Monday, February 23, 2015

An Open Letter to Someone I Never Met, Part III

Monday, February 23, 2015


[I am continuing to write to the person who, as a teenage boy, attempted to murder my father]

It's a cold Monday night in late February now.  I wonder where you might live now...if you are actually still alive.  I am growing weary of winter now.  But at least there is a shred of light in the evening sky at 6:30 pm.  We call this progress towards spring here in Minnesota.  The temperature outside might soon plunge below 0F again but at least the days are growing much longer now.

I lost a lot of confidence in myself after my father was nearly murdered.  I am finally beginning to better understood how and why this came to pass.  I wanted to run away before he was nearly murdered.  Doing so might have provided me release from the abuse my stepsisters were heaping on me.  But running away could have opened up a world of even greater harm.  I also wanted to run away after my father was discharged from the hospital as well.  I became a very good liar at the mere age of eight years old.  Today I feel it is a very sad thing that a boy of eight years of age should learn to become a liar.

I also feel sad when I read the comment I made above in which I express curiosity as to whether you might still be alive.  Much of my childhood felt like a revolving door of changing characters.  There were so many people who came and went throughout the earliest years of my life.  Somehow this experience led me to start feeling skeptical that a truly stable life was even possible.  I am still teaching myself how to create stability.  The world beyond my windows here in the United States of America doesn't often appeal to me these days.  Our economy has been moribund for years.

I still have moments in which I wonder who I could have become had any number of distressing events in my childhood never happened.  I wonder how my own adolescence might have been different if my father had not been nearly murdered.  In this regard I feel it perfectly fair to think of you as one of a number of thieves who entered my life without my permission and later exited my life with a piece of my heart and mind in your possession.

But I still try to have empathy for the person you were at that time in June, 1982.  Sometimes I feel so sad that I simply want to do nothing but sit in a sunlit room, breathe and enjoy the view of clouds passing by in the sky.

I wonder if you ever had a big brother.  Perhaps you did and he was a harmful influence on your own development.  Perhaps you did not and would have benefited from one.  I find myself aware of the deep yearning I long carried to have a big brother of my own.  Perhaps having a big brother of my own would have provided me more healthy opportunities to play and gain confidence that the world at large can be and is a place filled with love, kindness and opportunity.

I want to live a life without harsh and consuming sadness.


No comments:

Post a Comment

I invite you to accompany me as I document my own journey of healing. My blog is designed to offer inspiration and solace to others. If you find it of value I welcome you to share it with others. Aloha!