When we got home tonight, there was a message on our voice mail from Mark's brother. Given that Mark's dad is dead and buried, we never expected to hear from him again, we'd have preferred that actually. This is a man who didn't have the decency to go to his own mother's funeral. I could give you a huge long list of all of the ways that this guy has behaved in a less than honourable fashion over the years but quite frankly, it would seem like I was making it up if I did post it.
Joe was buried last year, in September. We've recently made arrangements to have the engraving on the stone finished so that we can have an unveiling. Apparently, "he can get us a deal" on the engraving. Mark was pretty pissed at the message, so was I. The last time we heard from him was via a lawyer he'd hired to find out if he was mentioned in Joe's will (he wasn't). After that, we figured that we never hear from him again.
Here is a guy who, in the five years that his father lived in Kingston, made the trip from Toronto to visit only once. At that time, he walked into Joe's room at the nursing home and made an insulting remark to him.
Anyway, I offered to call him back, explain that everything was under control and to ask him, politely, to never call here again. When I called him, I used my "work voice" on the phone, introduced myself (the two times I've been in the same room with him he refused to speak to me) and told him that we had received his message but that everything was already arranged and had been for some time.
After that, I told him that Mark would appreciate it if he didn't phone us anymore. He said, "drop dead lady" and hung up the phone. Mark was pissed. Mark took the phone, called the jerk back and, well, voices were raised, things were said and by the end of the conversation, the brother and his wife were arguing with each other on the phone. Mark bated them brilliantly. Over the years, their son has kept in touch with Mark so we've heard some pretty crazy stories about what goes on in their household. They had no idea that Mark knew some pretty sketchy stuff about them. The pair of them were both on the phone and getting really defensive. Eventually, they turned on each other. Mark held the phone up and I could hear them yelling at each other. These people are nuts.
It was really amusing. Mark's held on to a lot of anger toward his brother over the years. Last night, was able to release it because he finally saw that his brother is living in his very own, special kind of hell. I know this is schadenfreude but seriously, after the amount of pain and suffering Mark's brother inflicted on everyone in their family (not only Mark but his parents, his aunt and uncle, this guy's own children), it's comforting to know that he's miserable.
Fortunately, he's not been invited to the unveiling. He doesn't even know that we have one arranged. The best part really, about all of this is that Mark's finally been able to let go of all the venom he's felt and just laugh at the schmuck.
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