An Unmatched Shoe

Sometimes I don't feel like I belong in my own family. I think it mostly has to do with everyone having a partner, or belonging to a unit. This becomes more and more apparent to me at the holidays, when all my local family members gather at one sister's house. And while of course having a husband or significant other would solve the problem -- it's not the only thing that would.

Everyone seems to be matched with someone or someones. My oldest sister has her husband, and/or her daughters. Her daughters have each other. My other sister, whose house we gather at, has her husband and her daughter. And that daughter -- that daughter used to be my partner, used to be my matching shoe -- has her husband and son. And on and on with my brother and his wife and two kids.

When I first moved back to New York, it was sometimes so hard to go to Syracuse and spend time with my niece and her baby. We're so close in age, and we've always pretty much wanted the same thing personally -- husband, baby, family. When I first came home, and saw her with all of it, it was hard. Sometimes too hard. Sometimes I would find myself crying all the way back to Ithaca, feeling an empty part of my heart, wondering what I did in a past life to not deserve having it all, too.

And so rather than deal with that, deal with that unmatched shoe feeling, I've decided to take myself out of that situation. Out of feeling lost at the holidays. And I'm going to Richmond for Christmas. Part of me -- the PMS-y, feeling sorry for myself, over-tired part of me -- wonders if anyone really cares that I won't be in Syracuse. If they'll even miss me. And of course they will -- it would just be nice to hear, I guess.