Moving from apartment to apartment,
looking for a place to call home after the divorce.
Kept away from our own father by a relentless mother.
No visits. No phone calls.
He loved my sister and I with all his heart
and when months passed by and he still hadn't seen or heard from his girls, he brought Hell to mom's door step.
Pounding and yelling,
demanding to just see his daughters,
mom picked up the phone and called the law to remove him.
The only way dad could tell us he loved us
was through a cardboard sign he put up on the side of the road
so when we would ride the bus to school in the morning,
we would see it.
The moment I saw the sign, I knew it was from him.
His messy, all caps script wrote,

I LOVE YOU GIRLS.
- DAD

And I remember pressing my face to the bus window
to get a good look at it.
And I remember how my chest swelled with happiness.
Dad had to let us know he loved us.
And if that was through a makeshift sign on the side of the road,
so be it.