Memorabilia

This morning I was cruising around Facebook and a friend had posted about her young daughter’s choice of Halloween costume. This is another girl named Hannah (it’s a popular name). My Facebook Friend said something like “Hannah passed on the princess costume and chose the Jedi costume instead” and there was a cute picture of her little girl wearing her Halloween outfit choice for this year. When I read the first few words — Hannah passed on — I got so shocked and scared that Hannah had died during the night like Sarah did that I could barely focus on the rest of the post. Why was she wearing a costume? I had to read it several times to understand and assure myself it was something mundane and Hannah was still alive. It’s not my friend’s fault that I would read her mundane post that way. It’s just my damn PTSD.

I still think I’m doing well, I’m even managing not to pick at my face (see yesterday’s post), it’s been almost two days now so the sores are healing up well. The last two days have been very busy helping Dad move into his new apartment at the community he chose not far from here and help him get set up. Today the three of us (Max, Dad, and me) are going shopping for a new couch for him.

Dad as always brought with him a big folder of “memorabilia” for me. Old papers, letters, drawings, school report cards of mine throughout my lifetime. I’m flattered that Dad kept everything that I ever sent to my parents. But Dr. Z thinks I shouldn’t go through any more of this memorabilia because the last time my Dad brought down a bunch of this stuff for me there was something in it, I think a letter between my mother and me, that triggered a lot of sadness and anger and I really got very upset after reading it. My relationship with my mother was really so rocky and that fact makes me sad now that she is gone.

Well, I couldn’t resist going through this stuff and looking into the past, and I was reading through the pile yesterday evening. There was a book review in it that I wrote in 5th Grade and was published in a children’s journal of some kind. In it I talked about the plot of the book and I said something like “The girl in the book prefers her father to her mother.” It was a bit of a nonsequitur in the review. It made me feel sad that my psyche was sort of hanging out there for all to see when I was that young.

Sarah adored Max. I think she adored me too, of course, but I had no problem with their having a special, close relationship and her thinking she was his princess and his special girl and so forth. I encouraged it. Shouldn’t a little girl have a wonderful relationship with her dad?