Your greatest joy is sorrow unmasked. 

Kahlil Gilbran

If you read my posting “I Was Here“, you know that my sister Peggy passed in 2011.

We had a unique relationship that was shaped by two significant events:

• In 1966, she gave me life.
• In 1972, she gave me a chance at life by giving me my parents, Minnie and Dred Wilder. For that I am eternally grateful.

If our Dad were alive and you asked him to describe Peggy , he would tell you Peggy was a person that  truly lived the phrase “Do You” because no matter the reward or consequence, Peggy was one person  who always was Peggy and did what Peggy wanted to do.

For anyone that met Peggy, they would tell you that she had a presence, a swagger. You remembered meeting her.

For those that knew Peggy well, who she allowed to the see the core of who she was, they knew the dichotomy of her. On one hand, she was the most frustrating and demanding person you would ever meet. But on the other hand, she could be a  loving, funny, and thoughtful person.  She would give the best and the last of what she had.

Like all of us, Peggy sometimes made decisions that didn’t have the best results; however, before she passed, she was able to have some essential conversations that allowed her to acknowledge the impact of those choices and I know that it gave her some peace.

She and I had one of those essential conversations and as I ponder on the words that we spoke, I now understand the dynamics of our unique relationship.

I Now Understand…

• As a perfectly imperfect 49-year old parent that is lost at times about what is the right thing to do for my son,  I truly appreciate now  that  at 18, Peggy didn’t know what was right for me because she was still trying to figure out what was right for her.
• Parts of her had been broken by tragedy and trauma, so she shut down the part of her heart that hurt the most – loving me.
• Parts of me had been broken by tragedy and trauma, so I shut down the part of my heart that hurt the most – loving her.
• What I deemed as anger for her not loving me, for not keeping me, for not choosing me, it was just a little girl who didn’t understand that she showed me the  greatest love by  giving me parents that could provide me what she wanted to give but didn’t know how
• When I shared with her my anger, my hurt, my tragedy, she felt my anguish and wished that she could wipe it all way.
• When she told me that she loved me, I didn’t want to accept it but I knew within my being that she did.
• That in all the ways that we were different, we were and are alike in what matters.

Is there someone in your life that your relationship is not where it needs to be?  Is there someone in your life that you need to have an essential conversation with?  If so, remember that life is short.  Instead of waiting for a tomorrow that may never come, do something today:  Say the one that thing that really matters in the end, ” I now understand.”