Over the years since, he and I have not been openly antagonistic, but it has usually been cool at best, with a few exceptions. He grew up enough to get over most of it, as did I, but there have been moments that we have gotten into it, and it usually is about one of our relationships with the parent the other supports. A little over a year ago, he did get to witness a pretty ugly situation between me and mom, and since then, things have been a little better...I always wondered if it kinda clued him in to mom's 'other side'.
Now that he lives on his own, away from mom, he's been much happier, and gotten heavily into tattoos and piercings. This has NOT garnered him a lot of support from mom and the family, obviously, and I think this also has been showing him mom's other side...the side that made me walk away so long ago. Obviously, I'm happy about that...not only does it get him away from her a little, I'm hoping it opens him up more to Dad.
All this kinda fell in my lap today as I talked to him on the phone earlier (he turned 24 yesterday). The thing that made me really cheer out loud though was him telling me about something that happened recently (
discordian, you'll love this!). He was sitting around mom's place, and she started in on him AGAIN about his life, and he looked at her and said "Jesus Christ, Mom...and you wonder why PJ doesn't want to be around you!"I would have given important bodily organs to have been present for that, or even to see a recording of it. SCORE!!!
It's even funnier since I made my previous post BEFORE talking to him.