To my Mother,
I'll start with the loving memories.
Me and you, we've always been a team.
You were always there to provide for me
to love me.
You know me more than anyone else
sort of...
We've been through the hard and rough.
I remember you working
I barely saw you.
And when I did we walked.
To the store, the motel, the prison,
the tiny building where you would leave me at.
I stayed in a building filled with children.
I played pretend with so many unknown faces.
Those were the simple times.
Then we moved,
to a bigger town.
New faces
a new home,
that's where I met the second most important person in my life.
Grandma was there when you weren't
she was there to provide for both of us.
I met my brother and uncles, my aunts,
cousins.
Everything was fine
great, fantastic, fine.
Then he came into my life
The man you told me was my father.
He wasn't,
he is the father of my baby brother,
but not to me or my big brother.
You loved him, you still love him
even after I confessed his most horrible sin.
You still loved him.
The lines of violence and innocent squabbles are a blur now.
Those times are sort of behind us.
Now, we move on,
We move on to the 'now'
I'm becoming my own person
I'm becoming me
Slowly.
I learned how I'm like you
but how I'm sort of me
I'll laugh at certain jokes
I'll only give you what you want to hear
Listen to certain music around you
Act a certain way with you.
You only see a half of me.
But mother,
There is a side of me that I hide away.
If I showed my other half,
would you still love me same
would you love me less?
I do everything to make YOU proud.
There's something on my mind.
It eats away at me,
You told me I tell half truths.
You're right about that.
You wish for me to live a life of God.
You want me to be a good wife, mother,
Someday.
Every advice you give me is towards men,
But mom.
I'll say it now
I'm Bi,
I'm agnostic
I'm me
I'm your daughter.

-Love,
Your forever loving daughter, Alyssa.