Curt's Story (Third in a Three Part Series)

If you're still hanging in, this post wraps up the highlights of Curt's dismal existence to the point we are now. If you're just showing up here, you may want to go back and start with the first part.

But be afraid. Be very afraid.

When Curt and Angie divorced, Curt was deathly afraid of the consequences of being unable to pay child support. Given his inability to hold any job for any length of time, and the laws allowing for the incarceration of deadbeat dads, it was likely a valid fear. And so, he fought, very hard, expending a great deal of (his parents') money to get shared joint custody. And he was, despite his mental health issues, despite his previous child molestation issues, despite his drug and alcohol dependency issues, despite his criminal record, despite having no job and living in his parents' basement, considered a responsible enough parent to raise his daughter. I'd never really believed that the system could so utterly fail a child until that time. I said it then, and I still believe it now, I've never seen a more appropriate candidate for the foster care system anywhere. Say what you will about the problems with foster care. About neglected children falling through the cracks. Any judge who could look at this situation and think that a child would not be damaged living with this man is an idiot.

Angie began using crack around this time. Providing yet another parental pillar for the girl. She lost her job with the law office, dropped out of school, and spent a $20,000 inheritance within months on drugs. She and Curt, neither of whom were in an appropriate position to do so, shared custody of their child, but, because of the ever-present EPO's, it was a difficult and constant imposition for everyone else in the family to pick up or drop off the baby. Curt could not go get her himself. Curt kept insisting that this was ridiculous, as he'd "never done anything to hurt Angie". The family wanted to believe this. Which was absurd given the witness accounts and other physical evidence, as well as his penchant for violence in his first marriage and with his parents. I suppose it was easier for them to pretend. But, well, I wasn't as good at playing along. So, whenever he'd spin that little yarn for me, I'd remind him that he, himself, had called me and told me over the phone that he'd assaulted his wife. And that I'd believed him then. I also never missed a chance to remind him that he needed to work on putting his daughter first and becoming the man that he needed to be as her father.

Curt and I didn't get along particularly well. The fact that I had no respect for him probably had a great deal to do with it. The fact that he probably got tired of me preaching (relentlessly) about how much self-improvement he needed to do might have contributed. The fact that he'd borrowed our pick-up truck once to help a friend move over the weekend and then refused to return it for us to be able to go to work on Monday, because they'd gotten busy and weren't done, forcing us to go steal it from where he'd hidden it from us, didn't help his case either. The fact that my (then) husband had to constantly bail him out of jail, listen to his mother fret over how she was going to provide for him after she was gone and make ends meet herself while she was here, that we all had to try to help him parent his daughter (throwing birthday parties for her, babysitting, providing second-hand clothes, etc.) and he never once said thank you, might have had something to do with it, too. But, with Curt, it was all about entitlement. People owed him things. He never returned the favor or showed any modicum of appreciation. Other people had things and he was as deserving as any of them.

Curt's daughter is the only person I've ever known who has flunked kindergarten. In fact, she flunked it twice. She has seen a psychologist for years because of nightmares. In fact, during a session when she was 6, she drew a picture of daddy's 'bong' for her therapist, and still they let her go back to him. I guess the fact that her mother was a crackhead at this point made Curt look like a better father.

Angie's house and white pick-up truck were damaged about this time. Curt's "side of the story" of their life together, the lengthy explanation of why he'd had to hit her and how she was such a bitch that she deserved it, were preserved for all to see in permanent red ink on her truck and a few choice 'bitch', 'cunt', 'fuck you's, were spray painted on her house (and the house in which his own daughter lived half the time) for all to see. Curt was convicted of unlawful destruction of property and ordered to pay for the corrective actions necessary to remove the text from both the house and the truck. Several more thousand dollars that his mother had to pay.

My ex-mother-in-law began to be concerned about Curt's future (nothing like waiting to the last minute, folks) as she, herself, became more infirmed. And, her answer to this was to buy Curt a house. He would, then, have a roof over his head always. This wouldn't account for things like property taxes or utilities or maintenance and upkeep of a house, but she was sure Curt could take care of those things. I wish I could say that it was senility that caused her to believe these things, but it was the same blind faith she'd always had when it came to him. And probably a healthy dose of fear. She was, however, wise enough to realize that putting the house in Curt's name would open a Pandora's box. Curt could sell the house for drug money and then be living in the same cardboard box I'd warned her about for years prior to this. Curt's ex-wife could force the sale for money he owed her. He could lose the house in a police seizure for illegal activity. He could fail to maintain it to the point where the house would become unfit to live in. It was the first clue I had that she was thinking in realistic terms when it came to Curt.

Her answer? To buy the house and put it in the other three siblings names and allow Curt to live there. Basically, she felt it was better to put the financial security of her other three children (and NINE grandchildren) at risk, to make an attempt to take care of the monster she had created. There was no way I was going to allow my (then) husband to have property in his name in which his youngest brother was, in any way, involved. I plainly stated that if she wanted to buy him a house, she could do what she wanted with her money. But that there was no way that I could allow her to put my own children at risk to help Curt. And I was pretty firm about it. Not rude. Not raising my voice. And her response was to call me an asshole. She tried again and again to talk the family into this over the next several months to a year. But it just wasn't going to happen.

