I’ve never stopped looking for you. Although everyone tells me that I shouldn’t. Time passes and I still search for you. Especially when I’m at my lowest for some reason. Even when I’m surrounded by people who I know are actually there for me. I look for you even though I don’t even need you anymore or expect you to want me to. I feel like I should have some type of solid hatred towards you and rid myself of all that I know about you, but I don’t. I have preplanned, mapped out, rode buses during late nights, walked long winter blocks, left letters in mailboxes, and even dragged my sister in the heat of the sun’s rays when we were only teens to locations that don’t even exist anymore. Addresses I found that you have one lived, but only to find myself back at square one all over again.

I can’t imagine what it’s like to be able to give up your own children. I grew up running down so many pencils, writing/venting sometimes about how much I wish I was never born. Being adopted, becoming a foster child, having to pick up and take care of myself. You know, you may have regretted that one night you gave yourself to a man with curly brown hair like mine, but I am the result. Sometimes I wonder how it happened. Were you under the influence and didn’t know him at all. Were you an addict? Perhaps  you were actually married to him. What if it became too much to raise me? What if you were raped? Out of my other 6 siblings, what if I was your only mistake? On top of all of that I don’t know anymore about my father than I know about you.
When I look at the only picture of you we have the same eyes, cheeks.. It shifts from feelings of being hopeful and yearning to numbness and despair. Sometimes I wonder if it would make you happy to know the woman I’ve become. Would you even remember me? What would we even say to each other?

You will never know how many nights I spent crying because someone had changed, betrayed, hurt, or walked right out of my life. You will never know that I still claim your last name like I was adamant that it belonged to me. You will never know if I’ve found real  love or how difficult my teenage years were for me. How I had to go through child loss, and even went through a time where I lost my sense of self. Days spent living with caretakers, who instead of taking care of me, had poor judgment and made terrible decisions over me. You will never know of the men who used me and hurt me down to the bottom of my soul. I had no one in my corner, and I had
to grow up being the child and the parent at the same time while you have long forgotten me.
I don’t know why I still look for you.

Illustration by: Fatima Seehar
Copyright 2019 Valerie Sanchez