Telling The Truth Faster

Almost a year has passed, I don't know if it has been an eternity or a blip on my radar.What I do know, I've come up for air, burrowing in deeper than I've ever known- becoming the person I'm proud of, all the way through.

Ten months ago my dad died. I thought okay, my dad died. Life goes on. My life goes on, blah blah blah. I will go through the usual motions that a daughter feels, especially when there was a lot of heartache in our relationship. The last weeks of his life were very healing, releasing. I was  happy he stayed in Citrus Valley Hospice, where I volunteered a few years before. That was about the only thing that made sense to me.... it was like going home.

I was  grateful he was able to be there, my family knowing the respect and dignity of such a beautiful place, instead of what we experienced at the previous hospital. Everyone had their own space to mill about, my brothers took turns spending the night, keeping watch with my dad. On some of those long nights I got to know my middle brother, (who moved away years ago) as he told about himself, his life. It seemed as though our family was being brought together in a magical way through my dad. Everyday, for the first time in I don't know how many years, we all gathered together and put it all aside.....

It seemed like once he died, so did everything else. Even on the day of his funeral we all went back to the way things were before. My heart feels heavy writing this- but as a writer, unless you split it open, gut it revealing the contents and let it all fall where it may, you have nothing. Tell the truth faster. I have written almost nothing in this past year. My heart was heavy. It has gradually lifted to where I am now.... feeling free.

I am the fifth out of sixth in the line up of children. I was not particularly close to parents, meaning I kept a fair distance a lot of the time for my own health. I have always loved them and come in and out of their lives.  Self preservation, whatever you want to call it- growing up in an unhealthy family system, takes it's toll. Emotional, mental, physical, spiritual- it hit me on all of the above when I was around them. When my dad got sick, of course had to be put aside. When he died, that had to be put aside once again for some time, until I figured out my own balancing system. Spending a lot of time at my mom's house, which was something I was not used to, was like going into a hole and not knowing if I would come out. I only knew it  needed to be done, my brother and her were counting on me to be a constant in a world that no longer made sense to them. Hell, nothing in my world made sense to me.

First, cooking way too much food was the only thing I could think of to do.... and clean. I felt like I was in a foreign land. My dad always had good smells going, no matter what there was, always something good coming out of the kitchen. There was so much silence. (Now my tears finally flow) but the only smells and sights were what I could muster and I wasn't doing such a great job. A lot of fast food,
which my dad never really ate..... he always sat in the kitchen and cooked. Even with his oxygen on he cooked at the stove. That was his world- the kitchen. For weeks my brother sat in the family room eating ice cream,  my mom sat in the living room.

I started digging through boxes in the garage...... and found letters from her past. Sixty years of past she hadn't seen. My dad had taken them years before- she had never seen them again. From her mother, uncle, old boyfriend. Loss... I read them to her, everyone of them. It seemed for the moment years melted off her. Her dreams, her hopes, her pain, as we kept digging deeper.

A letter my dad had given me years ago, I found in this endless box. How can this be, one would wonder- when I ripped it up and through it away out of rage and anger over fifteen years ago? He made a copy and it was somehow in this box. I think that is when I realized my dad was with us, in a different way, one he could not be with here on Earth. He has come to me in dreams, working through forgiveness and love, urging me to push further. I feel this and do not doubt his love. Other family members have had their own experiences, as well.

I never thought I could release the pain I have felt with my mother, compassion for the life she has lived. I am glad I went into this blindly, had I had known what I was getting into, my true nature would have said hell no.... I'm not doing this. But today, the gift of stripping away so much pain between us, while she is living. I don't want regrets, I had so many with my dad. I want to be an example for my kid's- the person I've struggled with more than anyone in life, my mother. I've had an opportunity to go back in and heal. It's never too late. My youngest brother and I have built  trust for the first time in our lives. Forgiveness was not taught in our family and does not come easily.

What I do wish for everyone is peace in my family. I wish for myself peace as well. The greatest thing I have found out about myself, I was always enough. I've felt I had to jump through fiery hoops to prove my worth, never doing enough. Enough for who,what judge and jury? No one I would have as a friend today. I am enough simply by waking every morning and breathing in the fresh air. That is everyone's right. This proving game is so ridiculous. The one with the most toys wins. I really, really just want to be happy, content and loved.