monday, july 23, 2001

My heart is torn, and there are days I agonize over the decisions I have to make. And it makes me think this is how my father must have felt whenever we picked up and moved. It always seemed so abrupt, and without a moment’s notice, we were miles away from “home”, had a new address, and I was once again the new kid in school.

Wherever we lived at the time, my father was so certain it was right where we were supposed to be. He never consulted us about a big move. Never asked us how we felt about it. Never worried what kind of effect it would have on us. And I always thought him rather selfish for it.

In the last week of April in 1997, my mother called me at school while I was in the middle of studying for finals. She told me about their recent trip to El Paso, Texas, which was a complete surprise to me. I had no idea they had taken a vacation and wondered why they had gone to El Paso of all places. And then my mother hit me with the big news: they were going to move out there in three weeks.

Three frickin’ weeks. Who calls up their children in the middle of finals and tells them they’re picking up and leaving for good in a mere lousy three weeks?

I could sense the apprehension in my mother’s voice, and I knew she didn’t want to go. I knew she wanted to stay in the DC area where her children, her parents, and her siblings all resided. We were the only friends my mother had, and it was the first time in a long time she had her friends around her. But it goes to demonstrate what an amazing wife my mother is. She supported her husband and faithfully followed him each time, though it tore her heart to do so.

I didn’t want them to go either. All of my life, my family had been the one constant and tangible entity I could always rely on to be there. Everything else around me changed, except for the four individuals in my life who made up my family. When my mother told me the news, I was so infuriated with my father and couldn’t believe he was up to it again. Why couldn`t he just be content with where he was?

But my father was determined to go and so they left three weeks later. My siblings and I became the Party of Three. Two more children and we could have been a Fox tv show. It was a rough summer for each of us, and the summer of ’97 brings back some not-so-fond memories. Eventually, my brother moved out with them at the end of the summer, started junior year at his third high school in the past three years, and he hated my parents for it.

The last Christmas we spent together as a family was in ’96. In the past four years, we’ve only seen each other once a year. For three years, my brother grew up in Texas and became a man and my sister and I weren’t there to witness the transformation. In March ’98, I spent eleven days in the hospital, underwent three operations, and my parents never made a visit.

But they called every day. And continue to call. And when we do go out to visit them in Texas, there is something different about them. There is rejuvenation in their face, a sparkle in their eyes, and I haven’t seen my parents like this in ages. My sister and I managed to graduate (she with honors and me with a degree) while working our way to support ourselves. My brother, punk that he is, has become someone I truly admire. And each of us, in our own times of struggle, have learned there is truly only one thing consistent and trustworthy in our life: our faith in God.

I can’t say that it’s been a peachy road, but I know everything that has happened up to this point in my life was meant to happen. And I know whatever and wherever I am in the years to follow is right where I’m supposed to be. God has His timing for everything.

I know I’ll encounter a few bumps—some just a tiny pebble in the road, some like a deer heading right toward the headlights (I’ve had this happen to me before—it’s not a pretty sight). I may have to hit rock bottom before I realize I’ve been blindsighted, if that`s the case.

As I like to say, we live and learn. But some extremely stubborn and prideful people (I really shouldn’t refer to myself in third person plural) just always seem to have to learn the hard way.

Sometimes I think I'm just hopeless.

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