My family has gone from small to large and back to small. Being young, it was hard to understand that my father had left. As I got older, my friends always asked me who my dad was and where he was. All I would ever say is “I don’t know and I don’t really care.” But I did. I wanted to know why he left. Even after being told time after time that it wasn’t because of me, I still felt like it must have been me.

Once I turned 15, my father decided to contact my mother. Looking back, I wonder how he knew how to find me. Why didn’t he try to call me before? After a week I met my father for the first time ever. When I met him, I didn’t really care. We met at a AppleBee’s by the bar. The sweet smell from the kitchen lingered to where we sat. My mom and I waited. As soon as my mom saw him, she knew that it was him. When I saw him I didn’t know what to do. I still didn’t care about what was happening. As he has down he said, “Hello Trish.” I look up at this strange looking man, that looked nothing like I thought he would. I didn’t even say anything. He asked me many questions about school and things I liked. This lead to me say, “well um.” I didn’t know how to react or answer any of these questions.

Soon I started to meet my dad’s side of the family. I fell in love with my great grandmother and grandparents, but I still felt that gap. Knowing that they all knew how to find me killed me. I hated that he acted like

Soon I learned that I have 2 half-sisters. A few weeks later my great grandmother died at the age of 95. After I heard “You look like I did when I was younger!” from about all the women at the funeral, I met my two half-sisters for the first time, I could tell they didn’t like me much. At that point, I still didn’t care about what these people from a foreign land had to say about me. When I saw them my first thought was, “They look like our dad--this is how me and them are connected.” When I saw them I tried to see what made us look alike. Looking at these two overweight girls, I didn’t see anything we had in common. They looked like my dad and I look like my mom. I could tell that they had grown up having anything they wanted. I wasn’t that lucky, if I got something I would be grateful for what I had gotten.

When I meet someone I try to be very polite and nice, but not these girls. They each gave me a stuck up look and walked away.  I could’ve lived my whole life without ever even knowing their names. Once I knew those two names, I knew I had entered a terrible beginning of a short story.

Somehow I had ended up friends with them on Facebook. Not remembering how it happened, I was in shock when I logged on to find a message from one of my step-sisters named Alex. I wasn’t even a day after our great grandmother had been put in the ground before my so called family started a fight with me. She went into detail about things like “We can’t be friends because we have similar names” and “You should know how unlucky we are to have the father we have.” They made it clear that because I knew that side of the family this meant we could never be friends or even ACT like we were friends.

If anyone knows anything about me, then they would know that if someone says something to me I have to reply. Every action has an equal and opposite reaction, also known as Karma. So when I replied, I talked about how I was sorry about how her and her sister looked like our father and that we don’t have the same name so there shouldn’t have been a problem. Her whole name is Alexandra and how is that so similar to her?  Also that if she didn’t think we could be friends why contact me? So we met once and she acts like she knows everything about me now?

See, if she would have gotten to know me before she jumped the gun, she would’ve known that I had just met those people who are our family. That I didn’t even stay in contact with those people. After she replied 3 more times with the same comebacks as the first letter, she got our other sister to message me. She went into what Alex had said to me the day before acting like I was the one who said the rude things first. She talked about how Alex was the bigger person. To be honest, I wouldn’t have said anything mean to my half-sister if she wouldn’t have said something to be nasty to me.

Weeks went by before I even talked to my grandparents again. Once I saw my grandmother, I had to tell her about what had happened with my half-sisters. The only feedback she gave me was, “I should’ve warned you about them two.” This made me wonder if no one in that family cared about them, because of how nasty they were. Will I ever know? I don’t think I care enough to find out.

One of the things that was good that happened with my grandparents, was I was able to get braces. I had braces for two years. I almost said this was the last time I saw them but then I remembered. About a year ago, my grandma on my mom’s side fell and broke her hip. This began the slow downhill slide to her death. After being in the hospital for months, she got moved to a nursing home, I still believe this was why she didn’t gain her health back, the back to the hospital, then back to another nursing home where she died almost a year since she had first gone to the hospital.

When I walked into the wake, it smelled of death and older people. Not exactly old people, more like middle aged people. The people who aren’t quite young but not old enough for younger people to worry about them. The dark colored walls held up painting of roses and flowers. Every 15 feet or so there would be a door to a room so that they could have more than one wake at a time. The doors were a off-white that made them look old. The floors were covered in a dark purple carpet. You would think it would be be wood or tile, so it was easier to clean but I guess not. After a long day of sadness and hugging people who had once known my grandma at the wake, I heard a little boy call my name as I turned I saw my little cousin running towards me to hop into my arms to give me a huge hug. I had never been so happy to see my grandma, grandpa, aunt, uncle, and little cousin from my dad’s side.  This finally showed me that my dad didn’t care. The one thing he could’ve shown support for me, he didn’t show up. Then I went even longer without seeing or talking to that side of the family till my 16th birthday.

On my sixteenth birthday, as floods of cards came in the mail, I noticed that I didn’t get a card from my father. I’m not the type to call people out on things but I had to I rushed up to my room and produced a message to my Aunt telling her to inform my father that I thought it was a little rude to not send his daughter a sixteenth birthday card after only knowing her about a year. Not remembering your daughter’s birthday when your parents know and your sister knows, shows you don’t care. After this point I lost that little piece of hope that was left.

It’s almost been a year since I contacted anyone on that side of the family. I haven’t gained any type of hope or love for those people because I had lost it all after I turned 16. I learned that even as you get older it doesn't get easier. But also that most the time the way you think of people, is different than how they really are. It isn’t always bad but it can be at times. I’m happy with my family of 3, and I don’t mind it that way.