weed from Las Vegas” with me to Sacramento to smoke with you. This story somehow made its way to grandma. I was devastated.

But that’s just icing on an already icy cake.

You sold my bass guitar and my amp. I have no idea what you used the money for. You never even mentioned it to me. No apology, no nothing.

And when I lived with you? It seems like it was a constant struggle to just be. All-the-time one-upmanship. Telling me in front of a group of people to “go pick a flower,” as though that were some sort of put down. Imagine a man created in God’s image enjoying the beauty created by God himself—A God I didn’t even believe in at the time.  Appreciating the world and looking for light was not something that you condoned in me, but belittled and persecuted.

And the way you would talk about family members. The way you acted as though you were above them. The way you explicitly conveyed your intent to take advantage of the people who loved and helped you. The way you talked about my father (just like so many that we are mutually related to), even to my face! The way you would talk about women, and the way you would defend the way you talked about women. The way you talked about people behind their backs versus the way you composed yourself to their faces.  And who knew?

I would contest that we all knew. I would argue that many just didn’t want to believe it. Even though it would come up in family conversation on occasion, we all wanted to (be able to) think more highly of you. That you had some altruism hidden deep within you was far from any truth I ever came to behold.

And don’t get me wrong. I remember you letting me stay with you (at someone else’s two bedroom apartment where he lived with his mom). I remember… Actually, I don’t remember much more generosity than that.

It’s not that you hadn’t affected me positively.

You introduced me to the artistic love of my life, Hip Hop. I am still dedicated and passionate as ever about the little subculture from a ghetto in New York that has drastically impacted the entire world.

Because of you, I know a lot more about the drug culture, and the way it affects millions of young people and influences their present and future. You took me to my first rave. You helped me get my first hit of ecstasy. You introduced me to a side of life that some people (especially with a similar “Christian upbringing”) might never have a chance to see and experience.

You introduced me to being an outlaw. Spray painting the side of the highway with you was intense! I will never forget (and still often reminisce about) that moment. And any/all of the other illegal activities we engaged in helped shape my understanding of the world today. As brutally uncouth as that may sound, I am truly thankful to be on this side of the “moral war,” and would have it no other way.

You introduced me to some of my favorite movies, music, and style.

When I heard that you had passed, I didn’t know how to feel. I still don’t. I don’t feel like calling anyone. I don’t want to talk about it to them. People like to remember the deceased in a different light than they really were.  I’m not ready for that. I’m not ready to hear anyone tell me how much they miss you or how sweet you were. I’m just not prepared for any sugar-coated bullshit.

And I’m still hung up on why you never reciprocated my numerous attempts to contact you in the last year or so. Was it because you thought I would try to bombard you with Christian morals? I don’t have the balls. Did you think I was going to talk down to you? Was I going to act as though I was somehow above you? I may have once had the ignorant air of a person who stumbled upon some newfound truth, holding my head high as I boasted some groundbreaking revelation of truth and morality. But, I think, I’ve grown up quite a bit since then.  Or were you afraid that I would just slam you for everything you’ve done to me? Maybe I would tell you how hurt I am by all the royally fucked up things you’ve done to me? It’s possible.

But if I know me (and, although occasionally surprised, I am learning me better and better all the time), I probably just wanted to connect. Just wanted to see how you were. I most likely just wanted to find some point of empathy, maybe simple sympathy, and express to you that you are loved. I might have even mustered the courage to ask if I could pray for anything specific for you. The thing is, Phil, I still love you.

And that’s probably a big to do in terms of why I don’t know how to feel. I’m notoriously forgiving. One of my biggest passions is reconciliation. Yet, this situation was beyond my reach. As many times as I reached out to you, and maybe even a time or two extra, you denied my attempts to connect. You (very apparently) wanted no such talk, no such reconciliation, no such connection.

Probably, Phil, I didn’t write this letter so much for you as I did for myself (never mind all of the debate of afterlife and whether or not you can actually read this, or even if you would care to). If the truth were told (which seems to be the theme here), I also wrote it for your friends and my family. Because I wanted to let everyone know that I’m here, still trying to figure out how I feel about this whole mess. I don’t miss you. I wouldn’t know what to miss, really. You treated me horribly the majority of the time we spent together. From childhood, even until death, you never really had an honest moment with me. I never saw the “real Phillip Parker.” I only caught glimpses of whom you tried to portray. I only saw the empty shell, never the pearl.

And I’m not sorry for this. I can imagine the backbiting that might arise within this “family” as a result of my writing this out. I’m well accustomed to the fact that I am not good enough for the side you hail from, if only for the fact that I am my father’s son. I’m not deceived into believing that I matter to them more than another excuse to pass the buck, or to find someone to criticize. It’s all I’ve ever really known. The plague has even affected my own sister. She hasn’t talked to me in well over a year.

Maybe I’m using your death as an excuse to air out my feelings about all of the dysfunction we grew up in. God knows I’d take one.

Or maybe I’m just saying some things that have needed to be said for a long time in the only way I really know how. Maybe, once I let this go, I’ll be able to grieve the loss of another soul I came in contact with and grew to love. Maybe I’ll find some peace.

Whatever the case may be, I hope you have found the Truth. And that you have been made whole and freed from the pain and demise of human error. I hope that you have been found by Love and saved by Grace. And I certainly hope you are at peace.

Sincerely, and with all I know how to give right now,

Aaron Paul Quinn