Travels Alone and Lost Memories

One of my biggest regrets, perhaps my only real regret, was not marking up the atlas I carried (remember, this was before smartphones) and, more importantly, keeping the actual atlas that accompanied my yearlong walkabout.

For the whole year I have three, maybe four, rolls of film. Pictures did not capture the journey and the journal(s) I kept is gibberish, more a hashing out of the madness in my head than it was about capturing the externals of my journey.  

So what's left is memory and my memory is growing faultier and dimmer each year, pricked only by reminders of 'Hey, I was there' when I see it in some medium and it fills me with a tinge of sadness that I had no one to share it with and lack the language or artifacts to display the experience.

It changed me but I lack the words to explain exactly how.

It reminds me of a particular line from this song (which is a significant song as I had a revelatory experience while lying on the floor high as can be digesting each lyrics as if she was singing it only to me; I was in love).

"But she knows this and she smiles
For she has miles and miles of memories all to herself
Everything in between then and now
And all the images of everything in between now and then
And all they have
Are pictures..."

Jenny I Read - Concrete Blonde

Brief, End of Year Recap

Just to put this out there. 

In October, we took a week's vacation, the closure of a 25 year journey in my life, to California, including a capstone visit to the top of Yosemite Falls.

On November 12th, the removal proceeding against my wife were terminated. We were two months away from a final court hearing when the work of five years drew to a close. 

Fast forward to Thanksgiving weekend and the dreaded holiday season where my daughter put on a benefit show that taxed everyone involved, most notably my wife, the one who bears the brunt of the labor and emotional support. Keep in mind that last year, I was called 30 minutes before showtime to pay, on credit, the light and union labor in the amount of $8K. Stupid to pay? Perhaps. But it's done and I'm still paying without having received a dime in return. Thank God for 0% interest for 18 months.

The show, while excellent as always, did not meet expectations and so was an emotional jolt to those involved, especially my daughter. 

Fast forward toward the madness of Christmas. 

The week before Christmas I get an urgent text that I need to come as 'things got violent' between my daughter and her live-in boyfriend. After retrieving her and her three children, one which is biologically his with her, we learned the details of what has been happening the past three years.

We've witness it, we've sense it, we've vibed it but have had no tangible evidence until the emotions pushed it out of her. While it was a joy to have them all safe in our home for a week, they have since returned and things are back to that normalcy. And we are both devastated and terrified for her but, moreso, the twins who are gifted, sweet and innocent. We fear that will be lost in the midst of the dysfunction that is their relationship. 

While not unsympathetic to the damage that the sexual abuse they both suffered while young and its impact on their current adult self, the situation is dark, dark enough that the twins are seeing 'dark shadows' in their bedroom at night making things vanish. We fear for the worst though remain prayerful and trying to keep that connection with them, the twice monthly sleepovers at Nana and PopPop's house. 

Much, though not all, the family knows and she opted to avoid Christmas with the family altogether most likely out of shame though pinning the guilt on my wife. 

On New Year's Eve we called and the children, as always, were confined to their bedroom watching their television and eating junk food, though not at liberty to say what they were eating out of fear of reprisal from their mom, though driven by the fear of the man taking up residence in the house, because she knows better and because the children actually love tasty, healthy food.

Add to that some job insecurities with a good company and a solid, though aging, leadership team in a difficult industry with some top heavy expenses and 2020 is starting out in a blaze of glory.

On a positive note, my faith has deepened and though I haven't made the leap to form Orthodoxy, I have made the break with the 'evangelical' style of modern Christianity. While I can be fed there, though truthfully more often as 'personal growth' rather than deepening spirituality, I also leave about 90% of it behind, including much of the theology that drives it.

At 54 years of age, I'm curious to see where this is going.