A Day Late and A Dollar Short

There are many things in my life that I have wished for over the years. Some have been grand and desperately out of reach. Others have been more necessary, a warm hand to hold, the love of a good man. Some things I thought I would never have, and yet came to me unbidden. In some things I have been lucky. I others I have drawn the shortest straw.

Many children, given the opportunity would undoubtedly chose the mother they were given. She makes the best oatmeal cookies, cuts the crust from sandwiches just right, and smells like all good things rolled into one. I would have done nothing of the sort. The mother I was given was none of those things. Her language was course and angry, her temperament distant and cold. She was addicted to gambling and obsessed with the notion that as a young girl, that not only was I sexually active with my father, my brothers or any other male but also that it was her duty to cure me of this ailment by beating it out of me. Although she failed as a mother in all other ways, this was a vocation that suited her well. When she was not destroying my body and psyche, she was attempting to win it big at the OTB. At that, she was a total failure.

Of course nothing was ever her fault. It was others who conspired against her that caused all her failures. I didn't know it then but it was her borderline personality that caused us all so much pain and despair. We have all been injured by her madness, some more than others. We all need help, yet few seek it.

I have been lucky. Surely you have too. I have a warm hand to hold and the love of a really good man. My dreams are bad some nights and others a bit more peaceful. I have memories that will never fall away. There is little I can do about that. I am still lucky. And you can bet on that.

Andy