For as long as I can remember my family has gone to the Minnesota State Fair together. It’s been the one family tradition that we’ve managed to pull off for a few decades. This year, is going to be different. Not only are we down a family member due to an impending divorce, but this year my parents won’t be with us.

My dad has not spoken to or seen Sister #2 and her family since October of 2007. I was going to explain why, but it’s long and complicated, and really it doesn’t matter. What matters is what kind of man could go ten months without seeing his own grandchildren? Grandchildren who live less than 10-minutes away from him.

The whole situation angers me so much that I cannot talk about it at all, even when I try. It makes me so mad that whenever it is mentioned all I do is burst into hot, steamy tears and say fucking, fuck, ridiculous, and fuck.

He didn’t come to Thanksgiving or Christmas, and now he’s trying to ruin our State Fair. When we chose our day for the fair we made it clear to our mom that dad was not to be included. Today I found out that not only was dad going to the fair on our day, but now Sister #2 and fam were not.

I feel a little guilty for losing my cool on Sister #4, who broke the news to me, but I am so angry I don’t know what to do. We had planned weeks ago to attend the fair the day before Labor Day. Everyone agreed that day would work best and then all the kids would have a day of rest before school starts. Now he’s gone and fucked it all up. FUCK. He cannot choose which one of us he loves and get away with it. Though it might be wrong, I will choose Sister #2 over him every time. She did nothing to deserve this kind of exile. He is the one who chose to banish her from his life and I’ll be god-damned if he gets to choose which parts of my family I see. The way I see it, this is his choice. He has chosen his anger and resentment and petty grudge over his daughters.

So now we’re scrambling to find another day that works for everyone, and Sister #3 is going twice though she can’t afford it because she doesn’t want to take sides. And, me, I don’t even want to go at all because that’s how I deal with family-stress, by withdrawing.

And I’m still so angry, even after the crying, and the writing, that I don’t even know what to do with the anger.