Hope

A few days ago I was talking to my mom about her sister, my aunt. Back in the day my aunt and I were very close. She was also very close to my mom. I grew up with her kids, my cousins and for a long time they lived next door to us. Then things went bad about 8 or 9 years ago as things sometimes do in families. Things got complicated and people said and did things that shouldn't have been said or done and then silence began between two sisters who were so close for over 60 years. Unfortunately, the silence started right before my son's second birthday so he never really got to know his grand aunt at all. He has met her and she has held him as a baby but he doesn't remember her at all. In fact, he told me that he forgot that his grandma had a sister. He heard us talking and only then did he remember that she had one.

He asked me basic questions of what she looked like. I had a picture that I showed him and then the questions got harder. He asked what happened between her and grandma and how come they don't talk anymore or why she doesn't visit. I really didn't know what to tell him. I didn't really want to rehash the exact story. I thought it would be too much for him to understand. Heck, I don't even understand it sometimes. I didn't want to make the story so simple that it would just lead to more questions from his little inquiring mind that I know I wouldn't have the answers to. I pondered that question in my mind for a minute and then I told him that sometimes things happen in families and with friends that make a person angry so angry that they can't talk to the person for a while until they aren't angry anymore. That was the best I could come up with. I really didn't want to get into who did and said what. He would learn that when he is older. I am sure that someone will give him that blow by blow but until then I thought that he didn't need to know now. I hope that never happens but knowing this family I am sure that one day someone who knows will communicate the whole terrible story to him. 

Of course, he asked more questions and I changed the subject casually. I am not sure if that was the right thing to do but I did it nonetheless. I told him that maybe one day he will see his grand aunt again. I hope that someday he will and that someday his grandmother and her sister will talk again and all of what happened back then will be water under the bridge but in reality I know it probably will never happen but one can have HOPE.