Three Words

An exploratory piece exploring the nature of a personal belief of mine, through letter form to my mom. Inspired by the website: ThisIbelieve.org

 

Three Words

 

Dear Mom,

 

Most people spend their Sunday mornings in their best church attire. Entering the chapel as the organ plays is comfort to most, a home away from home almost. Feelings of guilt lift away and people learn that church can be a place of peace, a covenant of repentance and renewal. Well, I choose to spend my Sunday mornings at Estrella Jail, your home; a place of surrender and imprisonment. I enter with my feelings hidden; a poker face is the best mask I can put on when having to enter the doors of this solitude. I push open the gates of entry and am plagued by the familiar faces of mothers entering the gate to visit their daughters, and hear the heart wrenching sobs of the toddlers not wanting to leave their mom behind again. I smile as I hold open the door in their departure; that was me ten years ago. I spend an hour staring at a block of wood, waiting for you to be seated on the other side. I’m afraid of looking up; I’m too scared to make eye contact with the convicts you call your roommates. The repugnant odors of guilt and depression suppress the air, and you don’t know this, but I spend my time waiting for you with my head down, as if to ignore the cries of others around me.

In the hour I patiently wait, I tune out the volumes of the others, and I dwell on the past. I feel sorrow you’re spending another birthday here, and I gently remind myself that this will be the sixth year you will be missing out on mine. I have lived eighteen years of imprisonment with you. The scenarios that make up my childhood memories involve you spending time behind bars instead of helping me blow out candles, I remember days that dragged on where you ended the night inebriated and passed out instead of making dinner for Tyler and me. My first day of school memories were followed by me coming home to those foster parents I was assigned to, and the home cooked meals I remember were those dinners at the soup kitchens. I know I am strong, but I will admit to crying every time I think about the events that have brought me here today. Once fearing the world I lived in, I had doubt I would not make it another day. I realize as I’m waiting for you that there’s a comfort I have in my life now, one that involves stability and independence; two traits I know I wouldn’t have today if it wasn’t for the bumpy road you made me travel on. There is a feeling that I possess nowadays, one that loves you and one that thanks you; I smile as you walk in with tears in your eyes because you don’t understand why I still continue to see you. And why should I really? You say I punish you with my gentleness because you believe you deserve no visits, no post cards, and no love. Well I have come to terms with a new feeling I have; this feeling consumes me, pushes through the hurt and the anguish my past holds on to, and allows me to sit right across from you and remind you that you haven’t failed me. This feeling has driven me out of self pity and relinquish, and allows me to mutter those three words that I so strongly believe in, the ones that cause your jade green eyes to fill up with the tiniest tears and so pleadingly ask, “Why”?

With one harsh smack my body went flailing to the asphalt. I discovered in a matter of seconds that I was not only seeing stars, but I was also seeing colors; red, blue, and yellow flashes. Regaining my consciousness, I looked up briefly and saw you getting tackled to the ground by two officers. The wrestling that took place was not shocking; however, the fact your arm had caused my face to hit the floor was something new to me. Grandma, Tyler, and Marshall all began to speak with officers about the night’s events; I sat there for a minute and just stared at you. “I’m sorry,” you repeated over and over again. “I’m so, so sorry,” you cried as they gripped you by the attached handcuffs and dragged you into the back of the cop car. Those two words, “I’m sorry”, seemed to have plague that night.

