I haven't been in this topic in a while. Been playing the second Dissidia game until I fucked up the backlight ribbon
or fuse or something trying to fix the shitty UMD door in my PSP. (Sadly, I almost had it - everything was working perfectly after I initially did the deed, but I forgot to close two connector tabs for the UMD drive, had to open it back up and fix that before it would work... and then the backlight went out, so now it's like trying to play an original Game Boy Advance at 2 AM by starlight...)
Xii -
I know it's some days since you talked about it, but I can't even say that you're in the wrong here. Any idiot could have told her parents that being confrontational assholes about their daughter's death wasn't going to go anywhere. It's one thing to blame someone
emotionally - that's something you can't really help or control. And if something triggered one of them them to break down at the ceremony or something, that would be... understandable, at least. Logical reasoning takes a back seat to emotional finger-pointing during times of stress.
Two of them cornering you in a grocery store years after the death and days after any event related to it, well, no. That's them trying to blame you logically, without a reason to.
They blamed you for an event that they should have known you carry close to your chest, that they should have realized you carry survivor's guilt over. So to deliberately come after you without provocation shows a complete lack of thought or empathy on their part.
I'd say that your written apology is the right response. I would still say that they have more to apologize for than you, but that lets them know that the window is open for them to do so. They may never be fully able to get over having some emotional blame for you, but for god's sake, if they can't figure out how to separate that from the logical side of their brain by now, then they need to go see a therapist already, because I'd have to assume they're not. Everybody needs help figuring out their own head once in a while, or else it'll take them a long time to do it on their own. If at all. Coming after you, after all this time, shows that they need that.
Camo -
@Camoufrage drop the bomb and let karma handle the rest, I've seen it happen before and it is glorious
I'd have to come closest to agreeing with this.
Get them mailed to his new wife would be the first thing I'd say to do.
Would I do that? No, probably not; I can't stand to be involved with people when they are going to crash and burn. I have tried, but it's emotionally draining, I get involved against my will when arguments come up (could come in the form of being pulled into the argument, or just having my name dropped in some way to indicate blame or support), and honestly, fuck it, it's someone else's shortcomings and I am so fucking goddamn sick of people that can't be bothered to act like
decent fucking human beings.
What I would personally do is probably to send them (or talk about them) to his first wife, your mom, and ask for advice and support. She's been through this shit before and even if she and the new wife have mutual hatred (which I understand is not uncommon), she would probably still have more hatred for her ex, and a newfound wave of sympathy for the new wife, that would - hopefully - allow her to be able to treat this situation better than you can.
Going on a completely gut feeling here, if I were in the new wife's shoes, I'd rather have someone who had been through that sort of stuff before - someone I can sympathize with - inform me than I would have the kid of the man responsible do it, especially if you're not close to her.
Failing that, perhaps try discussing it with other members of your family. You mentioned your sister before, too. Send her a questioning message treating it as a hypothetical at first? If you handle it with some delicacy, it (hopefully) won't come out of the blue to her as such a huge, sudden blow. And even if it does, while it may further sour her opinion of her father, it might help that it's another member of the family who's saying "no, this is wrong". I don't know your gender, which might be a little important here too. If you're a guy blowing the whistle on a stereotypically-male thing to do (ugh) it might help her opinion of guys in general not break into pieces, for example. (Another example of emotional thought beating logical. I know my opinion of women in general took a major hit after being betrayed, but I knew it for what it was and dealt with it. It... "helped"... that I had trust betrayed by a male friend just a short month later... So now I hate/fear/mistrust
most of humanity on some level, instead of just one group of it.)
Well I'm much older than 8 or 9 so I have better idea of how to deal with this situation, but I'm pretty much stumped at this point nonetheless.