Broken Family

As I sat in ‘my’ bedroom in our newly inhabited ‘home’, staring at my plain, white and meaningless walls, I could not help but think back to the one moment in time where all of this began. The day that my family fell apart; the day I was informed my parents were splitting up.

“Corrie, Ryan, can you guys come here for a second, there is something your father and I wish to discuss with you;” my mom had said all those years ago. My seven year old self and four year old brother had been happily playing together in our playroom, something that now is a seldom seen occasion. We had both reluctantly dropped our Lego’s and race cars and had joined our parents in the family room.

Now, looking back, I find it somewhat ironic that the room in which my family was torn apart was in fact called the family room. However, as I’d bounded into the room with my happy-go-lucky air about me that day, I was completely unsuspecting of the consequences which this conversation was to have on my family and the rest of my life.

Had I been looking and observing, I would have noticed that my parents, whom had always appeared to be a happy couple, were sitting as far apart from each other as our family room furniture would allow. But I was not looking or watching; and consequently was not suspecting of what my parents were about to throw at me.

I had immediately jumped up onto my dad’s lap and had begun chatting non-stop. “Daddy, look! Look at what I made at school today,” I’d said, holding up my newest piece of second grade art, scribbles on a piece of blue construction paper. “And guess what, I learned how to spell Wednesday today! When you write it, it looks like Wed-nez-day. Wanna hear me spell it. W-E-D-N-E-S-D-A-Y.” I had recited proudly.

“Very nice,” both of my parents had praised. “Listen kids,” my dad had then uttered before I could continue sharing every tiny detail of my day. I did not interrupt him when he cut off my story, something I would normally have done. I guess it was because of my senses. Somehow, when you are at that young age you have some kind of sixth sense, a little voice inside your head alerting you when there is danger or when it is a time to be serious. That little instinct had told me to keep my mouth shut and let my dad talk; he had something important to say.

“Okay kids, your mom and I, ummm, well; we’re going to try this thing called a Separation. That’s when mommy and daddy try and spend a little time apart from each other. Mom is going to go live in the condominium that we have for a little while. Okay. This doesn’t mean that we don’t still love each other, but we do need to take a little break. And we both still love you very, very much.”

“Okay,” my brother and I had responded. At the time I couldn’t see why my parents thought that this was such a big deal. They’ll just spend some time apart and then mommy can come home and we’ll all be one big happy family again. I’d thought. Simple as that. So why do they look so sad? Then it’d occurred to me that they were going to miss each other while they were apart. Yes, I’d decided, that’s the reason why my mommy and daddy are so sad.

“Do you two have any questions?” my father had asked, glancing first toward me then turning to my brother. For some reason he’d had trouble looking at either of us for too long.

My brother and I had looked at each other, and then declared confidently “Nope.”

“Okay then.” After the awkward silence that followed, my dad had chosen to speak again. “Hey, I have an idea, before mommy goes away tonight why don’t we all go and have an ice cream at Lib’s.”

“Yeah!” my brother and I had cried excitedly.

“I want a chocolate vanilla twist!” I had declared confidently.

“Okay then, grab your coats and let’s go,” my mom had said as she’d herded my brother and I toward the door to get our coats and into the car. I had been so excited and in such anticipation for our little frozen treat to come that it did not occur to me that this trip officially marked the end of my family as a whole. If I had known that, I surely would not have eaten it and in so doing, eaten the remains of my broken family.