"I can’t remember why we fell apart
From something that was so meant to be
Forever was the promise in our hearts
Now more and more I wonder where you are
Do I ever cross your mind anytime
Do you ever wake up reaching out for me
Do I ever cross your mind anytime
I miss you
Still have your picture in a frame
Hear your footsteps down the hall
I swear I hear your voice driving me insane
How I wish that you would call to say
I miss you
No more loneliness and heartache
No more crying myself to sleep
Don't want no more wondering about tomorrow
Won’t you come back to me
Come back to me
I miss you
I miss you
I miss you...."
here it is again: the miserable birthday entry. how many of these things have i written now? saturday was my sister's birthday, and as usual, i called and talked to their machine. no one picked up, no one has called me back, and chances are good that no one will. this is the game they play, this is the game i lose everytime. i used to plan their parties, used to bake their cakes. now i get a thank you card for the gift i send in the mail. that's it, with very little contact in between.
how can this BE? isn't that me there in those pictures, holding them up? i remember it all...staring into those tiny faces, losing my heart. i knew how it was, i knew how it would be for them, for all of us, living in that house. i knew he wasn't lying when he said it was my job to protect them. and i swore that i would...but i couldn't. the deck was stacked. we were kids, all of us, and we all survived...but in the end, we could save nothing but ourselves.
i can tell myself that these are just the breaks, i was never their mother and there were never any guarantees. this is just life, after all. and maybe that's the hardest bit to swallow: i'm not, and never was, their mother...except that i spent my teenage years mothering them. it's in the in-between that i get caught. people don't understand what it takes to give yourself that way to a child that isn't "your responsiblity." it was the hardest thing i have ever done, but also without a doubt, the BEST. i thought we'd always be together. i never thought i'd lose my mother, i certainly never thought *he* would die, and i couldn't concieve of not being close to those girls.
but the worst happened, and yes, i'm grateful that they were taken in by family and raised together. it's most certainly a comfort that i could theoretically drive to them if i needed to. that they weren't split up. that we didn't completely lose contact. but it's a little hard to swallow that their father's family won't answer the phone, won't come to roanoke (even when grandpa was dying), and won't let the girls come either. i don't get phone calls. i can't send emails. letters and cards go unanswered. this is how a heart breaks.
i tell myself to just hold on to and be grateful for what i do have. the times they do answer the phone. but something is wrong, i can hear it. and i can't tell anymore if it's the family, or the girls themselves. have i been forgotten? has the distance taken it's toll? have i failed them, then and/or now? i don't know, and i won't know for a long time, until we have the time and space and connection enough to figure that out.
that's my dream, you know....i see us sisters sitting on my back porch with pitchers of sweet tea. i see reconnection and healing tears. i hear them tell me that it wasn't them, it wasn't me, that they missed me horribly, and never once doubted that i loved them. i know the reality can't be this...pretty. and if i'm honest, all i really want is just to hear their side of this story. honesty. i just want honesty.
i've missed so much time, and it ticks by everyday. there's so much i don't know, so much i've been kept out of. conversations, when we have them, are strained. this is how a heart breaks.
so girls...if by some miracle you ever end up here, know this.
i don't know what your life with them is REALLY like. i don't know. i don't know what this seperation has been like for you. all i can tell you for certain is that i have never stopped regretting that saving myself meant leaving you. i can't change that, i can't go back. it can't be fixed. but as you grow up, please know that there is always room in this house (and in this heart) for you. always.
and now i go about letting go again...over and over again. because all i can do, really, is live and love, and wait for the day that this changes all over again...
"Hey baby, is that you
Wow, your hair got so long
Yeah, I love it, I really do
Norma Jean, ain't that the song we'd Sing in the car driving downtown
Top down, making the rounds, checking out the bands on Dulheny Avenue
Yeah, life throws you curves but you learn to swerve
Me, I swung and I missed, and the next thing you know
I'm reminisicing, dreaming old dreams, wishing old wishes
Like you would be back again
I wake up and teardrops, they fall down like rain
I put on that old song we danced to and then
I head off to my job
I guess not much has changed
Punch the card, head for home, check the 'phone, just in case
Go to bed, dream of you
That's what I'm doing these days...."