The age of the internet put Curt in a position to meet new women who didn't know his past. (This actually was a huge advantage for my ex-husband a couple years ago, as well.) And he would use his mother's credit card to pay for hotel rooms to go meet these unsuspecting females. When my ex-mil reported the cards as missing and had them cancelled, he just had the women show up at her house. One early morning, my ex-mil was awakened to noises coming from the basement and when she went downstairs to see what it was, she found Curt...along with three of his new friends (two women and a man) engaged in (what she considered) deviant sex. Curt's mom did what she always did in these situations, she did the equivalent of shaking her finger at him and saying "you better stop doing that, Curt." And he did what he always did in these situation, he ignored her.

Curt continued to financially and emotionally drain his parents to the point where my ex and his sister took a stand. They felt they had to, as there became genuine concerns as to the ability of the parents to be able to survive until their natural deaths on what money they had left. As my ex and his sister were their father's power of attorney (at this point the old man was in a nursing home), they commandeered his direct deposits from social security and his pension fund. They could pay their mother's household accounts and Curt couldn't get ahold of the money from the new account, because no bank card or checks would be in the house. The plan was actually a very good one. Curt, however, couldn't have disagreed more. Very quickly, he began threatening and beating his mother, insisting that she make my ex and his sister return control of the money to her (where he'd have access once again). When that didn't work, he went on a rampage, destroying family heirlooms including hand painted ceramics that had been done by my ex's maternal grandmother that were brilliant, several pieces of expensive crystal, paintings that had been done by my ex's father (who was very talented in his own right) and, most tragically, an oil painting of a Nebraska sod house that several collectors had tried to procure for years, which had been painted by my ex's paternal great grandmother.

He, once again, made an attempt (by threatening his sister with physical violence)to get one of his father's guns, and when it didn't work, he threatened to kill all of his nieces and nephews. It was a threat that the family didn't take seriously. "Oh, Curt just says things sometimes. He would never really do them." I did. And I never let my children be alone with him again.

It was then that my ex-mil called us and asked us if she could come stay with us. Wanting, rather than to make Curt leave her home, to abandon it to him. When we explained to her that if her safety was an issue, she needed to contact the police , and that she needed to do so anyway to file a report about the property damage, she reacted as she regularly did, cussed us out and refused to confront him. She went to stay with her brother while she healed from yet another of Curt's beatings, and then when the brother wouldn't allow the nonsense to continue without Curt being prosecuted, a niece.

One would think Curt would have revelled in having the house to himself, but, it was not to be. Curt had, perhaps, the worst of his psychotic episodes around this time. (Just when you thought it couldn't get any worse, huh?) The lunacy was taking it's toll on me, big time, but I wasn't having delusions. Can't say the same for Curt. Curt began telling people that there were midgets in the attic of his parents' house. And he believed it. They were in the walls and when he slept, they came out and took things. He insisted they were there. And he called the police, a couple times, to come find them and make them leave. When a friend suggested to him that he might be able to capture their images on a video camera with a tripod, Curt explained that the midgets were too fast to be filmed and that police needed to bring their dogs to get the midgets. The police had taken Curt downtown for psychiatric observation twice, but if he wasn't hurting himself or someone else, they, apparently, could only hold him for a relatively short period of time.

This went on for weeks, until, one Sunday afternoon, a neighbor contacted my ex-sil, and she then contacted my ex-husband to tell him that Curt had been out in the front yard screaming for help. My ex-husband called the house and Curt told him that he had confronted one of the midgets who had tried to attack him and that he had fought him off, killed him with a kitchen knife, and had trapped the body in a bedroom...just in case he wasn't completely dead. He was very anxious for my ex-husband to come over to confirm the incident and help him. The blood drained from my ex-husband's face as he asked Curt if he was sure the midget was dead and if there was a lot of blood in the house. He was so afraid that someone...some stranger...had been hurt, but didn't, for a moment, believe it was a midget. And so, he headed over there only to find that Curt had trashed his mother's bedroom. There was no midget. No blood. No knife. But every piece of the antique cherry furniture that had been in that bedroom was splintered. It looked as if he'd taken a sledgehammer to it. The mattress was propped against a wall and had been slashed. The window to the front yard had been broken out. Curt was distraught that the midget had revived and escaped before any help had arrived.

My ex told Curt that the police were on their way to help with the midget situation and Curt, afraid that he'd be forced to go in for more in-patient observation, took off. At this point, he was afraid to stay in the house anyway.

