Open letter to my children

Love, memories and family.

What we are going through was not something we wanted.
What we are going through is not something we can change.
What we can do is remember and move forward, together.
It is only by honoring what is gone that we can love the present.
We are together now but separate.

I will always remember the times we travelled together as a family.
The Istanbul hotel, the crazy plane ride on ****** Island, Whitney Manor,
Kyrgyzstan, Disney World, and Sarnia.
Looking back – that is a weird mix of places!
We did it is as a family and in love.

To my soon to be ex, I will always seek to remember our times together
Richmond, Amish country, Eastern Shore, the Lake District and the journey through parenthood.
I am sorry that you decided that love was gone and not worth saving.
I looked deep into the abyss in a life without you and came out with a bare and raw soul to start over.  
While I will never understand, fare well. I forgive you and wish you well.

My dears, please remember the love we had and don’t ever give up on it.
What we are going through will not change the past.
The past is a nice place to visit but oh, the places we will go.
What we are going through does not prevent the future.
Our future means being here and now.

Please remember that there was love in our family.
Please know that there always will be love in our family
Please believe in a kind of love that never dies
The love of your parents was ended but know this does not always happen
Please know that love is and can be all you need.

Remember the examples of lifetime love.
Both of your grandparents loved each other their whole lives
Love is hard, it is rewarding, it can do things you never thought.
Please think of how you love your sister – you cannot stop that.
Please know that there is real love in the world for you.

Again, what we are going through we did not choose.
What we had will not change.
We have a wide and big family of love
We will have great and wonderful things
What we will always have is love.

The quiet house,
the missing kids,
the absent dogs,
your choice.

Where once we had a home,
Now we will have houses.
Bodies shuttled between.
your choice.

Peals of laughter,
The funny sounding bark
Shared by all but gone.
your choice.

The smell of family meals is gone
The stains upon the stove cleaned
The in-joke of smoke alarms absent.
your choice.

Finances are yours, independence at hand
Consuming the new needs to replace the old
Goods will not be lacking (but will they fill the hole?)
your choice.

The silent bed in your house
New mattresses to be tried.
Grinding and easy pleasures abound (but are they hollow?)
your choice.

The absence makes the heart grow fonder,
A lack not chosen but forced.
The space when love has left the we but not the family
my choice.

I will swim in paternal warmth,
And blow upon the deadened embers
A flame of love will be in my home
my choice.

Yelling will be absent,
Comfort given and not sought,
Bending to needs and not offering things.
my choice.

Food is quick but made with love
Eating is a time to share
Dining is relaxing and not a performance
my choice.

Love is spending time and not money,
Absent the pain of undelivered diamonds
Attention and a love of being and now
my choice.

My bed echoes with trust and tenderness
I will wait for those sounds to die away.
My sleep for now is love and fatherhood.
my choice.

You may say that I am arrogant
That you have lived too long
in a reality that I defined.
But while pompous I might be
I track closer the real than thee.

You say you never left me for him
until the marriage was done.
But in reality you jumped to him
before we were through.
In your heart you know that's true.

Motherhood is flag you fly
as if it's not a coequal branch of love
that nether needed nor received help
Your love of children I will not deny
but neither will I cede to a lie.

For you will find that I was there
Not as an accuser or judge
but as a lover and a friend
who sought nothing more than sharing
while you saw only overbearing.

you actually wondered why I was
not more supportive of your "growth"
I had to remind you that finding him
was to me not a sign of progress
but from reality a clear digress

you may say that we were doomed
long before it happened
you may tell others that "we had problems"
But when the tree fell , fast and furious
was not everyone's confusion curious?

I acknowledge your suffering
- all the sadder for being self created
but maybe its wrong to see me as the source
I may be an easy foil
a simple source of all your toil.

But as TED talks intro promises.,
the ultimate reality beckons,
you are the author of your own tragedy
by the light of burning bridge you drift
you walk forward giving me short shrift.

I know not what the future holds
and I hope that in solitude you can find
a way to understand this life.
one that does not feel borrowed from one
who you so clearly shun.

I so trusted the ground beneath my feet
but failed to see you were not so grounded.
my pain is to know that you have gone so far
that what we have is so much destroyed
to fix it tools cannot be employed.

