Christmas 2012

December 24th 2012

Dear B,

It is Christmas Eve. Lisa could not stay the night so I am all alone again on a very dark and cold night. I have all of the holiday lights on including both trees... even the bubbly lights. I miss you. It's not that I miss you more as time goes by or even less. It has just leveled out and I just plain miss you and I don't think there will be anything that can change that fact. And there shouldn't be. A parent's love for their child should be forever, regardless of the circumstances, as bad as they may seem or get.

But some days are much harder than others to deal with. Today and especially tomorrow will be a couple of those days. Days where I just don't want to wake up and face the reality my life is.

It hurts knowing the last few things you ever said to me were hurtful and even borderline hateful. The fact that we didn't spend much time in the last year together didn't help either.

Since your mom and I split where you were barely 1 year or so old I fought for your rights. I fought to make sure you got a fair education, food in your stomach, clothing to keep you warm, and a place to call home for at least on the weekends. I continued to take you to dance lessons and always made sure you never went without.

I knew that when your mom got married things could change and you might get attached to your new "step" dad but you didn't. In your early teen-aged years you were very vocal about coming to live with me full time which I took as a sign that I was doing something right as a parent.

Then when "we" bought our house... no, our home, I thought I had a good chance at really focusing in on being a full time parent. Your mom had already been fostering multiple kids for a few years and even adopted a couple by this time. I can understand how you felt left out most of the time. When you were here with me there was no competition from the other kids. Sure you loved them and they even looked up to you but you felt that mom should have paid extra special attention to you being her only natural born child. And you know what? I get it. You had every right to feel that way.

It took the threats of a law suit towards the Fall River public school system, countless meetings with officials in both school districts, (Your mom's and mine) and a lot of money and effort but your mom finally let you come to live with me on a full time basis. That meant you could go to a town school at an accredited high school instead of an inner-city school with thousands of students and not enough books to go around. Instead you were one of only 600 hundred students with a great faculty to student ratio and more than enough books to go around.

It was the Christmas break in your Freshman year just a short four years ago. Your mom had her hands full with the adoptions and foster kids and didn't put up much of a struggle. Not unlike any other holiday visitation your mom and I would split the break down the middle with you returning to your mom's to return to school. Except this time you stayed here with me.

I'll never forget signing you out of your former city school and the rudeness of the faculty. You could feel the hostility in the air. It's no wonder they have five full-time city police officers and two drug-sniffing dogs assigned to that one school.

The transition to the new school went a bit smoother. Sure you resented the guidance councilors at first but I think over time you grew to appreciate all that they did for you. By the second term of your Sophomore year you had settled in and even made some close friends.

I finally felt relieved and complete. I was at a point in my life where I felt I had won this great battle that I had been fighting since you had been born.

But instead of things being OK between us they started to deteriorate rather quickly during your Sophomore year of high school. I couldn't relate to what you were going through. But In reality I think I could but just didn't see it at the time.

Now I am realizing I didn't know what I was doing. Like most people raising their first born child, it really is by trial and error. Most parents pull from prior experiences when they were raised by their own parents. I didn't really have those experiences to pull from. I led a very unhappy childhood. In fact I was happiest when I was with my grandparents. Your great-grandmother accepted me unconditionally whereas her only child, my mother didn't.

That still troubles me to this day. A child is supposed to have their mother's unconditional love period. I didn't have mine and you didn't have yours.

It's all hindsight now.

The few times you approached me to talk I felt cornered and on the occasions I approached you I got the same reaction I gave you. We never seemed to be in sync and or ready to completely discuss things out in the open truthfully, We both felt the discussion had to be done on our own terms.

I wish you were here so I could have this discussion with you now.

Well... I've said it here and that's about as good as it gets I suppose.

It's two past midnight, officially Christmas.

Merry Christmas honey.

 I miss you and love you so much.

-Dad XO

Dinner without you.

December 22nd 2012

Dear B,

I'm attempting to make some semblance of the holidays by hosting another one of my dinner parties. I have invited almost a dozen people this year and I am not related to a single one. Just a few short years ago the holidays were spent with almost all family around the table. It doesn't feel as odd as I thought it might.

