570

One year, six months, 22 days.

81 weeks.

13,680 hours.

820,880 minutes.

A seemingly insignificant set of digits, merely a footnote to life for most, but a number of such significance in my own life that the tale associated with it must be told. Please indulge my ramblings for a short time while I explain it's importance.

Day one honestly started entirely too damn early. The day had rapidly been approaching far faster than I would like to admit and before I knew it the time had come. Being a soldier all the days before day one were a blur of PT and road marches, cleaning weapons and buffing floors, sleeping on dirt under the night sky and blowing things up. Time seems to pass slowly when you're doing those things, as exciting as buffing floors may be, but as with most things the days were a blur leading to the commencement of this tale.

I was actually sleeping rather peacefully those hours of the early morning, a feat that has always been a rarity in my life. The house was quiet and cool and the windows fogged when I was roused from my slumber by two words, “It's time.” Still in the haze of sleep I murmured, “Time for what,” a phrase that would later be used in the company of stranger, friend, and family alike as shot against my intelligence. Throwing on some clothes and rousing the house guest sleeping across the hall, I set off down the stairs and into the night. As the grass crunched beneath my feet on the way to the car, I looked into the blanket of stars held aloft by the early hours that cold Kentucky December morning and smiled knowing that this was indeed the day.

Several hours had past, and the sun had continued marching towards it's apex behind gray Tennessee skies, when standing in blue jeans and an over sized sweatshirt, tears streaming down and with heart racing, I uttered the words I had been waiting to let loose for months, “Hi. I'm your daddy.” That moment is indelibly etched on my being. Every flash of color, every scent, every detail no matter how minute is permanently a part of who I am. It is a perfect memory. One of such rare happenstance that one is lucky to be blessed with them but a few times in the course of existence. Inevitably these moments come either in times of most joyous celebration or in the depths of our deepest tragedies.

The next 568 days were filled with so many happy memories that to tell them in their entirety would take more words than I have the ability to write. They were filled with first words and steps and a first birthday. It was filled with a fourth anniversary and the first day that I hadn't worn a uniform in some time. There were some really good times in those 568 days. But day 569 was anything but.

The details of the moments leading up to the final seconds of day 569 have fallen away into the background of time. All the things I had done that day seem so insignificant when compared to the enormity of that moment. As I crawled into bed next to the woman with whom I had been bound in matrimony to for 1537 days to that point, laughter escaped her lips. It was the laugh that one has when hiding a joke from someone. That nervous laugh that often accompanies off-color jokes, political speeches, and dreadful moments.

“I filed for divorce today.”

The laughter flowed freely at that point. It built to a crescendo of cackles far more likely to be found emanating from the evil protagonist of The Wizard of Oz rather than the mouth of the woman who gave me the child sleeping blissfully unaware in the next room. The world came crashing down atop me, suffocating all happiness and all joy and instead filling me with anger and rage. Somehow I managed to control the brunt of my anger, even at that horrid moment I knew the innocent child that I had first held in my arms only 568 days earlier needn't be awoke by her parents loud words.

“How could this be?” I asked. “Where we not happy? Hadn't I been a good husband and father? Why are you doing this to me? Why are you doing this to us? What did I do wrong? Don't you love me?” All these things I asked, I pleaded, while my voice strained and quivered and tears sprang at the corners of my eyes. But she just stood there, dismissing each question and each plea as easily as one dismisses a waiter after the check has arrived. In the end the only answer as to why that she could give was that she just wasn't in love with me anymore.

And as time crawled to a standstill I crept into my daughter's room where she lay sleeping. The night light burning from the socket across the room bathed her in a warm glow. She lay there peaceful, silently unaware that her world had so quickly been torn asunder. In those late hours of day 569 I sat on the floor next to her crib, my forehead pressed against the slats of her cribs, and I reached out to touch my child.

I tried to relieve that first day over in my mind. I wanted, no, I need that perfect moment. If only I could recall all those details then maybe I could forget about it all. In vain I closed my eyes and wished that day into nonexistence and I tried to cling to that perfect memory. I silently cried out to God, to Allah, to Buddha, to nothingness, “Please let this all be some horrible nightmare! Please let me wake up! Just let me have that one day back!” But there was no relief, no salvation ever came. The only sound was that of my beautiful child sleeping, her chest rising and falling, and my sobbing which filled the rest of that night.

As the dawn broke on day 570 I set out to collect whatever things I could. Clothes, toiletries, and various bits and bobbles were shoved unceremoniously into bags. Within hours my mother and my sister arrived and helped me load those things into her car. All the while my beautiful baby girl watched the proceedings and wore a look of wonder and of excitement. Inside that beautiful little mind, hidden beneath the curly locks that bounced atop her head, I am certain she thought we were all going away somewhere, perhaps on some fun adventure, maybe someplace new. But as her daddy, the man that introduced himself to her only 569 days before, held her tightly as still more tears rushed down his cheeks, something in her told her that this was wrong. Her daddy was sad and he was going away without her. And as he walked to the door crying she screamed out “Dada no!” Her arms reached out clutching at arm, willing her father not to go, not to leave her.

I scooped her up and kissed her cheeks as she started to cry. I tried to tell her that it would all be alright. I tried to console her in those last moments, to reassure this tiny little person. But she held on tight refusing to let go. Using what little strength I had remaining I held my daughter for one last moment, told her that I loved her, and gave her to her mother.

The sound of my daughter crying and screaming “Dada no” as loudly as she could followed me as I closed the door.


If somehow you have managed to hold on for this long, please just indulge me for another few moments. As I've written this tale and relieved these memories I know that you can imagine the tears that've flowed from me. Tears of both pain and of joy. It is now late, but I wanted you to know this about me, to understand this about me. I want you to know that these two diametrically opposed memories are among the ones that most shape who I am. And if you have held on this long, you are probably wondering why I chose to write this.

Today, October 15, 2008 is the 570th day since my son was born. He is as old as his sister was when that most horrible of memories took shape. 570 days I've spent with him, growing, learning and loving. Much like day one with his big sister, I remember every detail of the momentous day that he was born. It's a perfect memory as well. I hold onto it just as tightly and vividly as I do her's. Now everyday from today is uncharted territory. Everyday from today is something new. But despite all the wonder that lay ahead, in the back of my mind as I watch my son develop and grow I'm going to wonder more now than ever about what I missed starting on day 571 with his sister.

The pain of that horrid day 570 days into my daughter's young life will never be erased, but I hope that the joy and the wonder starting today with the 570th day since my son was born will somehow make it more bearable.