For Her

I've been thinking lately, that maybe you don't understand my side. Maybe you don't think about anyone but yourself and where you are in life, what you need in the present.

There will come a day when you realize you've alienated those who would have been there for you through it all. You've burned the bridges connecting you to your family, only calling when you need something. You called your dad for money for your apartment, even though you complain that you have no time to do anything else because you're working three jobs and taking a few summer classes. Even though I've tried multiple times to contact you, and in multiple different ways, I always get excuses like "I'm really busy right now" or "Hey, I'm out with my sorority sisters, so I'll call you back tomorrow."

But do you? It's been at least two months since I tried to talk to you the last time, and you still haven't bothered to try to return my messages. You're so caught up in your own life, in your own problems, that you never look back to see how your family is. Sure, you saw your siblings and parents the other day. For how long?

When's the last time you talked to your father's mother? Did you bother to ask how she'd healed and how she was doing after her ankle surgery, when it'd been broken in three places? Did you send a card, which would have costs whatever a stamp costs these days if you'd have wrote a letter on a piece of paper and made your own little envelope? What about the rest of the family, who is caught in the middle of a feud between two of the individual families? Or the cousin who owns the property we camp on, which you're so eager to get to for a vacation? He hit a deer on his motorcycle a few days ago, skinned up his back bad enough so that one of his tattoos is destroyed; the bike doesn't sound like its salvageable, though the engine might be; he has three cracked ribs, is in constant pain trying to breathe, yet he wants to go back to work less than a week after the accident.

On top of all the others, there's me. The one you vowed to never lose contact with, vowed that we'd always be close as sisters. Just yesterday, "me" found out that in order to fix the pain in my knees that has me taking Vicodin daily to make it through, I have to have surgery. So the next year to two years of my life are going to be very trying and painful.

But obviously you don't care enough to make time to learn these things, or keep connections open with your family. I hope you don't expect us to make a huge deal over you when you do finally come back. I can guarantee I am not the only one who feels this way.