I haven't spoken to my parents in the past six months. I finally gave up after reaching out to them on countless occasions prior to these last six months. Jay-Jay, your great-grandfather has been gone now for almost five years. I'm sure he would be disappointed and deeply saddened and I wonder what he would have to say about all of this.

It was also about a year ago that I finally confronted my father about the abuse he put me through as a child. I was hoping it would open the doors to some honest conversation and air out some of my families past secrets. Instead he pulled over on the side of a busy interstate and yelled at me to get out or shut my mouth and never bring it up again.

Your grandmother and I haven't really seen eye to eye since Jay-Jay's death and even some time prior to him getting sick. Who am I kidding, my mother and I were never close. Not even as a child. She never took an interest in what I was doing. It was always her vs. me and since she was the parent she was always right and got to have the final say which was usually, "Wait till your father hears about this when he gets home from work. We'll see what he has to say about all of this." That usually meant a beating before or just after dinner.

Then there's my brother. He has three, no four kids? He and I spoke years ago in grandma's driveway after Jay-Jay's funeral. I told him to keep in touch and that I had tried many times to reach him  n the past. He just shook my hand and wished me well fully knowing he wouldn't be reaching out to me for any reason.

I don't expect to hear from any of them any time soon if ever.

Very little is under the tree this year. Yes, I got another tree. They were cheap everywhere this year. I guess a lot of sellers got stuck with inventory last year. Lisa and I picked out a tree in under five minutes. It took more time to cut it down. I have just about finished decorating the house. I even put your white tree, the one with the green lights on the second floor landing like you and I had talked about doing. I only put branches in two thirds of the tree so as to set it in the corner giving people enough room to walk up the stairs. You can't even tell! Of course there's no one here to walk up the stairs any more. It's just me in this big house. This big beautifully decorated home that echoes of past memories.

I just don't know how I'm going to make it through the holidays again. Everyone is so cheery in church. Sometimes it is so hard to meet their enthusiasm with even a slight smile. People that are familiar with the situation feel uncomfortable around me and there's no way around it. So either I can feel all self-conscience and pretend that everything is normal or just be my broken miserable depressed self. One heck of a choice if you ask me.

It's not even noon and the coffee has gone bitter again. I guess I'll make another cup and finalize the prep work I have for tomorrow's dinner.

A dinner without you.

I miss you and love you.

-Dad

Five Days...

December 20th 2012

Dear B,

There's only five days left until Christmas. Five. Yet it doesn't feel like it, not at all. This will be our second Christmas apart. Last year I was still in shock and in denial and went through the motions of the holiday season only feeling a numbness clear through the early Spring of this past year.

I've had an entire year in my life without you now and nothing has changed. With the college break upon us, you would be home for the holidays possibly traveling from some far away college. You would be filling our home with  the wonderful smells of freshly baked cookies and more pies than would fit on the counters. We would be catching up on the local town happenings and you'd have stories of your own from school. We would power shop for last minute gifts and hang Christmas cards from people we had forgotten to send our own cards to vowing to make sure they got one the following year. We would laugh at the silly stuff. To only be able to hear your laughter again.

Instead I find myself numb again. Not from the cold, but from the thoughts of going through the motions again, alone. Walking through crowded stores with all of the festive merry-making everywhere you look. Witnessing all the families coming together and seeing the smiles on their faces. It's just to much for me.

After a year you would think that after almost a year of grieving I would have gotten a bit better about this stuff but in fact slipped into a further depressed state.

What am I supposed to say when people ask me how I'm doing or when they ask me about you. Some people still don't know the situation. What is worse is when someone asks me how you are and the minute the words leave their mouth they remember what happened. I can see it in their eyes.

It's late and even though I don't have any plans for tomorrow I am going to go rest. Something that I have been doing a lot of lately.

I miss you and love you.

-Dad

Letters to B - Chapter 1

 

Chapter 1
 

It is cold.

