20 Years Ago...

I was ten years old the first I was in a court room. I remember looking up at my mom from the stands. She was crying so hard I couldn't tell what she was saying. Just angry tears filling the desolate silence of a room filled with strangers. I can remember trying to contort my long lanky frame into a little ball. Trying to make myself invisible through the masterful art of evasive slouching. I had my church shoes on. I don't remember any feeling of sympathy, any longing to comfort her. I just remember the embarrassment, my cheeks red and heavy with shame. I remember the relief I felt when she stepped down.

I remember when you took the stand. I remember my uncle's big hand grabbing mine and telling me to stand up. I didn't want too. I didn't understand. He wanted you to see me. To see my sister. To have our image emblazoned into your nightmares. The way yours was emblazoned into ours. You never looked at me. You never looked up. No one did. Not you. Not the judge. Not the courtroom filled with our families publication of grief. I have never felt more invisible then standing in that court room waiting for you to apologize to me, for killing my dad.

You might read this and think it is a sad story, but I no longer see it in those terms. It is a mark of time, a passage of growth. It is the A.D to my B.C. It is the birth of my self-awareness, my appreciation of life, my sense of justice, my distintion between dreams and nightmares, my feeling of self-preservation, my search for understanding...

It is not tragic. It just is.