Draft Personal Essay

There are many events in my past which have molded me into the person I am today. Growing up without a father, understanding the trials and tribulation of raising two boys and the loss of loved ones.

I was born in August of 1977 the son an airman stationed at Kadena Air force in Okinawa Japan. Middle child to my father and youngest to my mother. My father had been enlisted in the military since the age of eighteen as his father had done before him, perhaps to prove he was a man or to live up to his fathers expectation. In my mind my father’s task of becoming a man was never fully embraced. I could not imagine why a father would leave his wife and his two small boys, and later a little girl to fend for themselves.

Growing up my father really didn’t want much to do with my brother and I except at Christmas time. I remember most vividly a saying my mother use to repeat over and over again, “Remember he is still your father”. She never forced her judgment of him onto us, although at this point in my life I wish she had. My mother would bundle the two of us up and literally kicking and screaming, drive us the two and half hours to Springfield Massachusetts where my grandmother lived, to enjoy Christmas dinner and spend the weekend. She never stayed. She would quietly sneak out the back while my brother and I were busy opening presents. I never asked here where she went. I could only imaging that she had driven herself home, only to turn around in two days an make the trek all over again. I hated staying there. It smelled funny, an old musky smell of mothballs and baby powder. Antique hair brushes and mirrors sat on the dresser and pictures on the wall that seemed to turn into monstrous posters when the lights were turned off. It was not all bad. My grandmother must have sensed our uneasiness and calmed it with a late night Eggo and vanilla ice-cream sandwich. We got to stay up as late as we wanted. I can remember my father driving us around town, traveling to military base, which seemed so far way to get a haircut or to the local Friendly’s were my grandfather frequented, being paraded around as if we were some type of trophy. “These are my boys” my father said with what seemed like an overly enthusiastic smile. For a brief moment, I felt what it was like to have a father. My mother would arrive and everything started to normalize. Her protective hugs were now only an arm stretch away. As we piled what we could into my mothers little Dodge, my brother and I would begin to tell her every bit of our weekend on the drive home, and the only response from her was “Who cut your hair?”.

As an adult I can see and understand the sacrifices my mother endured for sometimes not so grateful children. We had formed a ritual year after year, memere and pepere would spend the night sleeping on the pull out sofa after Christmas eve mass. My mother would wake up early the next morning to put on the coffee. A ritual which extended far beyond Christmas and I had learned early in life, not to bug her until she had at least a hot cup in front of her for fear of being sent back to my room. I can remember the smell from around the corner and down the hall where my brother and my room was. We had been up for hours, waiting in anticipation to see what Santa had brought us the night before. Somehow, just barely we would hear from our mother “Ok boys you can come out”. Somehow she always knew we were up, I just chalk it up to mothers intuition. We would run down the hall, give our customary hugs and kisses and begin to tear though what must have taken weeks to wrap. I remember one year my mother told me she could just not afford to get me the new skis I wanted, yet there they were, propped up against the living room TV right next to a pair for my brother, the new bike I wanted and the yes even the underwear. Seemed like Santa had an over abundance of these white undergarments. These kind of presents, the skis and bike not the underwear, deserved and extra long hug, as I knew something of hers has to be sufficed to make this purchases. But we never went without, I know now as an adult that she did. She never dated, and rarely went out with friends, unless the event involved our confirmation or boy scout troop. I wish I had realized earlier of the sacrifices she made.

The summer of 1996 was the turning point in my life, the do or die moment, I was only 19 years old. On June 16, 1996 I woke up much like any other day, but this day was very different, I am graduating high school. I took my shower, got dressed and walked into the living room where my mother, grandparents and my aunt and uncle were sitting. My mother was crying, and my heart dropped at the sight of her. I had very seldom seen here cry, I think maybe one other time. She was a very strong person, and I feel I got my strength from her, but at that moment my strength was gone as well. My mother had been fighting cancer for several months and only recently came home. She had been determined to see the last of her two sons graduate high school, but this day would tear at her. She had made arrangement with a local ambulance company to bring her to my graduation, but that morning she was to weak to go. My family and I tried to comfort her, but it seemed nothing we could say could calm her. An hour later she gave me a hug an old me to go with the rest of my family to the ceremony, only my aunt remained to take care of her. I remember another conversation between my mother and memere that if she could see her children graduate high school that she had done her job. The next day I left to start a sixteen week contract at a summer camp. I spoke to her often and visited when I could. One month later on my night off, I returned home to spend a short but needed 24 hours with my mother. She had died one hour before I arrived, and still laid in her bed as if in a deep sleep. I found out some time later she had watched me graduate earlier that morning.

Many events in my life have molded me into the strong person that I am today, and I credit my success to my mother and the person she made me.