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From the moment a father first lays eyes on his daughter, she is forever his little girl, and he is forever her hero.
— from The Wonder Years (now that is a show I miss)

My dad and I have a very special relationship. I don’t know if it’s because I’m a girl or because I’m the youngest, but there’s always been a unique bond between us. When you add in Nate, sometimes my mom feels left out, because the three of us – sharing as we do genetics and a history that predates my mom’s presence in our lives – become a unit that can be impenetrable. I never feel more protected, in every sense of the word, than when I’m with the two of them.

I never realized it growing up, because I was self-centered in the way that most kids and teens are when they have everything they need and no worries to speak of, just how much my dad sacrificed for us. At 24, he took us from one place as very young toddlers because he didn’t think it was good for us, and eventually found that the place he’d taken us was more harmful than he could have believed, especially for Nate. I can’t imagine, as a parent, what that must feel like, to find out that your kids were being harmed by someone who had promised to love them – and you. So he took us from there, but we couldn’t all stay together, because he was in school, so Nate went to live with my grandma, and I went to live with my dad’s cousin.

While I lived there, I went to a preschool, and they were going to take us on a trip to the beach. I was really excited because I had never been to the beach before. But one day, my dad called and said he was coming to get me. The cousin had told him about the trip and how excited I was, so he asked me if I wanted him to come “before the beach or after the beach.” And I remember clearly, nearly 30 years later, leaning on the back of the recliner, playing with the telephone cord, and saying, “Before the beach.” And I knew that he was only taking me to my grandma’s, not to live with him yet, but even at 4 years old, I missed him even more than I wanted to go to the beach.

When we finally settled in Virginia and he was teaching at the local college, he eventually started looking for jobs elsewhere. He looked as far away as California, and I remember complaining that I didn’t want to move. I learned later that he had been offered several positions, but had turned them down so Nate and I could grow up and graduate in one place.

He bailed me out financially in college more times than I can count. He taught me how to break in a baseball glove with saddle soap, a softball, a rubberband, and a mattress. He gave me the opportunity to live in Spain while I was in high school, even if I whined like an ungrateful child in the beginning because I didn’t recognize how lucky I was. He thanked me in his dissertation for giving up my bedroom so that he could use it for his research (I was 7 or 8). He came to every night of every play and musical I was in in high school, and video taped them all. Before he and my mom sat us down to tell us Nick had been killed by a drunk driver while riding his bike, he offered me the spot on the couch next to him because he knew how much I cared about Nick (I turned him down because I thought they were sitting us down to talk about the beer they’d found in the fridge from when they were out of town). The day after I lost my hearing, I was eating breakfast in my living room when I all of a sudden recognized a pounding at my door. I opened it to see him standing on the other side; he dropped his bag and just grabbed me and held me for a long time. I told him later that day that this was “pretty much the scariest thing that’s ever happened to me.” He tapped me on the shoulder (because I wasn’t looking at him) and said, “Me, too.” He cried the night I called to tell him I’d been accepted to law school and offered a big scholarship. He cried again when he was the first one I called the minute I found out I passed the bar exam.

And most importantly, he gave us a mother who loves us without reservation – even when we sometimes band together in the three-person cocoon that’s existed as long as I’ve been alive.

The finest clothing made is a person’s skin, but, of course, society demands something more than this.
— Mark Twain

I was sitting in a meeting Wednesday and found myself distracted. I realized I was staring at my feet, marveling at how hot they looked in these shoes. (sorry to make you click – I couldn’t find a still photo) With my magenta toenail polish peeking out, and my feet tan from a weekend at the pool, I couldn’t stop looking at them. I decided the shoes are the sexiest thing I own, and I feel amazing and confident when I wear them. (I also own a super hot pair of BCBGirl black quilted suede 4-inch peep toes, but they take a back seat to the other pair because they are less comfortable because they’re so high.) So I wondered, what’s the sexiest thing you own? It doesn’t have to be clothing, but I’m curious.

