Yep, when your life pretty much unravels, it is time to repeat Ozzy Osborne and say, Mama, I'm coming home. These past twelve years have been a learning experience. I've enjoyed them. I hated them. The best part was being there when my daughter Bethany was born almost four years ago. The worst part was discovering that I had been loved not for who I was, but for what I had (and when I no longer had it, it was goodbye.)Since me and Bethany's mother are like two magnetic north poles, I shall depart the household, hopefully by the end of the month, and return to my native Georgia (not the old Soviet state) and begin afresh. It pains me to leave a child. It has been a hard decision. But I have nothing here in North Carolina. No future except to be a mill operator all my life. I think not. I'm better than that. I wasn't ready to continue school after highschool. I am now. There is so much I want to do, so much that I want to be, that if I don't leave and make it happen, it never will happen. My dreams and successes will be just dreams envisioned and never enacted. And I believe and have solid faith that I will be a better father to Bethany if I do this. Insofar, I plan to study physics, do some drama--I'd love to act--and I want to be a part of movie making, from screenplays to directing, to acting. I think it is about time I made my dreams come true. I want to reach people. I want to make people think, or rethink. I want to make an impact. And most of all, I want Bethany to understand this. I think she will. My greatest fear is that she will assume that I am abandoning her. But, of course, I will remain in communication with her always. This experience is not new to me. My sister actually did abandon her first daughter Tara--leaving her with her father--moving to New Orleans, and later New York state (and finally back home.) While home once, I had the misfortune to hear my three year old niece crying in the night for her mother. I have never felt that much anguish in my life as I tried to console her. I beleive I felt everything she felt and I cried just as deeply. It doesn't have the be the same way in my situation. I'm not going to let it. I know my actions (including the future divorce) will hurt my daughter, but I know that trying to cling to a relationship that is a lie will hurt her worst. The best possible future for us both lies in me moving away to make my life, and subsequently hers, better.
I just wanted to share that with you. (Who needs therapy when there is the Internet?)
------------------ "What is that? A tank?" --Our Lord and Savior David Koresh, the Second Coming snuffed out before He could any good.
Posted by Sol System (Member # 30) on :
I wish you the best of luck, Paul.
------------------ "Have you ever seen a bloody egg? Glass in hand, laying up in bed?" -- They Might Be Giants
Posted by The_Tom (Member # 38) on :
*really hates it when he has to be so uncreative in a response, but this is probably the best I could use*
What he said.
------------------ "You're not quite evil enough. You're semi-evil. You're quasi-evil. You're the margarine of evil. You're the Diet Coke of evil, just one calorie, not evil enough." -The good Doctor and his son, Scot
Posted by Kosh (Member # 167) on :
Good luck Paul! I think you are doing the single most difficult thing any person could do, leaving a child you love so much, but in the end, as you have said, it will be the best for her as well as for you. The one thing worse then a broken home, has got to be an unhappy home.
------------------ WHO ARE YOU?
Posted by Charles Capps (Member # 9) on :
*grimace*
Posted by Jubilee (Member # 99) on :
In the end, what it comes down to is that the decision that is the right one does not always make everyone happy immediatly. You need to do this, and I think that It's the best thing for your daughter, as well. I wish you the best of luck and i'm sure there are lots of us praying for you. :-)
------------------ "It is important to get up when you fall...for this much I know to be true: That thing we call Failure is not in the falling down, but the staying down."
Posted by Baloo (Member # 5) on :
Thanks, Jube! I couldn't have said it better myself. (So I didn't. Sometimes it takes me a while to ramp up to a relevant thought.)
Paul, you are in our prayers (those of us who pray) and thoughts (those of us who think, anyhow ).
--Baloo
[This message has been edited by Baloo (edited August 03, 1999).]
).