Here I Am

Say this to me...

I've waited longer for lesser things
But here I am
Who really knows what tomorrow brings
But here I am
Just in case you were wondering
Just in case you got lost again
Just in case you run out of friends
Here I am
It's so easy just to rip and to tear
So here I am
What you need the most disappears into thin air
So here I am
Maps and compasses may stay true
It doesn't really matter what you do
I have never forgotten you
Here I am
Some days our reach is bound
To far exceed our grasp
I gave up hoping long ago I could fix the past
Here I am
Today I called you for the very first time
In a million years
You would never know if I told you so
'Bout these million tears
Life doesn't wait as it's speeding by
Better grab on fast to hold on tight
And don't let it forget to fight this good fight
Here I am
Here I am
Here I am
Here I am

I still don't know

I still don't know what to do...what I will do.

I haven't spoken directly to my sisters about what I learned. My sister closest to me texted and asked if I'd had a good vacation - I texted back yes. That's it. I haven't made any big proclamations. I haven't talked about the fact that now She Knows.

The fact is, I don't know what to do. I know my stepmother would understand me not wanting to cut ties with my sister (or sisters). But I feel that it would be incredibly disloyal to her.

My whole life, a big part of my identity is the youngest of 4 sisters. They were my first best friends. We have fought and loved and suffered together. And when the one who did this horrible thing stopped speaking to me, years ago, for about 6 months, I felt like I'd lost an arm. At the time it was more difficult because we lived about a mile apart from each other. Living so far away now, it would probably be easier. But still. I've been losing people all my life, most of the time having done nothing to cause the loss. And this is actually my choice.

I'm forgiving by nature. I can't hold grudges. I find it very difficult to hold on to anger because it takes so much energy, and bitterness is simply not part of who I am.

I wish I could talk to someone about this. I wish I could talk to the girls about this. But I fear if I do, the decision will be made for me - that I will lose a sister, whether I want to or not.

And none of this, none of this was anything that was my fault. But holy fuck, does it hurt.

The Holy Longing

Tell a wise person, or else keep silent,

because the mass man will mock it right away.

I praise what is truly alive,

what longs to be burned to death.

In the calm water of the love-nights,

where you were begotten, where you have begotten,

a strange feeling comes over you,

when you see the silent candle burning.

Now you are no longer caught in the obsession with darkness,

and a desire for higher love-making sweeps you upward.

Distance does not make you falter.

Now, arriving in magic, flying,

and finally, insane for the light,

you are the butterfly and you are gone.

And so long as you haven't experienced this: to die and so to grow,

you are only a troubled guest on the dark earth.

by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

What I really want

The map of my heart looks a lot like yours
from the one way streets to the old detours
to the dark dead ends with their missing signs
the sun and the moon and the roads that wind
like the stories we tell tracing the routes
wind in my ears, dirt on my boots

The map of my heart is torn at the corners
from ignoring the warnings, disobeying the orders
I’ve been lost in a crowd, found in solitary
I learned how to travel with just what I could carry
towards the vast unseen and the great unknown
the map of a heart is all that we own

Leaving safety to chance and reason behind
x marks every spot I thought I’d lost my mind
I didn’t think that I could but I couldn’t stop trying

And I can’t stop trying to hold in my hands
that moment I could feel my heart expand
with more love than I thought could exist in the world
the hollows were gone, the emptiness filled
a life transformed down to the bone
this map of my heart is all that I own

Do we ever stop longing and looking for home
do we ever stop feeling apart and alone
do we ever stop dreaming of where we belong
This map of my heart looks a lot like yours
This map of my heart looks a lot like yours

Maybe

I was just having some wine and watching a show (Casual on Hulu) that often leaves me a little emotional. It's touching and funny and sort of where I am in my life right now. And I just started thinking about things, maybe things I shouldn't. But the mind wanders.

Sometimes I still miss him. Before, I never would have believed there'd be a day I didn't know him anymore. I always kind of knew it would eventually end. I hoped it wouldn't, but I knew it probably would. I bet against the odds thinking that this time would be the exception. And I lost. Oh, how I lost. And this is where he sat, and that is where he held me when my father died, and over there is where he sent my sons into fits of giggles. And now he isn't. Not in my world, anyway.

And I know this is good for me, best for me. I know I'm ok just the way I am: raising my boys, working, enjoying my days and my moments and doing things and meeting a few people. Maybe even "meeting" Him, even though I don't know what that is, only that it makes me happy and that I think it can be enough for now...even though I wish for more.

