lookingin.

i've spent a lot of time wishing i was more like my mother, rather than like my father. everyone compares me to him for everything, from how much i like to sing, to my tendency to be the center of attention, to my love for working with children, to my sense of humor. all of it goes back to my dad. in fact, my dad and i were like.. best friends for a while. we went everywhere together - singing gigs, his preaching engagements, book shopping, out to dinner, just out for drives, talks.. we were amazingly close. part of that was because it became painfully clear to us that we only had each other left. he'd lost both of his parents, i'd lost my mother and maternal grandfather (who was 1/3 of the dream team that had mainly raised me up until age eight) and i don't have any brothers or sisters... it was really just me and him. so we kinda HAD to be close... we didn't wanna lose each other. i feel like i HAVE lost him in a way, though. i'm very glad he got remarried, and this is no slight against my stepmother whatsoever.. but he's really more concerned about spending time with her than spending time with me now. i've been practically begging him for time for us to be together and the answer has gone from "soon" to "i'm just busy" to sometimes "stop bothering me". man... it hurts. i used to brag about him and how we were hangout partners and such... now? now we don't even go anywhere just the two of us. we talk every now and then, but most of the time i have to come to him. he comes to me now and then, but... i don't know. i really wish i could get him back...

but this isn't about me and him. this is about me and my mother. my birth mother. do you know what it's like to reach for a memory of someone and realize that you can't clearly see their face in your mind anymore? that the only way you get a crystal shot of what they look like is from pictures? it's like being sucker punched in the chest. and on top of that guilt is the guilt that i'm not like her enough. my mother was really neat. i can't keep my room clean for a week. my mom was REALLY pretty. i do't know aout myself... i'm not gonna beat myself up over my looks, but i don't think i live up to her looks at all. i don't act like her enough and, worst of all, i never got to know her as a person. i only got to know her a a mother. had she lived, i would've been just recently learning about who she was as a woman, as a human being, not just as my mother. i remember that her favorite color was yellow and that she loved The Beatles, but... i don't remember anything else. i can't. i can't think of too many specific moments with her... i remember some, but they don't feel like enough.

today, my godmother said i looked like her... sent me two photos... one of me right before my prom with make up on... and one of my mother with makeup on sometime before i was born... and she's right... but i don't feel like it's enough. i don't know... i just want to be able to be someone like my mother. i want to be able to talk to someone about this and actually know they understand or that they're trying to and not just staring at me helplessly.

i want my mommy :(


peace.