A Long December...

Oh, man, it's getting that time of year...

I've seen in on my street; in my neighborhood; in my town...

I've even seen it on Facebook.

People are decorating trees and houses and wrapping gifts...

All in anticipation of the 25th of December.

And, for me, it's a long December.

I fain excitement for those around me all wrapped up in the spirit of the season, but inside, where that spirit is supposed to dwell...

I dread.

I dread every second of it.

You show me pictures of your tree with gifts overflowing, and I think of mine...

All those years ago...

Five years ago, you'd have found my house aglow in the haze of clear lights and a tree that could rival ANYTHING you could find in ANY store...

And, I ain't kidding...

This girl can decorate like you've never seen.

Although, if you come to my house this year, I'd be hard pressed to prove it with the one poinsettia on the porch.

The pictures of gifts to overflowing make me sad, because a few years ago, I had a HUGE extended family to exchange with on Christmas Eve, and it is now limited to...

My two children.

They don't know it.

I never let it show...

But I LONG for Christmas Past...

When I had a houseful of kids and hope and excitement.

Where, on that ONE magical day, ANYTHING seemed possible..

And, even as an adult, I BELIEVED.

So, I've made an effort...

All traditions for Christmas have changed...

All my "single" friends come over on Christmas Eve and we have a gumbo and some laughs...

Christmas morning is STILL for my kids.

Kelsie still spends the night, although she and Camron have gotten too big to share a bed...

I still go jump on them about 4 a.m. on Christmas morning with the exclamation, "Get up! I don't know how you did it, but SANTA CAME TO SEE YOU! HURRY!"

And, they fake their disbelief that he still comes to see them...

They rise...

Wipe the sleep from their eyes...

And walk into the living room in "amazement" that, even though they didn't write to him this year, he knew EXACTLY what they wanted.

And, it is in those few hours with them, the two people on earth that have the power to pull me from my own darkness, I realize...

The true meaning of the season.

It's about family...

It's about food...

It's about laughter...

It's about faith.

Faith that the THIS year...

Might be better than the last.

Ah, yes, it is, indeed, a long December...

But once you get there, you wonder why you dreaded its arrival.

Life is beautiful.

Life is what you make it...

Even if it is a long December.

Stop this Train...

"Stop this train! I wanna get off!"

Those words have moved through my mind for months now...

Life is moving at the speed of life, and me, the girl who can take care of it all, has been reduced to...

A passive observer.

I've almost gotten accustomed to that role...

Seriously.

In the last few months, I have become the guru of "Life is What Happens When You're Busy Living It"...

Doesn't matter.

I still hate it.

Stop this train.

I want to get off.

I want to enjoy every second of it...

Each look...

Each sound...

Each touch...

Today, I want time to stand still.

I want all movement to stop.

I want all past arguments...

All past transgressions...

To be gone.

Today, I realize what is important.

Won't someone stop this train?

I am only good at being young...

Nothing else...

This world is demanding more of me that I can give...

I am tired.

Won't someone stop this train?

I want to get off.

And, go home again...

Home...

Where my mother is well and good...

Where my dad is full of enlightenment and can handle anything that comes my way...

Home.

It makes me sad to realize "home" is no longer there.

"Home" is, now days, found in this rented house that I HATE...

"Home" is forever transformed and will NEVER be the same again...

Stop this train.

I want to get off.

And, go home again.

Won't someone stop this train?

A new chapter begins, and yet...

I'm not fully finished with the last chapter...

I've had no time to digest...

To discipher...

To accept...

The next curve ball.

Please.

Won't someone stop this train?

I want to get off.

And, go home again.

I'm only good at being young.

Seriously.

That's my only talent...

And, it's getting farther in the distance...

With every day.

Won't someone stop this train?

I wait on the day that it feels like it should.

Until then, I am begging you, anyone, to, please...

Stop this train.

Angels on the Moon...

This song has haunted me for the last two weeks.

Each time I hear it, my mind goes back, and in true writer fashion, I can imagine what words I want to weave to its lyrics to express what I'm feeling inside when I hear it.

Today, I write it, but damned if I know what I'm going to say.

Four months tomorrow...

Four months.

I've had no contact with him for four months.

There was a time when four days seemed an eternity.

By the end of the second day, I would have been a wreck, doing everything I could to bait him into saying something...anything...

And, tomorrow, I could try every trick in the book, and I'd get...nothing.

Four months.

I never once, since the day I met him, thought I'd ever live a day without him.

Last week, we all wrote "Love" on our arms.

I wore that word with pride.

I wore it for him.

I'd write it on my arm every day of the week if it would mean I could talk to him...

Just one more time.

Four months.

What did HE believe?

He believed in his niece.

He believed in his sister.

He believed in his mother.

He believed in love.

He believed in friendship.

He believed in family.

He believed in God.

He believed in Heaven.

He believed in Hell.

He believed in two girls from opposite ends of the country...

One, he loved, without shame, and with his entire heart...

The other, he loved and vowed to protect forever and ever, just as a brother protects his sister.

Neither any less, but in different ways...

And, he made sure they knew one another...

Would care for one another...

Because, my friends, he also believed his life would be brief.

