The Update

So its been over six months since my last six month update. It’s not that I intentionally neglect this blog, but more that life moves on and I struggle to catch up.

Well my father passed away in May. It was expected. He had been dying for a year and half and we all knew it was coming. He was skinny again, way too skinny. He was weak and I think hiding and lot of the pain he was going through. He passed away May 5. Ironically, my racist father passed away on a Mexican holiday. There are sometimes when it hurts to breathe. Although I am 28 and have been totally on my own for ten years, a little girl always needs her dad. I guess part of the hurt was also in realizing that I am alone now. There are no makers of Mandie left. No moms or dads or grands, just me.

It also seems that my dad gave me one last parting gift. I had actually anticipated this but the fact that it really happened did surprise me. Despite the fact that I didn’t ovulate, well at least I never had a temp spike, and despite the fact that I had no normal periods since Riley was born, I got pregnant. In my family we joke that my dad is our fertility god. Since I became an adult, visiting my father alone has always gone hand and hand to being pregnant. All of our pregnancies including the miscarriages happened either right before visiting my dad or right after returning from a visit. Well this time I went to say goodbye to him the beginning of May and ended up pregnant that same month. So yes the Phillips family is expecting number five. And yes we do already have a baby. Riley turned one the day we found out. And yes I am 90 percent sure it is another boy. Scary and crazy yes, but there you go. The update.

Lost

I haven’t stopped to write for a while now.  Too frustrated, tired, and sick I guess.  Life goes on even without my ritual for self preservation.  I wonder sometimes why I fail to find the time to do even the most necessary things.  Writing is breathing and I have been holding my breath for much too long.

I did it.  I wrote him.  I know that this is stupid but I needed the link.  I wonder if it will help.  I wonder if converting both of her parents will somehow make me feel more justified.  However perhaps I am the one that forgot that he is more to me than she ever was.  He knew my mom.  He grew up with her.  He might know her even better than my dad does.  How amazing that would be.  Someone who could tell me what I am.  I feel so lost right now.  I guess it because of the cancer, but I feel as though I am moments away from being that lost orphan who has no family and no past.  I feel like I am about to become lost.  Maybe it is because I am older now.  More complete and more afraid of whom I am destined to become.  I don’t know why I ramble.  I do hope though that he understands his daughter and still can love me.

Living

There are moments lately when I find myself struggling to breathe.  I gasp sometimes, falter, and fall down; half exhausted, half discouraged.  I enjoy everyday, every single one of them, even yesterday when I reigned the victor of a food fight, a vomit competition, and a pissing war.  However, so often I find that the weight is literally sitting on my chest waiting to cave in my lungs and push my heart into my backbone.  Perhaps that is my problem.  Perhaps my heart just needs to get a backbone.  Is courage the ingredient lacking in my will to succeed? 

I have been pushed so far recently.  Pushed by a fussy, needy baby.  Pushed by an increasingly annoying hubby.  Pushed by being a mother of four never resting and never forgiving little boys.  It makes me ill.  Honestly it makes me ill to think about going to bed once again to wake up with two boys in my bed suffocating me and drain all the strength I have left. 

There are times I just want to scream along with them.  It is all so frustrating.

He’s here

I had the baby.  Still jaded, muted, numb, and tired as hell.  It never stops raining.

My quilt

Throbbing fingers falter
Tender from each misguided prick
Hopes and dreams patched together
With glue and string to make them stick.
Lives are sewn together
Hastily but carefully played
An intricate pattern emerges
And a patchwork quilt is made.
Some seams are made to be ripped
And squares to be pulled out clean
While others must be cut
And jagged edges must remain.
My quilt is full of holes
Pieces that have been worn through
Missing parts of my life
That use to guide me through.
But you have always been the string
That has mended up my tears
That has guided and has comforted me
Throughout the passing years.
My quilt is worn and ragged
And bloody dots show through in spots
But I know that it will last me through
Because every string ends with a knot.

Abortion

There was this sinking feeling today.
This dreaded thump of each heartbeat.
A slow and steady rush that was once welcomed but now seems tainted.
Where has your perfection gone?
The hopes and dreams dashed upon the ultrasound screen.
There is this scream inside my head that ignores my soul.
How can my heart love you so much but my mind falter at the words?
And always this echo
“If we had known sooner you could have had an abortion”
Each flutter is a reminder of my guilt
A reminder of my fear
And constantly I think I must be the brain damaged one.

Lost

My sorrow remains unclimatic
As the pain simply fails to peak
Your joy dissolves into my heartache
A piece of you that refuses to fade.
There were days that I adored you
Idolized you as the sun
Found peace and comfort in you
Held on for much too long.
Swollen tears of frustration
Inconsistent heartbeats lost
Failed hopes and dreams adorn me
Reminders of my weakest part.

Closed

I closed the chapter of my life where you reside.
I finally had the courage to put you up in the place reserved only for memories.
It took awhile, was painful, was sad, but now it is done.
You are done.
A finished chapter in a book that was good enough to read but not worth holding on to.

Goodbye

Characterized as Human

Welcome to the mind of madness
Crammed in between simplicity and chaos
An open door into imagination
Sorrow, joy, and unrelenting inconsistency
A character defined by no identifiable characteristic
Forgotten in a sea of others
Lost between you and them
Wavering on the waves of thought and temptation
Randomly bitchy, congruently sweet
Simply human and undeniably so

Ignorance

Your ignorance is palpable
An acid spew of filth so haphazardly laid
The fool you play, the foul jester
The disgusting whore who wails the wrong tune
Your own reassurances are faulty
Wrongly written and absurdly mistaken
You the ignorant bitch so highly placed
Will be beautiful only when you fall