Star: My Sisters

Star was my first child sex abuse client.  I talked about her matter last year when I described how it is that I pursued child molesters and sex abusing priests.  As a result of an unexpected visit by one of my sisters, yesterday I have been thinking about Star's father, one of the most evil and vile men I ever encountered.  My father was by degrees, only slightly less criminal.  Star's father got caught and paid a price in the physical world; my Dad was able to manipulate and play his children and family against one another creating by crimes, generations of injury and harm.  Two of my sisters spent some time over the weekend trying to get a grip on some of the parameters of the injuries he inflicted on his children and possibly grandchildren.  Unfortunately, the subject intruded like an uninvited guest at my 4th of July festivities. 

I love my sisters and brothers, but it is not lost on me that the estrangement among us is a continuing pattern of behavior fostered by the child molester, our father, to cover-up his crimes against my sisters and the other young women he had contact with throughout his lifetime.  We brothers and sisters continue to act out and keep one another at arms length and maybe blame one another for injuries he inflicted on us.  I've seen cats sit at a screen door and stare out at an interloper cat on their front porch, only to attack one another.  We do this.

Star's father molested every child in his family but primarily the three sisters.  Star was a a "Harley chick" and a tattoo centerfold, years before tatoo'ing went "mainstream."  Star's sister was a banker, and looked like a banker.  At the trial of their father, the banker sister got on the stand and attacked Star as a liar and manipulator and cheat and drug addict.  I asked the sister: so who taught Star to be a liar, cheat, manipulator, etc.  Her honest answer:  our Dad.  A jury awarded Star $5.5 million dollars (like most of the millions of dollars of verdicts I racked up over the years, substantially "uncollectable.")

My sisters, to some degree or another, have come to view one another less than charitably, I think.  My one sister has admittedly made some awful choices, my other sister has stepped in and helped her out with parenting, my other sister has been until receently--broken-hearted and uncommunicative with both of her sisters.  It goes on and on and while we are all adults and responsible for our conduct, we have forgotten who manipulated our feelings and why he did those things to us.  He did those things to us so he could commit crimes against children and others!  That we don't see that we are perpetuating these harms against one another is just one more crime he is committing against us from beyond the grave.

I gave my father too much free rent in my head over the years.  I used his crimes against me and my sisters as a reason to relapse into alcoholism after 12 years of sobriety.  The self-righteous bastard I became as a lawyer--who was incompetent to even run a business--justified his mis-guided and ultimately self-destructive crusades as a war of angels against devils.  This is my father's legacy.  Fuck him!

For my sisters and brothers, I love you and I wish you peace, and grace, and love.