So much I owe to him...

So much I can never repay...

With him, I had the relationship I've never had with my own brother.

Somewhere to go and just scream, "THE WORLD SUCKS, AND I AM TIRED, AND I AM SCARED!"

Four months.

I don't know that my calendar will ever creep toward that number "19" that it doesn't hit me...

There will never be another him.

Never.

He was the one and only...

The original...

The beginning...

The end.

He was my friend...

My angel on the moon.

I love you.

I miss you.

Forever and always...

I love you.

I carry your torch.

I believe in you still...

As long as I live, and as long as there is breath in me...

You live on.

My Angel on the Moon.

In My Daughter's Eyes...

You all know I'm her number one fan.

I always have been, and I always will be.

This "child", as I loosely must refer to her as these days...

Has taught me so much about love;

About life;

About forgiveness.

My only hope is that every parent can gaze upon their child and feel the sense of pride I feel when I look at her.

She is truly amazing.

There are no words fitting to express how I feel for her...

When I think of her, I am absolutely overcome.

How she turned out to be the unbelievable young adult she has grown to be leaves me awe-struck...

Designed by His hand...

Molded by mine...

And, people, mine was shaking with lack of confidence the entire time...

I am amazed.

In spite of me, she grew into the most beautiful of all souls I have ever encountered.

Times are tough right now...

For her.

For me.

But, my heart beats on...

It beats for her.

It beats for me.

She is simply the most pure soul I have ever had fortune to meet.

How in this world God granted me with such a special gift, I really don't know.

I hope she has recognized that I've taught her that when times are tough...

You NEVER give up...

When the world talks against you...

You NEVER back down...

And, when they least deserve it...

You FORGIVE.

I can only hope my child keeps that pureness of heart...

That the heart of forgiveness continues to beat within her.

That she is able to discern who is deserving of her forgiveness...

And, that with some, she must turn away.

My prayer is that God will protect my beautiful girl...

Giving her the tools that she needs to protect herself.

And, that one day, wisdom will be hers.

Because, to know her is, without doubt, a privilege...

It is NOT a right.

I can only hope that the way I see my daughter...

Is the way I'm seen...

In my daughter's eyes.

Shine On, You Crazy Diamond...

As I begin to type this post, I have to laugh.

My laughter is mainly because I know which of you are wondering if it is you I refer to as a "crazy diamond".

Let me assure you, if you THINK this is for you...

It probably is.

I have loved you...

I do love you...

And, your light continues to shine.

You may no longer be here...

Either by choice, or by circumstance, but YOU, and you ALONE...

Are my crazy diamond.

Those of you that are still here...

Those that have never left...

Let's get real...

You are here ONLY because, indeed, you are...

A crazy diamond.

Crazy attracts crazy, right?

And, to me, it does not matter.

I love you...

I have loved you...

For the individual that you are.

For the individual that you were...

And, in your absence have proven to me...

That you still are...

A crazy diamond.

It's a crazy world we live in, people.

A world none of us, back in our youth ever expected to know...

A world where we know one another better than those in our "real life" will EVER know.

And, yet, we have never met.

Face to face.

The fact is, we probably never will.

And, yet, the loss of one of our own can unite us;

Bond us together in grief no on else can understand;

THIS is our community.

I remember my most favorite of all crazy diamonds...

And, as for as long as I live...

And walk this earth...

His diamond shines.

That light will NEVER dim...

As long as there is breath in me.

Today, I am thinking of the other "third" and "fourth" of "us"...

Two other beautiful, crazy diamonds.

I am in awe when I look back and think, "They are all I have left."

All I have left in this world that, four years ago was foreign to me.

But, somehow, the four of us connected...

In a way I think no one else can understand.

My crazy diamonds.

That still "get" me...

That understand...

That defend...

When even I don't want to anymore.

It surprised me today when I felt so all alone and realized it was in my virtual world that I felt alone...

Abandoned...

Totally alone.

Today, for the first time, I realized I no longer have his protection with me...

Today, for the first time, I was really scared.

Today, for the first time, I realized...

Once I stopped feeling sorry for myself...

That...

He left me with an arsenal.

There are three of us "originals" left...

HOWEVER...

He left us with a HUGE SUPPLY...

Of those he knew would love us...

Accept us...

Protect us...

When no one else would.

He gave us an entire, immeasurable count of...

Crazy diamonds.

I promise I will continue to shine.

As long as all of you promise to continue to shine...

You crazy diamonds.

I Wanna Know What Love Is...

We were barely 18 and we first danced to this song...

In 1985 Louisiana, we were legal to drink...

Legal to marry...

Ridiculously legal to think we had all the answers.

At the tender age of 20, we married.

In 1987 Louisiana, it was legal for two children to have a child.

And, that, we did.

She came into the world on November 23, 1987 a frail little girl...

Weak from the nine months of improper prenatal care...

The product of an extremely immature and scared mother...

And, a father that had no idea what to do except what she told him to do.

And, she flourished.

The road was a little rocky and questionable at first, but she grew...

She grew in my heart...

She grew in his heart.

Two kids raising a kid...

And, but by the grace of God...

All three of us made it.

