(In) Dependency
It would be nice to push away all that I’ve come through in one strong, even burst. It would be simpler, perhaps, to give up trying to create that change. Past events seem to stick to me, resulting in a painful, heavy burden, and as much as I would like to pretend that they have no influence on my decisions, I can’t.

This story, in a sense, is about that: the past. Not forgetting it, as I’ve often tried to do, but remembering, admitting, accepting, and releasing. This story is a purging. In a way, all of my writing is, and reaching the end of a poem or piece of prose is difficult because my life has not yet come to any sort of conclusion. I haven’t found a way to detach myself from my experiences and say with finality that I know where I am or where I’m going singly out of my own strength. I’m not sure I want to. The people and places I’ve known the best have shaped me in an indefinable way. And to understand my story, you first need to understand theirs.

They had been high school sweethearts, though at first she hadn't taken to him. With his long, bushy hair and too-thin body, he wasn't exactly a teenage girl's dream, but my mom was his. So he attached himself to her, too sure of himself to ever give up. (My mom sometimes says that even with all of his faults, he can never be accused of impersistence.)

He would drop by her house almost every day, sometimes waiting on her couch for hours. She always dreaded it.

"That boy's here to see you again," my grandpa would say each time with a smile.

"Tell him I'm busy!" she would yell through her closed door. "Tell him I'm washing my hair." She couldn't think of a real excuse, so it was always something like that. I'm washing my hair, painting my nails, doing my homework, listening to a record: anything to postpone the inevitable.

"Now don't be like that," my grandpa would reply, "Come out here and see him." And eventually, she would, but only because she knew she couldn't wash her hair forever.

Then one day, as is typical of stories like this, something changed. It was something small, but it was a start.

"I got a new car," he said, and those were magic words to my mom's ears. "Want to go for a ride?" he asked.

"Of course," she said, and so they did. She says she fell in love with the car first and later with him. It wasn't long after they met that she dropped out of school, and they were married. She went to his senior prom pregnant. Nine months later, they welcomed my oldest brother into the world. That's where the happy story ends. Soon, the life he had just begun to be a part of would be far from welcoming.

My dad left when she was barely pregnant with my second brother. He left his family for cigarettes, bottles, and the streets, wandering them all with more enthusiasm than he ever had their marriage. They were his life, and he enjoyed romancing them. Something so poisoned and dangerous meant more to him than a family ever could, and what good was love against that?

I know she cried, but I'm not sure for how long. Through the years that he was gone, she continued to hope that he'd return. It wasn't so much a blind faith in him but a painful reminder of her beliefs. She thought she wouldn't be allowed to love again, and so long as he was gone, her life was empty. He was stubborn, as always: content to walk the town in tattered clothes, with alcohol as his only friend. Finally, his parents got sick of it.

"Go back to Gwyn," my grandfather told him, "At least you were happy then." My grandfather hated my mom, and I'll never know what his reason was for this seeming change of heart. Maybe it was his last attempt at straightening up my dad. But one thing was for sure: nothing a family could ever give him would really make him happy. Still, he took the advice, and they remarried. Over Christmas vacation from business school, my mom flew down to see him and returned a married woman once again. I'm not sure why he came back, except my grandparents refused to have a failure for a son, at least openly. In the same way, I'm not sure why she took him back after being abandoned for so long, except that she thought it was better to be with him than to be alone, as her religion had taught her she must be.

Afterward, there was little change. Things rarely seemed to fall into place for her and never with that satisfying click everyone talks about. Fate hardly ever threw its proverbial smile her way, and if it did, it was short-lived. She couldn't outrun the tears, and eventually, I think she gave up trying. His drugs and the lonely nights were just another part of the life she was fated to live.

I wasn't born then. I wasn't alive through most of this, and I'm not sure now whether I'm glad for that or not. Maybe I could have made her smile; I like to think I could have lessened the pain a little. As it is, I only know the story second hand, piecing it together from what she told my sisters and me through her tears on the car rides we'd take when it was all too much for her. She did her best to hide it from us for as long as she could, and looking back, I was completely oblivious to his actions for most of my childhood. When I was young, life seemed so hopeful, my options limitless, but as I grew up, the issues slowly emerged. I can't say the moment I knew. But it was only a matter of time before the truth began to show its face, and by the time I was twelve, I knew its entire mangled body and had come to hate it.

There was always the hope of living in a happy family: one without his drug-ridden mind and her constant uncertainty. There were the big dreams of a life where money wasn't an issue in every conversation and making dinner didn't mean finding whatever happened to be in the cupboards. There were small ones too: of just one day that wasn't filled with a hint of unhappiness or one smile that wasn't influenced by his other hobbies. There was a little laughter and always the fleeting thought of something better: a life not laced with hurtful words and nights spend crying alone. Maybe I just didn't know how bad it was, that I could imagine there was a simple answer. I was scared, and all I knew was that I wanted something else. "It has to be there," I'd tell myself, but there wasn't any solution I could see.

Eventually, I bought into the pain. I forced myself into the thought that life wasn't about dreaming and hoping but about taking what I had and living with it, whether or not it was what I had in mind. Dreams, at least the ones I ever thought I could reach, soon seemed foolish. Whatever the past was, the future seemed even darker.

