I'm sitting by a fire again.  My very own fire, built by yours truely.  I'm not quite as happy as last time.

My sister graduated with a top-notch degree today.  I'm so proud of her.  She's overcome dyslexia and her childhood.  She's gone from needing help to giving the help.

My issue is seeing her family.  They used to be my family, a long time ago.  I was 10 when her dad, who I knew as my dad, left me.  Our mom left him because he was terrorizing me.  One of the nicer things he said was telling my mom she can't even stand "the Bitch"... me.

I never stopped loving him.  Not when he took my sister to Disneyland a couple months after the divorce, ignoring me when he picked her up for the trip.  Not when he ignored the stranger whom had just touched my boobs.  Not when he slammed my face into the bottom of the tub because I didn't clean it well enough. And I didn't stop loving him years later, when he hung himself.

When he left me, so did his family.  They went on the trip to Disneyland, too.  Did anyone even ask about me?  Were my cousins looking for me or did they forget about me, too?

Seeing them today, I'd say I was completely forgotten.  That means both of my dad's, real and the one that felt real, are gone, leaving behind family that abandoned me, too.

So while I'm sitting by a lovely fire on a nice night, I'm not feeling very warm.