In my photo album there is a picture of my mother and father in 1948. She is pregnant with their first child, my older sister Carolyn, who was stillborn. Born two years later, was I a miracle, or a second best sad reminder of the first? Whichever it was, my father loved me dearly, almost making up for that which was lacking in my bi-polar mother.
I am told I was a loud mouth little kid and remember growing into a middle schooler with only a few good friends and a high schooler who found more acceptance with people several years older than myself. It was only after high school that I came into my own physical beauty, good intelligence, funny personality, and avid sexual appetite. And excepting for the normal aging processes, nothing else much changed.
It has been four years since last of the events related in Do You Believe in Always. I still live in New Jersey, have a great job with a company that is not going broke, and contribute regularly to an ever-growing retirement fund. Perhaps I will not be the old lady who dies in the third floor walk-up and is eaten by her cats.
My health is good, the liver seems fine, and I remain Hep C free. Although my knees are another thing completely.
My daughter, my best friend for 40 years, is still silent after having left without a backward glance – taking her husband and my two beloved grandchildren with her. Were it not for her website, I would have no news and no pictures of the growing children. I cannot help but notice her husband’s father is in almost every photo – so I’m still coming in second best somewhere. I keep a blog “Letters to My Grandchildren” and truly believe one day they will find it and know how much I have loved them.
For the last couple of years, a good man has called me sweetheart and I’ve called him honey as we enjoy all that New York City has to offer.
And so life continues, one day at a time. Remember poppets . . . don’t think of life as a happilyforeverafter. Men, and children, love you till they don’t.
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