Conversations with Angel

Last week, my niece turned 3. 3! And today we talked on the phone all about her birthday and how she got a Thomas the Tank Engine play set, and how she goes to school now and she's such a big girl, and oh yeah, she loves Happy Feet because the penguins dance. I didn't understand most of it: Evangeline has a significant speech delay. Her little brain works faster than her mouth can move on the best of days, and when she gets excited ... well, let's just say all that usually comes through is, "Woohoo! Oh Gosh!" and a bunch of jabber I can't follow.

Oh, I try: when she chatters away, I listen ever so closely for one word, one phrase, to tune me in to whatever it is we're talking about. Then I can take the one word and extrapolate a topic. If I hear "train," for example, I know darn well we're talking about Thomas: she's obsessed with him. Then I can keep the conversation going. But I have to tell you, this doesn't always work. If I'm to be completely honest with myself, Angel probably thinks I'm stupid half the time, because she's clearly telling me something of overriding importance and all I can respond with is, "You did? That's so cool!"

Now, the speech is being worked on. She has a speech therapist, and a few weeks ago she started 2 full days per week at a special-needs preschool while her amazing Mama, whom I swear wears some kind of invisible superhero cape, kicks butt in nursing school. And the work is working. Today I got, "I went to school!" and "I watched Happy Feet!" And today, I got the best present ever: She called me Aunt Tif for the first time, and I actually understood her.

Now, this would melt any auntie's heart, I'm sure. But for me, it's extra special. For those of you who don't know the back story, I'll try to sum it up: most of my family these days is family I have chosen. We have no blood ties, no common ancestor. I've heard it said that family matters most because blood is thicker than water, but that's not entirely accurate. Family matters most because whether you spring from the same tree or find one another later as two trees from two different forests, love is thicker than everything. 

I have a biological brother. His name is Matthew, and he's 24. But the way our lives were, growing up ... we're not close anymore. We haven't spoken or seen one another in almost 8 years. Last Christmas, when he had the chance to come in and tell me hello, he stayed outside in his truck. There's a chasm of pain there for him, and it's too wide for him to cross. Oh, I love him: I love him so much I try not to think about it, because it rips my heart out. I dread his birthday every year, because I can't help but remember the adorable little boy he was, all dark eyes and dimples, and how I always felt so much older, so protective. There are memories ...

One night, when our father came home drunk and he and our mother were having a screaming match in the living room, we both crept out of our beds and stood unseen in the hallway, watching, worrying. I was behind him with my arm around him, and in the split second before Dale hurled a flashlight through the wall, I covered his eyes so he wouldn't have to see.

I read him bedtime stories; his favorite was Mudpie's Big Adventure, about a little dog who goes on a picnic. Then he had a love affair with Horton Hears A Who. He loved the Disney version of The Jungle Book and used to go tromping around singing, "Colonel Hathi's March." It's funny how I remember it, the way I remember it, as if I were a little mother instead of a 7 year-old girl who hid in the basement most of the time and was scared of the world. I was determined that he would come to no harm. He was my brother, dammit, and anything that wanted to get to him would have to go through me first.

For a long time, Matt and I took care of each other. Then we had to push apart each for our own survival, like two boats in a narrow pass. We have not come back together. I still hold out hope, but with the way things are likely to be for a good long while yet, when I get nieces and nephews from Matthew, they will be in name only. I will not get to hold them, rock them, sing them silly songs, talk to them about Thomas the Tank Engine. I will not hear, "Aunt Tif" from their mouths. So when I heard it today from Angel, I nearly cried.

Her Mama didn't have to let me be an aunt. If circumstances had been just the slightest bit different, Chelsey and I never would have met one another. I wouldn't get an exorbitant amount of pride from calling her my baby sister, from knowing that her children are forever my niece and nephew. I love Chelsey fiercely for this honor: I would do anything, anything at all, to protect her and those beautiful babies. I think everyone has at least one person they would stand up and die for; I have at least 3. At least. Because when it comes down to it, heartache and hardship aside, I am a blessed woman. I wouldn't hesitate one second to say, "Take me instead." For Chelsey, for Evangeline, for Gideon, for Elizabeth, for Lou, for Michelle, for my brother Matthew, even now -- for them, I would stand up and volunteer to die. That is how I love; that deeply, that ferociously. Maybe you think I'm just being dramatic, but I cannot love any other way.

Today, Angel called me Aunt Tif. And if I went through decades of blood and pain and terror and loneliness just for that, just to hear those words from that baby's mouth -- well, that's the best argument for Providence I have, because it was worth it.

Lina and I share a smooch for the camera last Christmas.