Also, I need pants. Badly. Every single pair of my work pants are too big – some by a lot, some by just a little, but it’s getting to the point where I really need to get new ones. And I’ve been looking, but since I’ve lost weight, I don’t know where to shop anymore. Ann Taylor Loft is my new, favorite go-to for tops and dresses, but none of their three styles of pants fit me right, so I have to find something else. I’ve tried Macy’s, but that’s hit or miss mostly, and I haven’t found anything I love there. Where do you buy pants? I live in a major metropolitan area, so I bet if you name it, we have it, and I can check it out, but I don’t want to just go from store to store getting frustrated. I want recommendations, please.

I just want him to kiss me, and then kiss me again, and then everything will become very clear to both of us. Aha! he will say. I forgot! I do love you!
— from Until the Real Thing Comes Along, by Elizabeth Berg

Today I did the one thing I was hoping I wouldn’t have to do. I told my Might Have Been boy that I can’t be friends with him right now. Since the talk last week, we’ve IMed at work almost constantly – it’s amazing that we get any work done, actually – and we rode the train together Monday like normal. I was doing ok, mostly. It wasn’t as bad as I thought it was going to be, but there was something in the back of my mind that wasn’t quite right. I couldn’t put my finger on it, really, until last night.

He came in early yesterday, which is unusual for him, so we got to ride the train home together again. We were standing on the platform, talking as usual, and then he pulled out his phone and started texting her, joking that for once he’s the one bugging her about when she’s going to be home (yes, they live together now – did I somehow forget to mention that?). I immediately disengaged – I looked away, turned my head, and just generally couldn’t even fake it. He asked if I was ok, and I lied and said yes. We attempted to make more small talk, but by the end of the ride, we were totally silent and I was near tears. He asked if I was ok, and this time I said no. He asked if I needed to talk, and I said, “It’s not going to change anything.” He nodded, rubbed my arm, and just sadly said ok.

I cried all night when I got home yesterday, because what I realized is this: where before I felt like the best version of myself when I was with him, now I feel like the version of myself that is trying to do whatever I can to make him choose me. I’m doubting myself where I never did before – am I smart enough, do I look cute enough today, am I being agreeable enough to make him change his mind. And that kills me. I know his staying with her isn’t about me, but some part of me thinks there’s something in ME that’s lacking, and that if I could just figure out the right thing to say or do, everything would fall into place.

So I wrote him a letter.  That’s what I do – I’m so much better in writing than I am in speaking, especially when my emotions are so close to the surface like they have been this past week.  There’s no way I could say this stuff to him without completely breaking down.  Because the truth is, not talking to him, not spending time with him, is not what I want at all.  It’s a thing that doesn’t even make sense in my head – I’ve talked to him nearly every day for 9 months, and the longest we’ve ever gone without talking is two days.  I can’t begin to understand how not to be friends with him and the thought of it breaks my heart.  But, after talking to two people who know me well and who I trust very much, and who have gone through similar things, I’ve come to understand that this is the way it has to be.

We didn’t talk all day at work today until I IMed to tell him I had the letter just before I left – an hour early because I just can’t keep it together (though I will say that you’d be surprised at the number of tasks you can complete with tears in your eyes, as long as your office door is closed).  I went down to his office on my way out – he didn’t look as bad as I did, but he didn’t look great, either.  I handed him the envelope and he asked me if he should hold it for a few days in case I change my mind.  With my voice breaking, I said, “I’ve already changed my mind 100 times.”  And that’s true.  All day I kept going back and forth, and right before I told him I had it – the point of no return – I thought to myself, if you feel this bad about it, why not wait?  But there are things in the letter that he needs to know, and I know that it’s not going to get better if I wait, it’s just going to get worse.

I knew I was in big trouble last night when I was writing the letter and in my head I accidentally called him J, because I literally spent YEARS trying to say or do just the right thing that would make J realize how much I loved him and that we were perfect for each other.  And I knew that I needed to give him the letter sooner rather than later, because at this point in my life, I just don’t have that kind of time to waste.

