TM 166 - Do you believe in ghosts?
Feb. 21st, 2007 10:26 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
166 - Do you believe in ghosts?
((A private letter, locked to
admiral_adama. Contains spoilers for episode 3x15, "A Day in the Life".))
Dear Dad,
Thank you for the books. I can't really begin to tell you just how much it means to me to have something of Granddad here with us. I can guarantee that they'll find a proud and prominent place on a shelf in our quarters, and I wish I could promise that they'll see action sometime soon. But like you said, one day, there'll be time. Time when we'll all get to try or be things we always thought about.
It means a lot that you saved them in the first place, too, Dad. I know that you and Granddad had your differences.
And I know that we have, too. So, I guess I also wanted to apologize about earlier, in your quarters.
See, I had no idea that today was yours and Mom's anniversary. Believe me when I say that she never made any kind of fuss or remembrance over the day.
There I go again. I suppose that even after this long, there are things we can't put away or forget and things that still hurt even when they've been done a long time. But now that I've calmed down a little, there are probably some things I should explain or maybe even take back.
I said that Mom never loved you. That's unfair. I know what I saw in that wedding picture, and I know what I remember from before the divorce. She loved you, but maybe not in the right way for a marriage and a family, and definitely not nearly as much as you loved her. I know that because, well, otherwise you wouldn't have let us stay with her. You thought she'd keep being a mother. You didn't guess that the little mood swings would get worse and worse. You figured that she would step up and be strong.
She didn't, Dad. She wasn't. She was angry. And resentful, too, I think-- at you for leaving and letting her define her life by your career. At us for being your sons and looking like you and still believing in "the Great Adama". Maybe even at herself for ending up where she did. Whatever it was, she used the bottle to try and dull it down after you left. It only worked sometimes.
I think that's some of the reason I would get so angry with you. You left us, and that hurt. But you left us with her, and that was worse. For every time I thought I never wanted to be like you, there was another hope that you'd come and take me and Zak away to live on a battlestar. Can you imagine that? A nine year-old kid on a battlestar?
Now I think I get it. When you love someone, you see them the way you want to see them. You know they have faults and problems and baggage, and you know when there's the potential for disaster and you know all the thousand reasons why you should turn around and walk away. But you don't. And you make them, to you, the person you want them to be. Love's blind, isn't that what they say?
Maybe it's time I "visited" with Mom, too. Time I took a few old things off the shelf, put away a few old ghosts and replaced them with things that matter more.
Thanks, Dad.
Your son,
Lee
(566)
((A private letter, locked to
![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
Dear Dad,
Thank you for the books. I can't really begin to tell you just how much it means to me to have something of Granddad here with us. I can guarantee that they'll find a proud and prominent place on a shelf in our quarters, and I wish I could promise that they'll see action sometime soon. But like you said, one day, there'll be time. Time when we'll all get to try or be things we always thought about.
It means a lot that you saved them in the first place, too, Dad. I know that you and Granddad had your differences.
And I know that we have, too. So, I guess I also wanted to apologize about earlier, in your quarters.
See, I had no idea that today was yours and Mom's anniversary. Believe me when I say that she never made any kind of fuss or remembrance over the day.
There I go again. I suppose that even after this long, there are things we can't put away or forget and things that still hurt even when they've been done a long time. But now that I've calmed down a little, there are probably some things I should explain or maybe even take back.
I said that Mom never loved you. That's unfair. I know what I saw in that wedding picture, and I know what I remember from before the divorce. She loved you, but maybe not in the right way for a marriage and a family, and definitely not nearly as much as you loved her. I know that because, well, otherwise you wouldn't have let us stay with her. You thought she'd keep being a mother. You didn't guess that the little mood swings would get worse and worse. You figured that she would step up and be strong.
She didn't, Dad. She wasn't. She was angry. And resentful, too, I think-- at you for leaving and letting her define her life by your career. At us for being your sons and looking like you and still believing in "the Great Adama". Maybe even at herself for ending up where she did. Whatever it was, she used the bottle to try and dull it down after you left. It only worked sometimes.
I think that's some of the reason I would get so angry with you. You left us, and that hurt. But you left us with her, and that was worse. For every time I thought I never wanted to be like you, there was another hope that you'd come and take me and Zak away to live on a battlestar. Can you imagine that? A nine year-old kid on a battlestar?
Now I think I get it. When you love someone, you see them the way you want to see them. You know they have faults and problems and baggage, and you know when there's the potential for disaster and you know all the thousand reasons why you should turn around and walk away. But you don't. And you make them, to you, the person you want them to be. Love's blind, isn't that what they say?
Maybe it's time I "visited" with Mom, too. Time I took a few old things off the shelf, put away a few old ghosts and replaced them with things that matter more.
Thanks, Dad.
Your son,
Lee
(566)