They say time flies like an arrow
but fruit flies like a banana.
A sad dad joke is my refuge.
But in truth I do hope beyond hopes
that this world you will find your snopes

where you go in this world is beyond my ken
even if your new house is near
i hope you build your own life.
one that is not built in reaction to me
but one that in peace can be

I accept that in this life you find me
to be soul *******, destructive and vain
oh I wish with all my heart this were not
but please take for when you are ready
the memory that I tried to be steady.

I too am building my own new life
in the stark glare of reality.
I will furnish it with love and hope
and in a corner build a small shrine
to remember what was once so fine.

So fare ye well and please lessen the fear
that you will be judged or condemned
for in this world you are your own enemy
the field is bare and all allies rejected
so try not to stand self dejected.

Pain, hurt and loss are real,
but they are only part.
I see that part of me is carrying them.
And rightfully so, they are hard won feelings.
But and here, as the Bard would say,
Here's the rub:
I see me carrying them and so -
I know I am not them.
They are part of the darkness -
that lets me see the light.
And while I hold them close to me for now
I know that the light is there.
I will bask in a life without such baggage
But for now I will grieve a bit more.

my life was ripped asunder
by the opposite of love
a ****** of apathy so strong
shredded what I believed.

the violence of the uncaring
the push of pure ego
the complete absence of care
twas an un-****** of my soul.

what we had is gone
its weight so light on you
that like a seesaw partner
I came thumping down, hard.

the kids were lost and sad as I
the night you went on a date with such glee
we cried but without understanding
what the future will hold

ghosts of past family "love" we see
there are wisps of the past
like when our youngest asks so gently
is there any hope of reconciling?

Alas my dear, alas.
I know not or understand not
but no, that future has been ignored
the wall of numbness too high

I knit the tattered feelings I have
and discover a new life possible
my life with my two girls will be 50 50
at least in the presence of each other

but please know my loves
that I will be there always
you have seen a ghost created
but I will not be like that

I am new and live in the now,
I will be there for you, mindfully.
the suffering that others inflict
comes from sadness they cannot share

I intend to forgive her
if even now I cannot
her power over my soul is gone
and I pray she fills her void.

I will live for me and mine
my detour with you almost complete
someday I may recall with warmth
but for now I will work on today.

Grief is the wing of my depression
lifting me lowly higher
All the better see what was
and chart a path towards what will be.

As I look over the charred lifescape,
I know who started it.
A fire so fast and furious.

I did not throw the match
nor realize how dry it was
to feed a fire so fast and furious.

But as I nurse my burns
And soothe my daughters welts
I am left with a curious thought.

I did not burn up in the pyre
But choked on smoke and suffered burns
from the fire so fast and furious.

To have survived the furnace
I must have left it some time before
But when did our love turn to tinder?

That will be my reflection
To learn what can so dry a love
so that I never again

have a fire so fast and furious.

You believe I claim to be superior
that my sour smugness stings
oh you say, you are not better.

But 'better or worse' (oh the irony!)
are not the issues now
my claims are about me and not us.

My suffering is mine to bear
my past cries signs of a soul injured
responding, disturbing, and growing.

Even as the court ends what we were.
I cannot accuse you or judge you
without hurting myself even more

All pain inflicted on others
is reflected agony from elsewhere
the shrieks from me, I acknowledge.

But know that my distress I will address
Til death do me part (oh that's self inflicted)
without seeking to score points.

Your new life, though painful to me
Is yours and yours alone
I will not add my judgement to it.

So, I claim not to be better
I will resist the urge to be bitter
and someday, I intend to forgive.

While echos of us I still hear
these sounds are fading
I wish you farewell and me, some peace.

The blame game has a name:
While rooted in a claim of shame
and a desire to defame
it leaves you lame
as you aim to maim.
it's very difficult to tame,
The name is ego.

I realized that my out of office was on
for far too long a time.

I could not deal with the growing dread
of seeing what we had become.

A ring, some things like all the others had
an outward symbol would show my love.

My taste was bad, my gifts not your style
order fulfillment was my role.

my trips were pleasantly ordered marches
that you would observe but only semi-enjoy

and so I put a simple response to you
that over years was never noted.

instead we smugly assumed that each of us
was occupying the higher ground.

I was to chase and flatter and spoil
the one who preferred my out of office.

where I had hoped for some sign
that she missed and wanted the real me.

And now our accounts are closed
and I am going to be careful...

about my out of office