December 14th 2012

Dear B,

As I watch the events of the morning unfold in Connecticut's elementary shooting via a live stream on CNN, I am deeply saddened. The death toll is over 20 and the news reports state that they are primarily children and there are more students unaccounted for meaning the death toll could rise. The reporters are comparing it to Columbine, but saying it is much worse. The authorities still don't know if there is more than one shooter.

Tomorrow will make one year that you have been missing from my life. I can only imagine the pain in these parents hearts as they learn that their six or seven year olds won't be coming home today and are instead laying lifeless in pools of their own blood in classrooms that are supposed to be safe havens for them.

Their lives cut so short, their entire futures ahead of them, and now they are gone. Gone forever.

If there was one thing I could tell these parents it would be, "It doesn't get any easier, the pain you feel now will be with you for the rest of your life."

So close to Christmas.

For the past few weeks I have been attempting to decorate the home which was once ours for the holidays. On some days I have sat in front of the totes of decorations and cried for hours. On other days I manage to unpack a few things and put them up.

The freshly cut Christmas tree is finally up. Decorated in all white lights the way you always liked them. Lisa and I went to the tree farm a couple of weeks ago and it only took about 10 minutes to find this year's perfect tree. You would like Lisa and I think the two of you would have gotten along. She's kind and considerate.

I have also put your artificial white tree, the one with the green lights, up at the top of the stairs. Each night when I light it I think of the day you asked me to buy it for you. We were at Kmart and it was well after Christmas and I think the seasonal decorations were up to 75% off. You said you wanted a white tree and that you were going to decorate it with all green lights and green ornaments. I thought it was a crazy idea but at 75% off it was a great buy. That year you had it set up in your bedroom and when it was lit at night it made your already green bedroom walls glow even greener if that was possible.

I had actually been making good progress earlier this week and fixed multiple sets of nonworking lights and strung them around the house. You always laughed at the amount of time I spent troubleshooting broken sets when it would have been easier to just buy new sets every couple of years once they were marked down after the holidays. Then I came across your stocking and money Santa. Those were tough moments. I felt sick to my stomach and couldn't do any more that day or the next.

I miss you. I miss your smile, your laughter, and the sound of your voice. I miss cooking dinners with you. I miss the desserts you would make. I wish there had been more time for everything. I wish there had been more time for us.

CNN's online news ticker is now reporting the death toll at 24. I just closed the stream on my computer. I don't need to know any more for now. Death is meaningless without reason.

How will these parents live their lives moving forward? How have I made it a year? How I will get through tomorrow is unknown.

I miss you and love you.

-Dad

Letters to B - Back Jacket Cover

Letters to B - from dad to daughter takes you through a journey in time. Suddenly facing life without his only child, Glenn finds his world turned upside-down and inside-out affecting him emotionally, financially, physically, and psychologically, a father seemingly left without a purpose.

Relying on past coping techniques for his bouts of depression, some good such as therapy, support groups, church, and friends, and some bad, alcohol and drugs, he continuously struggles on a day to day basis.

At the onset of the holiday season and the anniversary of his daughters disappearance, the pain is only intensified. Succumbing to the darkness seems to be more of a valid outlet then any other.

Its only after he finishes a blog update titled: "If I woke up dead would it really matter?" does he realize what must be done.

Glancing at a copy of his first book,  What it Means to be - STUCK IN NEUTRAL - A lifelong struggle, he takes to the keyboard once more. Willing himself to move forward, he begins a letter to his beloved daughter. What follows is an emotionally filled series of letters that takes you through their life together and how she changed his life forever not once but twice.

If you are a parent or lost someone dear to you, what would you say to them if you had the chance.

Read and relive this man's journey through the letters he writes to his daughter in Letters to B - from dad to daughter. A man's search for his daughter, himself, and his purpose in life.

Letters to B - About the Author

About the Author

Glenn Silva, 45, author, blogger, columnist, photographer, self-employed, semi-retired network engineer, - spends most of his spare time restoring his 1920's Victorian home on the East Coast, collecting sea glass while going for walks on the beach, and dreaming about the life he should have had.

His personal blog can be found at: http://as-seen-through-these-eyes.blogspot.com/
Glenn can be contacted at inspired.images@ymail.com.

