Missing

As I mentioned earlier, several family members came to stay with me for the weekend of Dad's memorial service. Two of those people were my dad's younger half-sister and her husband. These are two very special people. They both are extremely talented, bright, hard-working, humble and down-to-earth. The husband is one of the few people I have ever known who make me think that nature has a stronger role in the ongoing nature/nurture argument. His family was right out of the pages of The Grapes of Wrath. When he was two years old his entire family piled into an old car and drove West. His place, he remembers clearly, was lying on the flat area behind the back seat, looking out the back window. A family could never do that with a child now; they'd be arrested. But those were the days long before cars had seatbelts, and mandatory seatbelt laws were unheard of. While the rest of the family gravitated to trailer parks, this child grew to be highly-educated, energetic, and successful. He eventually became principal of a high school for troubled teens which morphed into a highly-structured and innovative campus. By the time he retired the school was running schedules that started every day at 6:00 a.m. and went until 10:00 p.m. because they were designed to meet the needs of the unusual student body that included many teenage mothers and young working parents. It housed a childcare center and several job-training programs. The structure was solid and everyone knew and respected the rules. Along the way, my aunt's husband learned just about every trade that is ever taught in school: woodshop, auto mechanics, auto body repair, carpentry, drywalling, electrical and plumbing. He still excels at all of those but the one thing he really excels in is photography. It has been a favorite hobby for decades. Once when he was in a photography class, some old guy named Ansel Adams came by and told him to keep it up because it looked like he had a good eye for photos. Today he has a permanent exhibit at the capitol building in his state where he displays over 200 photos at a time and can rotate them at his discretion. He also makes all his own frames and mats. When he and my aunt visited us three years ago, he took Bill out to shoot pictures. They went to our local wetlands and we all went to the poppy fields together. He and Bill connected over photography. They could also talk cars, and I think that he understood that Bill had been a difficult teen and had an atypical learning style. While he and my aunt were here for the memorial service, I had just taken over driving Bill's old car. My aunt has the exact same car, except in red, where she collects speeding tickets. I was having trouble getting the heating system to put out hot air. It just kept blowing cold air on me and we were having a really cold spell. He checked under the hood and then showed me how to adjust the heater and make sure the a/c was off. As we sat in the car, he got quiet for a moment. Then he said, "You know what, Cindy? I miss Bill. I know you had a bad divorce and things were tough, but I miss him. We had connected with the photography and I enjoyed Bill. He was never inappropriate when I was with him. I know he didn't like your dad and that was really uncomfortable, but I just want you to know that I liked him and I miss him." And it was maybe then that I realized it was okay to admit that there are times when I miss him, too, that I didn't have to have a black or white feeling about Bill's absence, that it was okay to say----even after all the awful things that went on in the marriage and during the divorce-----that sometimes I miss Bill. So, I very slowly and quietly said, "Sometimes I miss him too." And the consideration and honesty of this man opened yet another door for me, the door where I could stop being all angry about Bill's bad behavior and walk through to the place where I acknowledge the emptiness left by no longer having the Bill who was intelligent, comfortable to be with, and interesting. And admitting that there are times when I miss him was a relief.