Anniversaries

This summer has been full of anniversaries for me.  Not so much joyous ones as painful ones, unfortunately.  I'm doing pretty well staying in the present despite these strong memories, but I also think it's healthy to respect the past and the feelings these anniversaries bring out in me.  For that reason, I'd like to take a moment to reflect on them tonight.

The first anniversary I faced this summer was an old one, a wound that has healed over and instead become a scar - one that has changed me and that I will have with me always, but no longer so fresh.  June 13, 2001, was the day my parents split up.  It always falls within a week or two of another day in June that causes me distress over the things my family has been through in the past 12 years as well.  But in the past few years I've been okay.  This year, that just so happened to also be the anniversary of the day A and I left for the best vacation of our lives.  So yes, I looked back on and felt the depth of how my life changed on that day 12 years ago, but I no longer thought only of how it changed for the worse - I looked at how it shaped me as a person and even changed for the better.  Would I have ever become the person I did and left for that vacation a year ago if it weren't for the events of my adolescence?  Would I have the empathy I do for teens who are going through similar things to what I did?  Probably not... and for that I wouldn't change a thing.

The next set of anniversaries was harder.  June 20 was the day our lives changed forever... the day my sweet A told me the one secret I couldn't keep... the day I set out trying to make things right for her... and ultimately failed.  The following day, the 21st, was the day we flew home and disaster struck.  They didn't believe us.  I couldn't keep my promise... the one I made to A that I would help her.  I couldn't keep it because the system wouldn't let me.  We parted ways in the most painful way possible... we said our goodbyes in sign language through a plate glass window... I... love... you...

June 20, 2012... the day the storm brewed up.

June 21, 2012... the last happy picture before everything changed.

June 27 was the hardest anniversary of all.  That was the day it had been one year since I saw my princess A.  That was the last time I laid eyes on her, our final goodbye.  I remember it like it was yesterday.  She was in the back of her grandpa's truck, no booster seat.  Somehow I bought myself time.  I spoke as quickly as I could.  I told her I loved her, that I had tried to help her, and that I was sorry for the things that were happening to us.  I told her I would miss her and that I would always be here for her.  I asked her if she remembered my phone number.  She said she did.  I told her to remember to tell the truth all the time, and to try not to get in trouble, to make good choices at school and to take care of her little brother.  Then I told her I loved her again.  When they drove away with her, we both waved until we were out of sight.  That was the last time I ever saw the little girl I raised for seven years... the little girl I love like she were my own flesh and blood... who I would give my life for.  Now it's been a year.  The longest I have ever been away from her by far.  Not a day, or even a moment goes by that I don't miss her... that I don't regret what happened a year ago... but I do believe she's coming home, one way or another, and that God will protect her until then.
This year the pain of that anniversary was eased by the joy of a coming birth.  I spent the night at my best friend's house helping her prepare to be induced the following day with her 4th little girl.  After a couple of crazy days with hospital policy, Rylee was born on Sunday, June 30.

Congrats, Shannon & Mike, and thanks for the new memories of snuggling your little ones!

Those days last year set in motion a battle we fought for the better part of a year... one that didn't end the way we hoped it would.  It makes the anniversaries sting all the more that we tried so hard to make things okay, and we just couldn't.  Those painful anniversaries shouldn't exist.  They just shouldn't.  We should be enjoying another summer together... but instead, we're both going it more or less alone.  I live for the day we have a happy anniversary to celebrate... a homecoming.

July holds a different set of anniversaries.  Tomorrow, July 15, will mark two years since my best friend Angie went to Heaven after a five and a half year battle with cancer.  She was only 20 years old.  It was a year ago, almost to the minute, that I last saw her... that we said, not "Goodbye", but "See you later".  We never said goodbye... we even talked about how we never would... because we knew it wouldn't be goodbye, not really.  We knew we'd see each other again in another life.  Instead, the last words I said to her were "I love you."

This may be the only two days of the year that I spend much time thinking about those particular hours two years ago that came at the end of Angie's life.  That's not the person she was and that's not how I like to remember her.  That's not how she would want to be remembered.  I spend most of my time focusing on who she was before that - the funny, silly, compassionate, beautiful, strong and amazing person who was my best friend for so long.  I remember how scared she was of 'losing herself'.  She didn't want a time to come when she didn't feel like herself, because she was so sick.  I thank God that she was able to maintain her sense of self right up until the very last week.  I thank God that when that time came, He brought her home quickly.  I thank God that He gave us time to say that one last "I love you".  And even in those last difficult days... I know she could hear us.  I know she knew we were there.  She became agitated when someone started to cry.  She calmed when we reassured her that we would be okay.  She heard us when we told her it was okay to let go.  Her pain ended two years ago.  In that way, it's a happy anniversary.  But it's a terrible one for the rest of the world, for we lost a beautiful, amazing person... one who I was privileged to call one of my best friends.

Angie and I, goofing off a little over two years ago.

At the end of the month, a day will come that marks one year since the passing of my precious one-year-old kitten, Boo.  A couple weeks later will come the happier anniversary that marks the homecoming of his younger brother, Marbles.  My kitty-babies.  This August will mark one year since a very dark time in my life.  But I'm better already and I'm going nowhere but up.

My Boo, when he was a tiny kitten.

My Marbles... this is about as tiny as he ever was!

As painfully full of anniversaries as this summer has been, I am proud of the way I have handled them.  I am glad for the happy new memories I've made, and for all the ones I'll make in the future.  And I know one day, just like the anniversary of the day my parents split up, the wound that those days have given me will be nothing but a scar - one that has changed me, and one that has made me who I am.