Letters to B - Prologue

Prologue

I'd like to say that the reason for writing this book is because of the sheer demand for it. The final pages, no, the final sentence in my last book What it Means to be - STUCK IN NEUTRAL - A lifelong struggle left the reader anxious and hopeful for what was sure to be a follow up book. If you haven't read Stuck In Neutral, which will be most, if not all of you, I encourage you to do so. That could be a daunting task to say the least. But I assure you this is not a continuation where my last book left off although I will include events that did in fact take place after the final chapter of Stuck In Neutral. In fact, this book isn't even being written in the same style. So it isn't a sequel. Not at all.

The "Reason" I have written this book is twofold.

The first is simple; I have much to say, in fact so much that only by writing it down can I get it out of my head and into the space that is not in my head.

I wrote this book in the event something happens to me. I wanted to tell a story, my story to the world in the hopes it could save someone from traveling the same dark roads I've been on and ending up well... at what I'll call the dead end to life as we know it. This book is a safety-net of sorts. I always thought if I wasn't here to tell my story, who would? Now the book would. It was simply getting all my thoughts on virtual paper and not having to retell them ever again.

The second reason isn't as easy. It kept me from going crazy. Now this isn't unlike the first reason at all but a bit more complex.

Let me explain...

I wrote the first draft of Stuck In Neutral in less than 4 months. What started out as a two page homework assignment turned into an entire book. It not only kept me focused but it got me out of bed in the morning and gave me something to look forward to do each and every day. It kept me from going crazy and also prolonged my life by almost three years to the date.

The recent events of the last year have all but destroyed me emotionally, financially, physically, and psychologically. As my life began to unravel what seemed to be the last shreds of cohesion here on earth I started to look at what it had amounted to. I truly felt I had given it my all. I had gotten back up each time when life had knocked me down over and over again. I had loved and lost, and loved again. I had been at the right place at the right time on more than one occasion in my life. I had also done what seemed to be the right thing at the moment only to realize down the road I couldn't have had worse timing. I had journaled, Blogged, and eventually written a book about it all.

What I hadn't done is followed through and gotten it published. I shopped around the self-publishing options, copyrighted the title and my work, and even filled out the application for obtaining my own ISBN number. It has been read by a very limited audience and everyone who has read it agrees it needs to get into the mainstream and be published. It will get there.

Letters to B was born in a similar fashion. A suggestion of sorts from an associate. This book has kept me from falling into the abyss during its creation. It has kept me from opening the door to which there is no return.

It is my hope that whomever may read this understands that pain comes in many shapes and forms varying in degrees. It is also my hope that the majority of you take solace in the fact that you will never feel first hand, the pain I have felt and live with. No one should.

No one should lose a child...

                                         at any age.

And now... Letters to B.

SIN Publishing - The Birth

This is home for where all things relevant to SIN Publishing will go.

The follow up to [What it means to be "Stuck In Neutral" A lifelong struggle] will be posted here in its entirety.

This will include notes, rough drafts, indexes, research material, cover pages, unused chapters, extras, etc.

The working title at this time is: ["Letters to B" - From dad to daughter]

Other titles including but not limited to [Dying 100 Deaths in 100 Days] and ["B" - Gone] are still being considered during the initial draft.

Comments, questions, and open discussions are welcome and permitted as long as things stay civil. It is at the author's discretion that at certain times these comments, questions, and discussions may be deleted without prior notice or consent from the OP - Original Poster. (After all, it is my BLOG.)

Anyone who significantly aids me in the completion of this, my second book, will get a personally signed copy upon completion of the book in its entirety. This will be an advanced copy before being made publicly available in any store (brick and mortar, or online). It is still unsure if this book will be made available in the Kindle format or other e-reader format for that matter. It is also unsure if this will be released as an Adobe Acrobat file - .PDF seeing it will already here online.

The estimated time for this project is 6 months to a year with certain guidelines to be met along the way. The first full working rough copy (draft) should be completed no later than May 29th 2013.

No less than 8-10 working hours per week will be spent during these first 6 months. This is a minimum of 208-260 hours of writing.

Thanks to all in advance for your kind thoughts, prayers, advice, criticism, and support.