She and I would pack up sack lunches and head out to the park every single day.

She and I grew up together.

A little unfair to her, I know, because she helped raise her mother...

Her mother learning her mistakes along the way...

The one thing she did know was that this child...

This precious human being...

Was the reason for her existence.

We were a family.

The three of us were all we knew.

Loving one another...

Holding onto one another...

When there was nothing else to cling to.

The years passed.

We grew up.

We grew apart, her dad and me.

Not his fault, and not mine.

Both of us victims of the clock that seemed to tick against us.

In late 1991, we realized I was having another baby.

I remember my baby girl anxiously awaiting the arrival of her baby sister.

The joke was on her.

Her baby brother came into the world on June 10, 1992.

And, the three of us became four.

We lived...

We loved...

We tried...

We faked it...

We did all we could to hold that world together.

Our efforts were all for nothing...

In the end, there was no amount of responsibility, nor longing that could allow us to go on any further.

It was a bittersweet end...

And, I was left to explain to those two little faces what had happened...

Why life as they knew it was no more.

From that day forward, I have felt guilty...

Guilty for shattering their world...

Guilty for shattering his world...

And, today, I realized something...

I have carried 11 years of guilt that I should not have carried.

I gave it my best.

I have no reason to feel what I feel.

It is not right.

I did nothing wrong except to try to hold it together...

When circumstances dictated it would never work.

I held on...

I held strong...

And, in the end, it wasn't enough.

I have the best that world had to offer me...

It's in the bedroom that I walk partially into each morning at 6:10 a.m. and say, "It's ten after six, baby. Time to get up."

It's in that voice on the phone that can't help but call me and without taking a breath say, "Mom, you will NOT believe what just happened..."

The best of that world...

Where I know what love is...

Lives in her.

It lives in him.

Wanna know what love is?

Love belongs to me.

In my world, love begins with a "K" and a "C".

Yes, I know what love is.

And, you can't stop my love...

That Lucky Old Sun...

Today was a day I greeted with semi-dread. I had to get Mother to the doctor first thing, make time for a 9:00 a.m. conference call and then, oh, yeah, make time to actually work.

More and more these days getting my mother to an appointment on time is like revisiting early mornings during my children's elementary school days.

"Hurry now and eat your breakfast. You're still not dressed and we have to leave in 15 minutes."

She completely ignored me.

"Mother, come on now, please. I've got to get you into the doctor's office so I can be on my call before nine."

She glanced my way begrudingly and finally acknowledged me, "I'm trying, but if I eat too fast I'll get sick."

"O.K. I've got an idea. How about if we get you dressed and you can take your toast and your juice in the car with us. Deal?"

She let out a frustrated sigh. "Alright."

As she got up to get dressed, she, of all things, began to sing with all the joy of a school girl getting ready for her first date...

"Up in the morning...out on the job...Work like the devil for my pay...But that lucky old sun...Has nothing to do...But roll around Heaven all day..."

As she sang the words, a pang of longing mixed with amusement overcame me and I remembered the date.

I giggled to myself as the thought of my boy rolling around Heaven went through my mind.

I like that thought.

In fact, I like it so much that even though I look at the date, I have managed to carry a little joy in my step all day.

He is rolling around in Heaven.

Probably rolling around in laughter at the pranks he pulled on me the last week.

Just a week ago I told a friend of mine, "I think he's moved on. I haven't felt him in a few weeks. I just don't think he's here anymore."

The very next day my phone, out of nowhere, lit up with all the power of a million Christmas trees and beeped. When I picked it up to see what happened, somehow all the text messages I had received from him those last couple weeks...

All those text messages I had painstakingly moved into a folder so they wouldn't accidentally be deleted...

Were all showing on my phone, as if they had been recalled, and yet, the phone was nowhere near me. It was nowhere near anyone.

Somewhere in the universe, I could imagine him laughing at me, reminding me that, although he may have chosen not to be as visible these past couple weeks, he is, indeed, here, and for me never to forget it...

When he's not busy rolling around Heaven all day, that is.

Like so many things since he left, I believe he gave my mother these words this morning because he knew they would give me peace.

I heard him speaking on one of his old radio shows yesterday morning, and it both surprised and actually delighted me when I was able to listen to his voice and remember his sense of humor, instead of concentrating on how much I hurt.

The last show was actually one where I had called in, and I must admit, it wasn't one of my finer moments.

The last thing I said to him before I hung up?

"I love you, punkin."

He used sweet Caroline to deliver that reminder. He knew I loved him. That thought yesterday gave me so much peace.

And, three months to the day that I last talked to him, at long last, I believe I am ready to heal.

He'll be here with me, every step of the way, I'm sure.

When he's not busy rolling around Heaven all day...

I love you, my friend.

Thank you for making my world a better place and allowing me the honor of calling you friend...

Knowing you has, without doubt, been one of the most wonderful things I have ever known.

There is a special place reserved inside my heart for only you, and each time I examine it, I am filled with the most pure feeling of love I have ever experienced.

You for me;

Me for you;

Without question.

Forever protecting.

Forever accepting.

Forever friends.

I adore you...

You Lucky Old Sun...