on the divorce & being the black sheep

out of my brothers & me, scottie was most affected by my parent's divorce. my dad had been distancing himself from the family for a couple years before finally getting the balls to leave. one weekend in june of 1998, my mom took my brothers & me on a mini vacation to rural pennsylvania. when we got back my dad was waiting in the driveway. as my brothers & i piled out of the van & into the house, i heard my dad say that he had to talk to my mom. we were so happy to be back home; we were too preoccupied to notice that dad's belongings were missing.

when my parents came back in the house, my mom was still crying. my dad lead us into the library, the room unofficially designated for computer use, piano playing, & christmas morning. he told us that he had already moved out. he had rented a condo about 30 minutes away, a really small place, but we were welcome there at any time. he said not to worry, that it wasn't anything that my brothers & i had done; this was all between my mom & dad. he started to cry, for about the third time i could remember in my 16 years of living. everyone was crying, except me. maybe because of my dry cheeks, my dad felt most comfortable asking me to come with him to check out his one room apartment in echelon, right down the street from the doomed & deteriorating mall. i agreed to go because he was my dad. i never said no to my dad. i never said much of anything to him.

i wasn't surprised too much by the separation. i had seen it coming. i noticed that the time dad spent around the house had become increasingly less. at night when they thought i was sleeping, i could hear my parents arguing. my mom asked my dad about an address on his parking ticket, & why he was out so late. my dad loudly & angrily denied any kind of wrongdoing, claiming that my mom was being paranoid & ridiculous. a few years later, my dad finally divorced my mom & married the woman, with 3 young kids, that lived at the address on the parking ticket. 

scott was 11 when dad left. we all felt abandoned, but scottie, being the youngest, had been without a father figure for years. my dad traveled a lot with his job. he would be gone for weeks at a time, come home for a handful of day, & have a new international destination in store for his already saturated passport. it felt normal for him to be gone. in school, when scott was asked to describe my dad for father's day, he said that dad like ties & suits; that's all my brother knew of our father. 

a few years later, when dad got remarried, he refused to go to the wedding. but he ended up spending the most time with my dad & his new wife & family. steven & i went off to college, leaving scottie to console our still grieving mother. he was forced to spend time with the dad he hardly knew. he became the liaison between my parents, & a step-brother to 3 kids who adored him. but what he truly wanted is his family back together. 

scott, particularly later in life, was probably considered to be the black sheep of our family. but i recently heard that there really aren't any black sheep. these "outcasts" are simply the most sensitive & emotionally aware kin. they end up embodying the rest of the family's joys, despairs, angers, shames, excitements, love. they feel so deeply & truly that sometimes it is hard for others to accept, particularly if they are trying to forget. i now see scott as the delicate & passionate brother & son who wanted to relate to each one of us without inhibition. we were too scared to be so exposed... to feel so openly...

may we all become the black sheep in our families.