Why.
It isn’t about how the past has become damaged;
it’s about how we can build a better future.
It isn’t because I don’t love you enough to stay;
it’s because I love you enough to leave honestly.
I do harm to the family we can all be a part of if
I think that, through an honest appraisal, I did harm
to the family we were a part of.
Living through this guilt means I don’t trust you to love me.
I trust you to love me.
Therefore, I cannot feel guilty.
To worry that we may not be happy because we are not the same image of
family that once we were is to lend credence to an image in which
I find nothing substantial.
A family is not defined by doors or names or car seats or time.
A family is defined by people.
We need time, of course.
We need intimacy, of course.
But we can hold together the family of today no matter the distance or delay.
I can’t make a place in my home for you if I have no home.
I can’t make a home for us if I live through guilt.
Therefore, to make a place in my home, I must put down my tool of guilt, the
thing I use to hide from happiness.
You see, happiness is a burden.
Happiness is a state without excuses, a state of responsibility.
Happiness is a state of empowerment and fatigue and love and work.
Happiness is beyond the reach of guilt or self pity.
Therefore, I can’t be happy through guilt or self pity.
Therefore, I have to let go my guilt and self pity, and live, and build
something for all of us to share.
You can’t know how much I miss you,
Keanu,
Shaiman,
Kitana, and
Tali.
It is easy to think I don’t, I’m sure.
It is easy to think that, because I don’t wake you up for school,
because I don’t tell you to chew with your mouths shut,
because I don’t tell you to get your feet off the table,
because I don’t play video games with you,
because I don’t see you ride the bikes I taught you to ride,
because I don’t kiss you goodnight more than those four nights a month,
because I don’t pick you up from daycare,
because I don’t watch cartoons with you,
because I don’t remind you of all our laughter and tears and of all the places we’ve lived,
because I don’t hug you every morning and every night,
…
It is easy to think that, because of those things, that I have forgotten you,
that I don’t miss you,
that I don’t cry because I don’t do all those things.
It is easy to think that, but that’s no excuse.
You can’t fool yourself to think I don’t miss you.
I have fooled myself to think that you may not miss me, and I’m a fool indeed.
Some people have helped me fool myself, and to them I say, “Thanks, but I’ve had enough.”
I know who I am.
I know who I love.
I know who loves me.
I don’t need anything else.
Things seem hard; but we have more to share.
Things seem hard; but nothing worth a damn is easy.
Things seem hard; but you’re tougher than those things.
Things seem hard; but they’re not.
I love you, all of you.
All eight of you.
All nine of us.
I understand just how much I mean that, now.
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