50 Myths That Could Ruin Your Life

You know that show, “Family Matters”? With the slightly dysfunctional family which always sorts out their problems and manages to stay together throughout it all?

Yeah.

Don’t you just love the 90’s?

Anyways. Growing up, Family Matters seemed to be the “role model” for families. What a family should be.

My family?

Nothing like the Winslow family.

You remember myth #2?

Well, my family is the perfect example of this. My dad cheated on my mom, and when she found out, I thought she was going to kill herself. She was so distraught, because she loved my dad, more than anything. She thought that he didn’t love her anymore, that he never loved her, and that he had just been messing with our lives.

She was depressed for a while, toying with the idea of suicide.

Then she finally came to her senses and realized that it wasn’t her fault; had never been her fault. He had just been thinking with his dick. And she also realized that, hey, I don’t have to be with him anymore, even if he does love me. He almost totally ruined me.

And then karma smacked my father in the face in the form of divorce papers.

(Literally. Mom took the papers and slapped him silly.)

So now my father lives across town. My mom has my sister, brother, and I for the weekdays, and we stay with my dad on weekends. Since my mom works on Fridays, and so does my dad, neither can take us to his place, so my Uncle Eddie had the great joy of officially being the Friday Night Chauffeur.

As an eighteen year-old, I had a license and a car, but on Fridays, I was under strict orders to drive myself home and leave for Dad’s place with Eddie and my siblings.

My Dad says it was so less gas could be spent.

My mom said that this was total bullshit and the only reason for it was because he wanted us on a tight leash. And apparently, to him, me + car = sneaking out to go party.

Which was also bull. 1) I never had to sneak out. My mother trusted me with my friends. And 2) Party? Me? Seriously?

Gotta say, I was one hundred percent with my mom on this.

Anyways. Fridays at school are generally better, because everyone’s in a good mood about the weekend coming up and all the wonderful surprises that are in store during this time. (Did my sarcasm leak out at the end of that? Whoops.) Less fights, less bullying, even the Royal Court seemed to get off their throne to stretch a bit.

On this particular Friday, it was like the others. Uneventful. Slightly pleasant.

I yawned at the end of my seventh period.

School itself was still boring, of course.

“Ms. Johnson,” snapped Mr. Mason, my AP Bio teacher. He was tall, thin, and greying. “Would you care to pay attention?”

I nodded meekly. Mr. Mason scared the crap out of me, to be honest.

He nodded firmly, then turned around to continue teaching. I took notes as he preached the Bible of Bio, when the bell rang.

Finally.

I found Miranda out in the hallway and grinned at her. We silently walked down the hallways—it was too loud to talk, anyways; everyone else was making so much noise—until we stepped into the sunlight.

“Ah!” sighed Miranda, quite dramatically. I burst into giggles as she began to proclaim, quite theatrically, how nice it was to finally see the sun, for she had been afraid she would’ve wasted away in the dark prison she had been in just moments before.

“Stop it.” I giggled. “Sheesh.”

She sighed dramatically once more as we reached my car. We both laughed as we opened the door and got in. I shoved all of my books into the backseat. We talked a little bit on the way home, making some plans to do something over the weekend so we both wouldn’t go crazy.

“Make sure you text me what the times are for the movies,” I called as she walked up the front steps of her house.

She nodded and waved goodbye to me. I smiled back and took off. When I arrived home, my uncle was already there with his van. My siblings were already in the van, he informed me. I greeted him, then ran upstairs to grab my suitcase—my mom always made us pack in the mornings—and my electronics. I double checked everything, then went downstairs and locked the door. Unlocking my car, I went to the backseat to get my books and then shut the door, locking the car.

“Here,” Eddie said, “Let me help you.” He smiled.

I handed him my backpack and extra books, and he huffed from the extra weight.

I bit back a laugh.

We piled everything next to my sister, Emma, who was ten, and I crawled into the passenger seat. I greeted Emma and my brother, Alex, who was fifteen and in that fuck-off-before-I-kill-you stage.

Emma smiled at me and Alex just mumbled in return.

“Okay, kids, here we go!” Eddie exclaimed.

I rolled my eyes.

Eddie pulled out of the driveway and out of my neighbourhood. About halfway through the drive, I saw a motion out of the corner of my eye and flicked my eyes to it. I watched Eddie rub his nose. Then, he…

Well…

He started digging, if you catch my drift.

I winced, shut my eyes, and looked the other direction.

Myth #10: Family members aren’t as embarrassing as we think. Teens are just ultra-sensitive.

Yeah, right. We were driving through the middle of town, with people around, and my uncle was picking his nose.

Myth #11: Being in a car means that you're not in public and people can't see you.

... There's honestly no non-sarcastic response to that.

I suppressed a shudder.

It’s okay, it’s okay, it’s okay, I chanted in my head.

I didn’t want to call him out on it, because, 1) I really, really, really, really, really did not want to know what his response would be (“I almost got it!” or something worse, maybe) and 2) I was not looking forward to the awkward silence that would ensue it I did call him out.

I saw another flash of motion and watched him put his hand down.

I almost sighed in relief out loud.

And then, I saw him go at it.

Again.

I turned around, diverting my eyes from the horrendous seen, to look at Alex and Emma. Emma was behind Eddie, so she didn’t know what was going on, but Alex… Alex was staring at Uncle.

And then Alex turned red.

At first I thought he was embarrassed, but no. He was trying not to laugh.

And suddenly, I had the urge to laugh, too.

I turned around, covering my mouth with my hands to stifle my giggle. Then, I looked out the window, and saw all of the people I knew.

They would see me.

In the van.

With the crazy middle-aged man picking his nose.

Oh no.

Oh no no.

I did the first thing I could think of—pretend to see a cat in the middle of the road. “Eddie! Brake!” I screamed.

He ripped his hand out of his nose and grabbed the steering wheel, stomping on the brake. “What? What?!”

“I… I thought I saw a cat,” I mumbled.

People were staring at the van, now.

But at least it was because they thought we crazy.

There’s a plus.