DIDN'T CHANGE ANYTHING

Dear Spike:

It’s 5 a.m. I’m having some trouble sleeping, but I didn’t want to wake you or your mother (you’re both snoring soundly in our bed, at the moment) so I’ve moved into your bedroom.

It’s snowing again outside. Just past your window, the bare branches of the lilac bush have captured thick, cottony clumps of snow. All the surrounding rooftops are frosted white. There are even layers of ice ballanced upon the powerlines that run from roof to roof in our neighborhood.

Later this morning we’ll go for a walk in the snow. And perhaps we’ll catch breakfast at the cafe on the other side of the park. Then, in the afternoon, I’ll go pick up your Aunt Kelly and Uncle Eric at the airport. She’s here for a meeting in Park City on Monday. He’s coming along so that we can go snowboarding together.

I’ve been struggling, over the past few weeks, to figure out how to explain to you everything that is going on with Kelly and Eric. More than once, I’ve sat down to write this letter and then stopped, bewildered by the challenge of making this all make sense. Indeed, I’ve found myself relieved that there’s really no rush to put this into words. And I’m not certain what I would do if you were older and I had to find a more immediate way to explain why your aunt and uncle are getting divorced.

I presided over Kelly and Eric’s wedding. I welcomed our family and friends. I spoke briefly about why they’d chosen to get married. I stood beside them as they recited their vows and traded rings. And then I turned to Eric and said, “You may now kiss my sister.”

He’d been kissing her for some time already, of course.

There is family you get and family you choose. Eric was family we got. Kelly chose him and, fortunately, we all fell in love with him. And so long before the wedding, I already considered Eric to be my brother.

In that way, their marriage really didn’t change anything.

And in similar fashion, I guess, neither will their divorce.

At some point — and this is the part that I have struggled to explain, so perhaps it is best if I should not even try — Kelly and Eric decided they couldn’t live together anymore.

It was a shock to our family. It was difficult to know how to respond. It was frightening to think that I might lose my brother and that you might lose an uncle who loves you very, very much.

I suppose that we are fortunate that your aunt and uncle are still friends — best friends, they say. Although this makes their decision all the more difficult to understand, the grief I feel for their marriage is assuaged by the understanding that I am not losing my brother and you are not losing your uncle.

And in some ways, we are gaining something.

Love is not a prerequisite for family. Not in the legal sense, at least. Regardless of how I felt about Eric in the past, he was my brother in law.

Now, he’s just my brother.

I can no more predict the way things are going to unfold with Kelly and Eric than I can tell you how much more snow we’re going to get, this winter. I don’t know if in the future they will visit together or separately. I don’t know if they will always remain such close friends as they are right now.

But whatever happens, I’ll still have a brother and you’ll still have and uncle who loves you very, very much.

The snow’s stopped falling now. The sun is about to rise. It’s a beautiful day outside.

A good day to visit with our family.

Love,
dad