In Chicago we have a radio station that plays nothing but Christmas songs during the holiday season. It is always my favorite time of year. This year they started playing the Christmas music on the 11th of November. I cannot tell you how much that is a big boost to my sorrow. I longed for Christmas growing up. Every Christmas commercial or the old mash-ups they did with television shows singing carols would send me to tears with an aching heart. It wasn't about presents or "getting stuff" it was about the one thing that I felt was missing, family closeness and love. I didn't celebrate my first Christmas until I was 16 years old.
The magic of childhood Christmas was not mine to have along with so many things. There are so many little things that people take for granted that mean the world to others. The two things that can really make my heart ache and bring on the tears, to this day, are Christmas movies and of all things, the movie "What a Girl Wants". I know it is a kid movie and there is a lot of silliness, but the theme of the film haunts me. The one thing this girl wants is to dance with her father, the father she has never known. When she meets her father she is an outsider in his life and not wanted by most of those around him. Of course in the end she gets what she has always dreamed of, a dance with her father. That is how I have always felt. The difference is, I am 41 and there is no dance in my future.
When I met my father for the first time 11 years ago I was happy beyond words. I was so much him. He had a family with 3 daughters. I was like a distant cousin. My father was so important to me. I knew that I could never have childhood memories with him, bedtime stories, Christmas mornings, and feeling protected by Daddy. Nor could I have the adult milestone moments with him, the birth of my son or having my father give me away at my wedding, those were already completed before we met. But the two things I longed for I was to be denied. At his youngest daughters wedding I physically had to leave the "hall" as he had the father daughter dance. My heart hurt so badly. It was the only dance my father and I never offered one.
The second thing was my graduating University. I worked so hard to finish my education degree. I called and spoke with my step-mother and told her how important it was for me to have my father there. She told me he could not travel that distance with his back. I said I understood, but then they began driving to Florida in the winter which is ever farther than the trip to Chicago. My place was solidified.
It is a difficult thing to come to terms with. A battle I still fight to this day, being second place or an afterthought. I always knew I was an afterthought in my mother's life. In fact, in most peoples lives. It just hurts when it happens when you are older. You are suppose to be stronger and built up an un-scalable wall.
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