Ironically, he called about an apartment that was in a building owned by my current landlords (who are friends and former bosses). They had, during the six years I worked with them, heard a great many "Curt stories". And so, they were intimately familiar with the tenant who was looking to rent their apartment. I hadn't talked to them in a year or so, when the older of the two brothers called me. It was an interesting conversation, to say the least. Dan said, "I had to call you. I've got a story you won't believe." I was at work, but I bade him continue. He said, "I got a call from somebody wanting to look at one of my apartments. So, I met the guy out there. He looked around and told me he was interested in renting the place. I asked him his name and he said Curt R________. I couldn't believe it! I said 'Are you THE Curt R_________???', and when he reluctantly shook his head, I said 'Man, you're FAMOUS!" By this point, I was cracking up. Certain that Dan had heard enough "Curt stories" that the story would end there. But no.

I don't think people believe me when I tell them these stories. I suppose they are somewhat unbelievable, but I assure you, I have not embellished. Not in the least. And I assure you that I've left out a good deal more that I could have included. Dan was calling, then, to let me know he'd rented the apartment to Curt. And two months later, when he had to evict Curt and was putting his furniture on the street, he called me again. It was generous of him to give me the opportunity for an "I told you so." But he's a pretty sweet guy. Not that I wasn't expecting the call anyway.

Curt was pretty upset about his furniture being put out for trash. Not upset enough to contact the landlords or make any effort to pay his rent. But upset enough to contact his sister and insist that she use her dad's pension money to buy him new furniture and a deposit on another apartment. She wasn't nearly the soft touch that her mother was and poor Curt ended up out in the sticks in a run down trailer.

I understand he's been back in jail at least once since I split with my ex. In fact, the family thought he was still in jail when his father passed away last November. He surprised them by showing up at the funeral, though. His ex-in-laws now have full custody of Curt's daughter. Sad that it didn't happen until the child was ten years old. My ex commented that it was tragic that her grandparents wouldn't allow her to come to her own grandfather's funeral. (Curt is not allowed any contact with her.) I commented that it was tragic that Curt had made the situation what it was. The family (including my ex) disagree.

They're still...after more than twenty years...making excuses for this man. I suppose that's what dysfunctional families do. For a lifetime. Someone once pointed out to me that each member in a dysfunctional family has a role. A role that they take on (or that is thrust upon them) from a very early age. And it becomes so ingrained that it feels 'normal' to them. I believe there is a great deal of truth in that.

Have you ever seen RAISING ARIZONA? One of my most favorite movies of all time. Nicholas Cage's character is a bad boy who isn't very good at it. He ends up serving a lot of time in prison. Each time, as he comes before the parole board, they ask him if he will do better. They ask him if he'll give up his criminal lifestyle. And each time, he says he will. This happens over and over and over again. And it's always the same people on the parole board. It's not like they haven't seen him and had this same conversation before. But each time, he tells them he'll be good this time. And they look at him and say "Well all right then.", and turn him loose. That's the way our local legal system continues to handle Curt. He has been arrested so many times and charged with a variety of violent offenses. Yet he's never been to prison.

His family treats him the same way. I never could. I had a hard time believing him the first time. At some point, fairly early on, I quit believing ANYTHING that came out of his mouth. It confuses me how the people in his family, who experienced the same things I did, and more, continue to be mesmerized by the constant falsehoods Curt dishes up. I suppose you have to be shoe-horned into those roles at an early age for them to take well. Or maybe I'm just stubborn.

Curt's daughter will have a lifetime of problems. Problems that her father, and her mother and her grandmother all paid for in advance. And each member of that family will carry the scars of their responsibility in making Curt what he is today.

I still worry, from time to time, that one day he will snap and make good on the promise he made so many years ago. A promise he made because he believed that all of his troubles were caused by the failure of his family to help him at various points in his life. Some nights I wake up from the nightmare of the phone call from my ex telling me that his brother has broken into his house and killed our children. And it's a bad one. I'm so glad that Highlander is there when I wake up.

I'm always a little suspicious when people roll their eyes and talk about their crazy in-laws. Could it be that they have their own Curt? I suppose. But I get through each day convincing myself that most people just don't know how lucky they have it. It's not that I don't realize that every family has some problem or another. Hell, my children are related to this man by blood. They could, potentially, share the genetic predispositions he does. And that really does scare the shit out of me.

Funny, I keep trying to come up with a moral for this story. Something that we can all learn. I can't seem to do it.

Maybe the moral is to get the help your children need when they are young. And, even if it hurts or is tough, you have to follow through, because you're doing what will be best for them in the long run.

Maybe it's that drugs and alcohol can completely destroy you. If you cannot control your demons, they will consume you.

Maybe it's that you shouldn't marry into a family with that many mental health issues. Or make that untreated mental health issues.

Maybe it's that you can't protect your own family from everything. No matter what you do. Sometimes the hell comes from within. Though that moral really sucks.

Whatever else I've learned in my own life, I can say, without hesitation, that I saw this one coming. A long way off. And while I tried to make everyone who had any power to change it aware of it, ultimately, for a variety of reasons, nothing was done and it turned out pretty much exactly like I knew it would. Sometimes, you really don't want to be right.