Dear Diary

November 1988

Age 8

Dear Diary,

I didn’t mean to be bad. I just wanted to win at hide and seek. Now Daddy is sad, and Mrs. V and her daughter say I’m a liar. Even Daddy says I lied. But I didn’t, Diary! I didn’t! Daddy said maybe I need new glasses because I couldn’t have seen him kissing Mrs. V the way he used to kiss Mommy. Even though Mommy and Daddy got a divorce Mrs. V is still married and Daddy says it’s not okay for him to kiss Mrs. V. He said I never should have told her daughter because it made her cry. Now I’m crying because I don’t lie, Diary. Daddy and Mrs. V never heard me sneak in the kitchen and hide under the table while her daughter counted to ten. I tried to tell Daddy I didn’t lie, and I would never lie to him, but he kept saying I couldn’t have seen it. But, Diary, I did see it! Now I have to tell Mrs. V’s daughter I made it up. I don’t understand, Diary!

November 1988

Age 8

Dear Diary,

I apologized to Mrs. V’s daughter. She’s still mad though. She won’t play with me anymore.

February 1992

Age 12

Dear Diary,

I found my first diary buried in my closet today. I haven’t had a chance to read what I wrote all those years ago. School is awful and I can’t wait to graduate. Only a few more years.

April 1997

Age 17

Dear Diary,

My sister accused our dad of having an affair with Mrs. V. I told her she was crazy, and they are just friends. They’ve been friends since I was little. School still sucks but it’s almost over!

October 2019

Age 39

Dear Diary,

My dad had a stroke today. He’s living with me now. He’s re-learning how to use a fork and he can barely walk but he’s still Dad… sort of. Mrs. V has been pushy. I know she’s his best friend, but she isn’t the one making all his meals and cleaning up the accidents he has when he can’t get to the bathroom. She didn’t have to quit her job and become his full-time caregiver, Diary.

June 2020

Age 40

Dear Diary,

Today, I remembered what I saw when I was eight years old. I was cleaning cookie crumbs off the counter and wincing at the increasing volume of the TV Dad keeps on all day long. I am exhausted every day and I am devastated at how different the dad I know now is from the dad I used to consider my hero. Mrs. V is constantly sending me emails and text messages of things I need to get Dad to do or try. She seems to think he can get better. The thing is, Diary, Mrs. V hasn’t been here day in and day out for the last two years. She hasn’t watched her hero slowly regress into a needy, forgetful, frail shell of who he once was. I dug out my old diaries and I have been reading them. I feel betrayed all over again.

June 2021

Age 41

Dear Diary,

Dad died today. I didn’t go the hospital after the ambulance took him away. I called Mrs. V and she was with him when he took his final breath.

July 2021

Age 41

Dear Diary,

I’ve finished clearing out Dad’s things. I found love notes between him and Mrs. V, old plane tickets for trips they took together and hotel room receipts. I can match them to the lies they told. They even had nicknames for each other. It should have been her cleaning out his things, boxing up his clothes and selling his vehicles. She should have been the one driving him around, arguing with doctors, making phone calls, paying medical bills and sorting prescriptions. I should have sided with my sister all those years ago, but she’s gone now, and I can’t tell her she was right.

July 2021

Age 41

Dear Diary,

The funeral was today. Mrs. V came with her husband and daughter. When she got up to speak, I stood behind her with a comforting hand on her back as her daughter stood to the other side. She seems to have forgiven me for what I “lied” about all those years ago. I listened to Mrs. V cry her way through memories of Dad as I looked out at her husband sitting in the pew. He had to know, right, Diary? How could he not? Their affair lasted for over thirty years. I kept wondering how he could have been so ignorant. The irony of my thoughts are not lost on me.

November 2021

Age 41

Dear Diary,

It’s been thirty-three years since that fateful entry, Diary. I am left with more questions than answers. I am not angry anymore, but the anger kept me going. I am now overwhelmed with a deep sadness for the fact that my dad hid a huge piece of his life for as long as I can remember, and I don’t know why. I’d have to imagine the thrill of the secret was long gone. Every night that he went to bed alone, did he wish she was laying by his side? When it was me that accompanied him to his appointments, did he long for her hand to hold during the bad news? As he began to look back on his years, did he regret his minimal time spent with the woman he loved? During his last moments, did he appreciate that it was Mrs. V. and not me at his side? I’ll never have all the answers, dear Diary, but I’m certain the answer to all of these questions would be yes.