It's Friday night and I'm doing my usual thing: Hulu, wine, writing. It's enough for me, even though it's not enough for some. I'm weary from travel, and need the down time. I've had to be "on" nearly nonstop for over a week, and it exhausted me.

Maybe that's my trouble. Maybe I need to be a little more quiet, a little less ravenous for connection.

What to do

Sometimes, I just want someone to tell me: what do I do with all that pain?

Clearly, writing has helped me create a space for it. If I can write about it - even just for myself - I can keep it from choking me. But this...I have not written much about this. I think some things are best left unsaid. Some people say secrets are poison, but I've never quite believed that. Sometimes, hurtful truths can stay in the darkness. Even so...

She knows. She now knows what he did, many years ago. She spent decades with this man, and had no idea. She came after the abuse. After the pain. After the horrible, family-shattering, shameful period of my life that doesn't get talked about. Not anymore. Not for a long time. The man she knew was not that man. He couldn't possibly have done those things. All this time we assumed she didn't know, and we saw no reason to tell her. He was a different man with her. A better man.

And then he went and died. And he wasn't rich, but he was comfortable. And there was some money to be given to us - only the youngest two of us. Not to the oldest, who no longer had a relationship with him and hadn't in decades. Only she didn't have it liquid right away, and I was fine with that. I was fine with waiting. I didn't want his wishes of an inheritance to us to be a burden on her, because there were extenuating circumstances. My sister did not feel the same way.

She wanted that money to pay the sisters who were abused. She wanted to provide some restitution for actions she had nothing to do with, to pay for our father's sins. She thought giving money to the other girls was the right thing to do. I disagreed. No amount of money could undo what was done. No amount of cash was going to fully erase the horrible memories. And it wasn't theirs, and our father was more than that.

In a moment of hate - not particularly out of character - one of the sisters divulged the secret to her, my stepmom. And my stepmother assumed it was a lie. She told me the messages she'd gotten were full of hate and lies, and I  - maybe I shouldn't have, maybe I should have let her believe it was a lie - had to tell her it wasn't a lie. He really did those things to her. And I cried, and she hated that I'd gotten upset. And so we decided not to talk about it anymore. But part of me wants her to understand what my co-inheriting sister was trying to do - that she was trying to pay for the things our father did. To do something small to make it right. It's not that she was greedy, necessarily. Her perspective was different.

So now she knows. And it wasn't her choice to know, and it wasn't mine, and part of me hates my other sister for disclosing hurtful information that had nothing to do with my stepmother. I don't know what to do with it. I don't know what to do with the relationship. I don't know what to do with the pain.

I don't know.

Mommy Issues.

A repost from somewhere else a few years ago...

After watching too much news last night (and consuming too much Facebook), I was so anxious and depressed that it took me a long time to fall asleep. My heart just hurt. It still does.

I was talking with someone yesterday about my mom. I was asked if I see a lot of her in me (she had 4 kids with 4 different men, all before her death at the ripe ol' age of 37). It was a really thought provoking question for me. In some ways, yeah. I think I do. Daddy issues (you do the math there, lol). Her dad was around, at least until she was 24. But he was a preacher, so she naturally went wild. I said something that, after I wrote it out, was a little bit of a shock to me:

"I honestly don't know how much of her I see in me. I think I am a lot more willing to sacrifice myself and my own happiness for what's best for my kids, and I have to say she spent a lot of years doing what seems like the opposite. Don't get me wrong - she loved us very much, but the part of her life I remember most was the part she was trying to get right because she was dying."

When someone dies, especially at a young age, we tend to put them on a pedestal they may not deserve. Now, my mom as far as I remember was wonderful. She had 4 kids, she loved us to bits, she worked, she fought cancer. I remember her as gentle and fair and always letting us know she loved us. But she made a lot of BAD decisions before I came along, decisions my sisters had to live with. And she made a very bad decision in marrying and staying with my dad. I think it only just occurred to me yesterday how unstable she was for a long time. People tend to start putting things right when they fear their life is ending, and she was no different. I got to see the best of her. Who knows if it would have lasted, had she survived.

Even so, I miss her. Almost my whole life, I have craved knowing my mother as an adult. I got cheated out of that, and it hurts. I love my grandmother to pieces, but it is not the same.

Maybe there is some Suzy Seafler Moore in me, but I hope it is more of the good parts.