My Awkward Life

Those were among the last words I wrote in an email to my dad. They floated around on the screen as I vehemently typed all of my teenage angst with pride, filling the blank white space with my false sense of dignity and self-worth. I thought I had finally found my voice. The voice that, in my mind, had been stifled by all of the adults around me.

I was in my grandmother’s office and logged onto my AOL account (remember those days?) ready to write this email that my therapist encouraged me to write. I was feeling confident, like I was having this out of body experience and taking back my life in the most dramatic way. I typed with elegance and poise as the desk transformed into a piano, and I played the keys on that keyboard, filling the room with the beautiful anthem of autonomy. I was almost dissatisfied with the lack of my own personal cinematic background score that should’ve descended upon me from the very heavens I did not believe in. Paparazzi should’ve been hunting me through the windows. The sky should’ve cracked open to reveal a golden spotlight directed at me while Angels floated down around me, draping my shoulders in lace and picking me up to levitate with them. I was the brilliant composer of this melody that was now being carried through wires and chips across the Gulf of Mexico to be delivered to my father in mere minutes (because DSL).

I printed that email and brought it to my next visit with my therapist. I gripped it with pride like a trophy, feeling the glory in the weight of my powerful, liberating words. This email, which was once my voice taking back everything I thought he had stripped away from me, my pride and joy, my trophy, my freedom… well, it quickly became the weight that would drag me down to depths of depression I hadn’t even imagined, and it would hold me there until I was suffocated by regret. I had been depressed before, sure, but this depression was like thinking you knew what being in “The Dark” was, only to really find out that true darkness is starting to see what isn’t there with your eyes wide open and your brain having a field day with all of your ir/rational fears.

My dad and I always had a strained relationship. I’m recognizing now that it was probably the fact that he lived in Nicaragua, and I only saw him about once a year. He begged me to come live with him, and I refused because my school was here, my friends, my family. I was young, I didn’t know how different everything would be. I only talk to a handful of those friends now, and not enough for me to have given up that opportunity. I could’ve had a very different life had I gone to live with him. I often wonder if he would still be here if I did go live there. Maybe the events would have unfolded differently. I was going through old photos and stumbled upon this photo my sister sent me from one of his journals.

My brother now is living the life I was meant to live, not in the same way, but he lives with his dad in Nicaragua since COVID hit. He told me a few months ago that his girlfriend wanted to get Italian passports with him. That was something else my dad wanted me to do with him. I feel like the universe has just been tearing open the same wound over and over again, mixing salt and rubbing alcohol and pouring it in there. I feel like I’m slowly being ripped apart. It’s hard to feel happy for my brother sometimes, but it’s not his fault. It’s something I have to work through on my own.

My depression now sometimes feels like an itch that I can’t seem to find. I can feel it coming on, but I can’t stop it or reverse it, I just have to let it happen and find which switch I need to flip to change the course. I discovered Linkin Park’s Hybrid Theory when I was young, and it became my gospel. They sang my feelings before I even knew what they were. These lyrics painted the picture of my realities at the time, and I felt as if they were written just for me. I felt validated for the first time, and I finally felt like I wasn’t alone. When Chester Bennington took his own life, I felt like another piece of me died, too. He did what I couldn’t, and I wasn’t sure if I was sad or jealous or sad that I felt jealous or what. I sang along with him for years, screaming my pain in unison with his. It took me a while to be able to sing those songs again without crying.

About 5 years ago, I logged back into my AOL account for the first time in probably 15 years, and everything was gone. I tried to reach out to AOL, but I guess years prior, they had done a sweep of all of the inactive accounts to free up room on their servers. All of my correspondence with my dad was now just a memory with no way to get it back to the physical form unless I suddenly develop an eidetic memory and recount all of our emails word for word. Un/fortunately, my memory resembles a slice of Swiss cheese, unable to retain anything except useless bits of information that I’ll never need while purging the important bits. It’s as if my brain is the AOL server, just constantly sweeping everything away. I think that’s probably best, though. Otherwise, I’d be reliving my worst moments every day, probably.

I’ve always felt so alone in my grief. Everyone who was feeling the loss as heavy as I was feeling it lived in Nicaragua. My mom and everyone here in the States were sad and torn up about it, but I felt like I had been literally gutted. My Uncle Mirko once smelled my head and said my scalp smelled like my dad, and I remember thinking that this should be weird, but I felt so close to my dad at that moment and so sad.

I started writing this post a few weeks ago, and since then, a lot has happened. I’m now working through another death of someone who should still be here. I’ll sit down and write about him properly later. I don’t want to piggyback him onto another post. He should have his own.

Until then, always hug your loved ones like it’s the last hug you’ll ever get, let go of stupid ass grudges, and be honest with those around you. You never know what tomorrow may or may not bring.