Autobiography

Daniel, Annie & Beth in our rec room. Today she is the happiest I've ever seen her! The painting is from 2007, Acrylic on Canvas, 16" x 20".

My daughter had to write her "autobiography" for one of her classes in school. She got a 100% on it. When I read it, I cried. In the beginning paragraphs, she expressed her "hatred", her "anger" towards her father. Yet, ending that paragraph, "if I hate him soooo bad, why do I still want him to love me".

I cried for I knew. I knew that exact feeling. While I was married to her father, I hated him so much, yet I could not stand the fact that he did not love me. He wasn't nice. He wasn't nice to me, yet, when he was, that was my "world". So I thought it was my fault. My error. "I must not be doing something right or else he would not treat me that way. To be human, is to hurt. To feel pain. She finally told her father, "Yeah, Dad, I would really like to see you, but not with Sharon (her stepmom). Sharon has done so many mean things to Beth to keep the father and the daughter apart. Sharon cannot share her husband's attention. Soap operas at best. My daughter was 9 when her father left us. Not me. Us. To abandon me was one thing, but to abandon your children, frankly, I never did "get it". It was a power play game. I will hurt you through what you love the most. Sick.

My ex responded to his daughter with: he cussed her out. He blamed me. If I had not done the things I did, Sharon would not have responded in the way she did. Soap opera. My daughter has seen her father twice this year. Once at the beginning of the year to celebrate last Christmas, and the other, her father's birthday.

Today, it is ok. I am sooooo glad that life turned out the way it did. My daughter did not "need" that "sickness" in her life. She is her own person. You cannot force someone to love you. You cannot make someone be who they are not. As far as Sharon and Dario...they deserve each other.

Life is so full of memories. My memories happen to be of discovering. Discovering how life is SUPPOSE to be. Not controlling, not manipulative, absolutely not abusive. It just flows. To be human....yes, we are not robots. As much as television wants to point out that we are all just "personal computers", not life as a history. Learn from it. Learn to touch. Learn to feel. Learn to be human. Humans hurt. Humans heal. Humans die. Hold on to what is real. I am no longer a "monkey"...listening to "past lives"...I grew up...just as my children have. What is real...that same phone call saying, "hey mom"....