That was when I turned to words, condemning my thoughts to pages instead of the air. There was no defining moment that I decided to be a writer. I didn't make a choice, at least consciously. In my young mind, it seemed like my only option. The slow progression of these events through my heart had left me weak, dizzy with unshared pain, and I had to find a path away from it. I wanted to be strong. I began to write poetry furiously, cramming so many lines onto the pages of my journal that I began to feel almost cleansed. My writing became the only barrier between my fragile heart and a tumultuous home life. I watched their relationship break down day by day. I watched her cry, never knowing what could possibly comfort someone so torn. I heard him curse at my friends, my family, and even complete strangers on the phone when something happened that he didn't like. I saw him come home stumbling on the porch, fumbling for his keys, barely able to open the door. And when he finally did, eyes glazed over, I saw the disappointment hit her. I think she always hoped that one day it would be different, but nothing ever changed. It was a never-ending drunken dance with him. He refused to let her lead, and she could never keep up. She couldn't catch her breath. I didn't know who to feel sorrier for. He had a dependency on drugs, but she had a dependency on him.

I listened to him scoff when we asked for money, but there was nothing funny about his laughter. I listened to them fight. She was usually quiet, but his voice would break through my music, unbearably loud in the pauses between lines. I tried not to listen, to block out his rampages, but mostly, I was frozen in place: forced to hear each biting word. Neither my sisters nor I dared to move, barely breathing for fear of setting him off again. There didn't seem to be a breaking point, only constant seething that boiled up whenever something went wrong. Thankfully, it never went so far as physical violence: partly because I think he knew my brothers wouldn't let him stand again if it did.

We had moved so many times, finally making our home in a small town, close to family once again. And for a while after that, at least for me, there seemed to be a settling. My words calmed themselves: shy, wavering poetry became cheerful and firm. I had become somewhat solid within myself. I let my heart open up to love, and that led to a whole world of writing I hadn’t been able to approach before.

I began playing with new forms and crazy rhythms; I experimented with spacing and punctuation. There was something exciting about the ideas filling my head: a poetic rush, I guess you could call it. The challenge of rhyme was thrilling, and I threw myself into it as a distraction. Whatever came at me, I was prepared to fight it with words. All these intangible frustrations were my enemy, and I knew I had to defeat them by marking them down and making sense of them. And so, in a way, the page became my enemy too. In the throes of battle, I screamed onto it what I wasn’t allowed to voice any other time, and I was brutal.

My heart ached for this change and my newfound courage to say, but I knew that beyond the palm trees and ocean breeze of our small town, there was dissatisfaction and restlessness. I was scared to face it. Something of the past lingered with each sunset, rising like the tides I saw every night. Outside, it seemed quiet and warm, but the salt in the air had begun to sting.

Maybe there were too many memories attached to the town; they had met there, after all. Whatever it was, life was unbearable for her and, as a result of this, hardly any better for me. I began to wonder again what it was like to have hope, to be so consumed in the feeling that nothing else could sneak in. I was living in between lines, insulating myself in the pauses, and I began to realize that poetry could only hold up for so long against the harshness of reality.

I could tell she wasn’t satisfied with what little difference the last move had made. Something in her actions spoke that clearly, though she still tried to hide so much. I asked her why she had chosen him, when there were so many others. She told me, "I loved him, and that was enough then." She paused for a moment before saying, "It isn't now." That was when I knew she had made a decision. Things seemed quiet, but it was only that sense of calm you reach before making a choice. She had made hers. We were leaving.

The drug use and drinking continued, with us on the verge of walking out. His habits were part of the reason we were going; the potentiality of our future was the deciding factor. For the most part, I was calm in our removal. I never faced the wavering certainty so many do in the midst of a divorce. I knew this split was the result of years of unhappiness, and I understood that none of it was on my shoulders. His apathy as our moving day approached only strengthened my belief that we were doing what was right. There were no desperate attempts to keep us there: no quiet pleas, even. From his end, there was only silence: a quiet, final fraying at the seams.

I remember being impatient, desperately wanted to be rid of that existence. In my mind, there was so much waiting in the departure, so much hanging on the moment when we could look out of the window and see the town disappear behind us. I convinced myself that a single second could be my salvation and comfort: that all of my pain would be eradicated quickly and smoothly, instead of falling in jagged stages like before.

The moment wasn’t what I expected it to be. In truth, the initial break had little impact on me. Leaving my friends behind was the worst of it: letting go of loves that had been so easy to embrace. A small part of my past was being torn away from me, and while I resented the change, I knew it needed to come. I had to adjust to the difference, and it was the cross country drive that helped me do it. It was excruciating to watch the miles pass, to pull away from the only father I had known, but as the distance between us grew, so did my strength. By the time we reached the state line, all I was anxious for was our new life.

Looking back, I think we decided our fate long before we took it into our own hands. We saw a chance, and instead of leaping at it, we took it slowly, moving away first in mind and then in miles. The process was long and heartbreaking, but it was necessary. Now, I’ve accepted my past, and I know that there will be hope again. Maybe there already is. I can’t say that every day is easy. Some are harder for the distance, but the accomplishment is comforting. I took a thousand small steps, and where I’ve ended is cumulative. This feeling may not be the conclusion, but it’s leading there. And because of it, the fear in my life and writing is gone. There is no hesitancy in my words. These pages come readily, and I think that owes a lot to the opportunity to speak. I’ve realized that I can’t be scared to face the past, but at the same time, I can’t cling to it. It doesn't hurt so badly to say that my family is broken. I know it will heal, and that truth is liberating. I know the strength that I've developed gradually over these past years will be the strength I lean on when something else arises. And though I'm left with countless pages packed full of desperate freeverse to remind me of the hard times, I have memories and experiences to remind me that it's better to fight through the pain than to give up.