Moments before, you had trapped yourself in the bathroom, threatening in drunken tones that you were going to end your life. “I’m sorry,” was the only phrase that I could scream between the door that kept me from saving you; I was desperately trying to prevent an event you so often played with. Upon hearing that Grandma was scared and fear gave her no choice but to call the police, you broke free from the door and sprinted towards my window, desperate to break away from the cops. You sobered up in an instant. Kicking the window with your right foot you broke through the only barrier that was keeping you from fleeing. Without a moment’s hesitation, I jumped through the ragged edges of the glass and ran after you. While following, I begged you to come back; I knew that you wouldn’t make it past this street so intoxicated. Having the advantage of thirteen year old athleticism, I caught up with you and pulled your shirt back in attempt to get you to notice I was there. You turned around in anger, stared at me with such menacing eyes, and slapped me. In shock I fell to the ground, and in perfect timing the cops came and arrested you. My face was stinging, a combination of tears and asphalt piercing through my cheek. The night’s events played back in my mind, but the only thing I could focus on was your lips muttering those two words: I’m sorry. I stared at your insistent eyes as I got up embracing my cheek, I wondered then and there if I could ever forgive you.

 In the months that followed that scenario, we discovered you were sick. Burdened with not only alcoholism, bi-polar disease, and schizophrenia, we discovered that the bulimia you suffered from had taken a toll on the way your brain functioned, causing you to behave the way you did. It took many years to accept the fact you were ill. How does one excuse their mother’s abandonment based on the fact they suffer from several conditions and need medication? It began to hit me the day I turned sixteen. That was the year I moved out; a junior in high school, I was burdened by tests and school drama, but it didn’t end there. You were in jail, Tyler’s drug addiction got him sent away, and I had no place to go. The difference between me and the kids I sat in class with was the resources I had discovered on my own throughout the previous years, and the knowledge I had on survival and early independence. Taking on a job at fourteen, I learned to save money, and at sixteen I did the only thing I could do, escape and be on my own, and survive the best I could. The years that followed allowed for self discovery. Consumed with bills and the reminder that I would never be the average teenager again, I fought wars within myself, and worked hard to maintain independence; at this point in time I still avoided you.

Graduation day was when my awareness finally came to be. This was the month before I moved into my own apartment and received admittance into Arizona State University. You were there briefly and I gave you a hug, but I left to have dinner with the friends that had become my family members throughout the years. A month after that day I got the call from you; you were locked up again. It had been years since I was burdened with a call like this, and the words you started with made all the memories come back, “Adrianna, I’m sorry.” It was at the very moment that it finally hit me. I was settled into my apartment and I was busy with friends and a full time job; I spent my free time preparing for the school year ahead of me. I realized however that even though it appeared I had everything together, there was one piece of my life I hadn’t moved on from, one thing I was weary to admit to; if it wasn’t for your abandonment I might not have found myself living such a content life. Fully aware it was my hard work that led me here, I slowly began to reflect on the events that you caused that actually helped raise me as well. I remembered the time you threatened your life and realized how it took such a disastrous event to make me cherish mine. I tasted the soup kitchen’s broth on the tip of my tongue and saw that those desperate times were the reasons that motivated me to help those around me. I flashbacked to every time you said you were sorry, and discovered that the pain in your voice is what led me to gain a feeling I never experienced before with you, a feeling that no one in the family would even admit to. This sensation allowed for me to accept your faults, to be thankful for the pain that actually nourished me, and through this all I discovered the gratitude that then allowed me to make space for peace.

“Why?” is what you ask every time I visit you. You shake your head, you cry, and you pull on your orange jumpsuit as if to prove me wrong. I’m completely aware that things haven’t always been easy. I know by counting the amounts of times I write you, in correlation with the visits I make to see you, that I’m trying to make up for the years we lost along the way. I understand that there are those certain memories that won’t fade, but I stand firm in what I tell you every Sunday, “Because you’re worth it. Because I know that not a minute went by that you didn’t punish yourself for not providing or for not being there. Because I grew up in the midst of tragedies, I’m now strong enough to tell you that I believe more than anything, in forgiveness. And I’m sorry I didn’t tell you this sooner, but I forgive you.

Love,

Your daughter

 

Author's Note

Like skeletons in the closet, there is always something that we believe in, but why? What is the history of the belief? What is the evidence of that belief? Why do we believe in that, and how do we express that belief efficiently?