Tomorrow is my son's birthday. He's 16. This could probably explain some of my weirdness lately. June and August are hard months for me. Reminders of things lost. Irreplaceable things. Reminders of hopes and dreams that are nothing more than whispers in the wind. Never knowing if they will ever be more than shadows I glimpse out of the corner of my eyes. June and August are weird times for me.
I haven't spoken to my children since 2006. To be honest, there have been times where I didn't even try. Too much pain. Too much heartache buried in rejection. Pretending. Ignoring. Less pain in numbness than in feeling. I don't know what his favorite food is anymore. It use to be my lasgna but who knows now. He use to be an amazing futball player. He was a striker but now?
I wonder if he knows how to drive or if he has plans for his first car. So many thoughts rolling around the darkness of my brain. I stalk my ex (his father) and my ex's wife on facebook. Their status updates always make me laugh at their hypocrisy. I think if people only knew your truth, but I remain silent. Deep breaths.
I never pulled the rope in the tug of war with my ex. Whenever he put my kids in the middle, I just would let go. I never wanted them to feel they had to choose sides. I never wanted them to feel they could only love one of us. No matter how much I hated my ex I loved my children more so when he tugged I let go. Whoever said take the high road was a fucking moron. I wish I had been a bitch. I wish I had put his ass in jail when he didn't pay child support. I wish lots of things but they are just wishes. Unrealized moments of what if's and should have beens. Deep breaths.
Then there is my ex roommate. The catalyst in what led me to sending my kids to live with their father. She told me she would help me. She told me she was my friend. That she would be there for me and like the niave idiot I was I believed her bullshit because I was so alone. I wanted a friend. I wanted to believe her lies were different. That this time it would be different and it was. For a moment, but then she was fucking a married man and well you can only fuck married men in so many places. She wanted our one bedroom flat to be that place, but my daughter has a mouth that does not close so she couldn't fuck him if my kids were there.
They were an interference in her affair. When it comes to fucking married men, promises get forgotten and friendships become burdens.
She told me I had two weeks to find a new place to live so I phoned up my ex and for the first time in the 8-9 yrs my children had breathed the air on this planet I forced him to take care of them. A part of me knew that I would never see them again. A part of me knew that I was opening an alternative universe that I would never again be able to visit. A part of me knew I was about to step off of the edge of reality. A part of me I have lost somewhere.
Her affair was the final straw in my crumbling world. A world that was slowly being filled with delusions, insanity, turmoil. A world I allowed to consume me once my children were "safe". For three years I allowed it to consume me. Its embrace was comforting. In its arms I didn't have to feel the emptiness. The pain. I didn't have to BE.
I gave up hope. Hope of a tomorrow with my children in it. Hope of a day when truth is real and not the fantasy my ex and his wife make it out to be. She was our babysitter. My ex's best friend's daughter. I trusted her. Invited her into my home. Even afterwards. After the lies and the divorce and the torture, I still opened my home to her.
I taught her about religion. Stupid fucking high road. Don't ever take the high road. Don't ever be the "better" person. It's a dead end street to nowhere and nothing. Because no one remembers the truth. Just their illusions. No one remembers she was our babysitter. No one remembers she broke my home. Ask anyone and I am the evil bitch. I abandoned my children.
No one remembers the unanswered phone calls. The threats for leaving a message on the machine. No one remembers the letters. No one cares about the years spent homeless. Never knowing if there would be food or a place to sleep the next month. No one cares why. They just care that they are the "good" one. That's all that really matters anyways. Not truth. Exhale.
What would I do differently? Honestly I don't know. I am the person I am today because of the pain. Because of the difficulties. Without them I don't know who I would be or what or where. I was slowly being sucked into a vortex that I didn't want my children to be a part of . I wanted them to know sunshine, and rainbows. I wanted them to see the flowers and feel the rain on their faces. I didn't want them to know what it felt like to have your breath sucked from your body.
But somehow I think they know. All of the things I tried so hard to keep from them. They know. So today I wonder if my son is happy. If he is content. I wait for the day when maybe his curiosity will outweigh his hatred. A day when maybe just maybe. That is the day I wait for.