But I’m miserable.  I don’t have any idea what life without him in it as my friend is going to be like.  It will probably be less funny and have fewer smiles for a while.  And apparently I’m on the heartache diet these days – I can’t really eat, which is unusual for me.  My plan is not to actively avoid him (that’s easy enough as it is – the nature of our jobs and the set up of our offices makes it so that I can go days without seeing him), but just to not seek him out.  I don’t know how long I’m going to last, honestly.  He’s the one I always want to tell everything to – how am I supposed to just let that go?

I rarely do the right thing for myself when it comes to men – I have a long track record of figuring out what they want and trying to mold myself to fit that image.  That’s no good, though, because if you win him that way, you’ve lost yourself.  If I changed, and he left her to be with me, that wouldn’t be honest, and it would never last. And it’s not fair to ask him not to talk about her – if we’re friends, those are the things friends talk about – but I just can’t pretend it doesn’t hurt me to hear it.  So walking away, that’s the only option, right?

Right?

Fly free and happy beyond birthdays and across forever, and we’ll meet now and then when we wish, in the midst of the one celebration that can never end.
— Richard Bach

The Princess turns four today!

I remember the day she was born, when I held her for the first time, wondering how anything could be so perfect – she was so tiny, with a perfectly round head – and when Nate and Molly left me alone with her to take a walk, I sang to her, and whispered to her all the things I wanted to teach her as she got bigger, and told her that she would always be my best girl.

She’s at the beach celebrating this week, and I can hardly believe what a big girl she’s become – Nate sent me a couple of pictures yesterday of her early birthday celebration. Here she is on her new “Princess” bike:

And Molly, my ever-creative sister-in-law, has struck again with this castle cake:

I don’t know how she comes up with these things (she did Thomas the Tank Engine for the Conductor’s birthday in January), but she never ceases to amaze me. (And I see there were Dots involved. Why was I not invited?)

I’m headed down next weekend for a little belated celebration; this is the first of her birthdays that I haven’t been there for the actual day, but that’s the way it goes sometimes. I got her some clothes, a very cute pair of shoes, and a baseball glove. Pink, of course!

He suspected you could work yourself some good in calming your mind by thinking forward to what great pleasure it would be to hold your grandchild on your knee. But to believe such an event might actually happen required deep faith in right order. How would you go about getting it when it was in such short supply?
— from Cold Mountain, by Charles Frazier

I feel like my life, relationship-wise, is a series of missed opportunities. After J and I broke up, as I’ve told you, we danced around each other a handful of times over the years, but for one reason or another, our timing was never quite right. I lost P, as you know, because when I could have been with him, I was too afraid, and when I finally wasn’t afraid anymore, it was too late. The Good Kisser told me it was timing, too – he didn’t want to be distracted from doing well in school – even if that turned out not to be true. The Dentist? I worked up the courage to ask him out, but he told me he’s seeing someone.

And now, this guy (he needs a name, but I suck at making them up) . . . he was single for SEVEN years before he met her, and they were only together on and off for about 6 months before we met. I couldn’t have met him when he was “off” with her? The universe couldn’t have kept him single for 6 more months after SEVEN years? You’ve got to be kidding me.

This kind of thing, the what-if of it all, makes me crazy. I think of myself as the kind of person who believes that things generally happen the way they’re meant to, but sometimes I wonder how that’s possible. I mean, what are the odds that you are right for the person who is right for you, that you actually manage to meet that person at some point, that you’re both single, both interested in each other at the same time – I mean, it seems like an astronomical impossibility, doesn’t it?

I suppose, though, that you can’t see how it’s all going to work out when you’re IN it, like I am now. Right now I feel like I lost something really big (and I’m not even going to listen to someone who says, “But you didn’t even have anything to lose,” because I did), something that had potential to be a good thing for me, even if it was complicated and difficult in the beginning. And because I’m not good at meeting people, the loss of the possibility of something more with someone I feel so connected to is that much larger and harder to take. I’m not the girl that can just walk away thinking, “Well, if he doesn’t want to be with me, it’s his loss; there are other fish in the sea.” I can’t. I have to let myself feel what I feel; there’s no way over it but through it for me.

But years from now, when things are different for me (please, god, let them end up different for me), I’ll probably be able to look back at this time in my life and realize that he was just Part 5.