Bittersweet

Yesterday we went for quite a ramble. We drove Hwy 52 along the Ohio River, stopping at interesting places to take pictures to share in an ongoing Twitter thread. The kids call this live tweeting I think?

We stopped at the Meldahl dam just in time to watch a tugboat push four barges piled with coal through the lock. The river is high enough that the dam was open so we didn't get to see the lock in action. We stopped in Ripley, which was a major stop on the Underground Railroad, and nearby Shawnee State Park for some pretty shots of nature. We followed the winding river up into the Appalachain foothills to Plymouth where we ate amazing pizza at a funky little pie joint.

From there we caught Hwy 23 north to Chillicothe. We stopped at a rest stop hoping to get a good panoramic view of the rolling hills, but the tree line was in the way. Rude. There, Sgt. Hubby reminded me that this was the same Hwy 23 that runs down to Johnson City, Tennessee (said with Wagon Wheel inflection, of course), which reminded me that it's also the highway that continues to Asheville, where I was born. (And hence my affinity for the Appys,)

I am very proud to be from Asheville. Even though I didn't grow up there, I always told everyone I was from Asheville. Both my mom's mom and my dad's parents lived there so I spent summers and Christmases and Thanksgivings there. I moved back after high school to attend UNCA. It is a wonderfully funky, hippy-dippy, artsy-fartsy town and the surrounding Blue Ridge Mountains are the most gorgeous backdrop.

When Sgt. went overseas, I moved back to the area with my sons, then 2 and newborn. I say the area because I didn't actually move back to Asheville. I moved to the tiny town where my paternal grandmother was born and raised. My family history goes back several generations in that town.

But my Granny was a ballsy lady. She left town when she graduated high school and moved to the DC area of Virginia to attend secretarial college while serving as domestic help for a cousin. That's where she met and married a Department of the Treasury accountant who went on to join the Secret Service. They moved back to the area -- and by that I mean actually Asheville -- upon retirement. I practically grew up in that house on Hillview Circle.

They sold that house and bought a house in Granny's little hometown when I was 13. I think Grandaddy knew he wouldn't outlive her and wanted her to be near family. He died a week or so before I graduated high school and I went to live with her while I was at UNCA, but I was still an Asheville girl.

Eventually I left North Carolina to follow my soldier and while I was pregnant with Nut 1 Granny died suddenly in her sleep. My parents inherited the house and a few months later -- when Nut 1 was a newborn, Daddy died after a long battle with liver disease. When Sgt. went overseas, that is the house I moved to with the boys.

My mom stuck around for awhile to "help" with the boys (she wasn't much help, actually) but we were too much for her and she moved to Tennessee to be near her mother and brother. And that's when things fell apart. The boys were taken into foster care about a year and a half into Sgt's 2-year tour. I fell into a deep depression. I did stupid things. I already told this story and I don't care to revisit.

I know that the unfolding of my life wasn't actually my fault and I really did the best I could parenting three non-neurotypical children, and I know that even if that weren't the case, I can't change history, but I can't seem to let go of the guilt and shame of having my children taken into custody, of being a failed parent, of losing my sons. (They aren't dead - they're living down south and failing at adulting. They just aren't a part of my life, mostly by their own choice,) I don't know how to do that.

So, realizing I was on Hwy 23 in my beloved Appys was bittersweet. Can I go home again? Can I ever unpack this? Will I ever be able to go back to Asheville without stirring up all that pain? I haven't been back since I left to move to Ft. Bumfuck, so I don't know. If I turned right to go south instead of north to circle back home, would I be okay with that?

We went north, of course. I found my panoramic view. I took more pretty pictures and posted them to my Twitter thread. I came home to a bottle of chilled dry white, put my feet up on the porch, and did some Saturday porch drankin' with Sgt.

I have a good little life here. And I think the Girlchild is going to be okay -- she's actually in therapy now by her own request. I also will be okay. But I don't know if I'll ever be able to really unpack that bitter from the sweet.