The Fourth Child - Session 1

(Beep. Music fades in)

I think I need to adjust your expectations appropriately. Because, well, I went in this order for a reason. Maybe you know that, and maybe you think you know the reason. After all, it seems so obvious.  Birth order is more than acceptable. It feels fair. There’s no need to make judgments about whose more important or whose more in need. It’s all dependent on time: a force that humans cannot control or influence. Marching in stride with it means being truly and utterly neutral, as long as you don’t miss a single step. 

It’s a nice thought, but that’s not why I did what I did. There’s another reason for it. And simply put, it meant that you would be last. And I wanted that, not because I didn’t like you or that I didn’t want to talk to you. I just don’t know what to say. I… I know I shouldn’t get it wrong. For either of our sakes.

But don’t worry about that. Right now, I mean, don’t worry about me. I’m here for you. I’m here to get you through this. 

Don’t worry about me. This isn’t about me. Though I understand why you might think that. 

(Music fades out and new music fades in)

To a great extent I see aspects of myself in all of your siblings. Grief is highly personal, but it also isn’t. There’s something universal about it. It’s an experience that no person can escape from. It’s a price we all must pay for the love we feel in our lives. As much as I hate to say it, they are the two complementary parts to one whole. And I don’t know what to make of that.

Because obviously that’s no reason to let loss swallow you up. We all know that. We recognize the danger that loss poses, the deception of those siren songs whose melodies rise up from the murky depths, and all the while, we fight to keep our ships on the right path, for the sake of ourselves, our crew and all those who love us. As we walk through this valley of darkness, we know what we have to do. I’m not saying it’s easy. I’m saying that it’s known. Other parts of it, not so much. We can see it. I can see what comes next. I can see the rocks ahead. But I don’t know how to navigate around them. And as much as I enjoy referencing Greek mythology just to make a point, I don’t have a reference for this struggle. For the nightmare that is seeing my own face staring back up at me from the ocean that wants to swallow me up.

N–Not me. It’s you. We’re talking about you. You need me. You need me to get you through a storm I don’t understand. The sirens are behind us, but the rocks are ahead. Some other threats are ahead, maybe. An extension of me, of us. We are not the problem. But we are the key to it, are we not? Or maybe we are the problem. We certainly think we are the problem. Or we are worried that we are a problem. Not just have a problem but have outright become it. 

Because if our grief does swallow us up, what will it leave behind? What will it make us? This feels like a transformative force, not unlike any force of nature. Especially while we’re so young. And maybe it already has. 

(Music fades out and new music fades in)

I was younger than you are when my father died, but I think I can remember him. It’s been so long, but there’s a part of my soul that has held on against overwhelming odds. And it is the strongest part of me. Sure, the memories aren’t crystal clear. But I remember his love for me, and mine for him. I remember being what they call a daddy’s girl, though I am well aware that such a phrase has its problems now. Unfortunately. But that’s who I was at that time.

There’s a time in all of our lives when making an identity for ourselves is just beyond reach. We’re still developing the capacity that we would need for such a thing. And so, while we wait for those to come in, we borrow pieces from everyone else and reflect back onto them. I didn’t have an identity of my own as a child. But I had him. And that was good enough.

(Music fades out) 

Until I didn’t have him anymore. And then I didn’t know what I was. Not even ‘who’ I was. I wasn’t even at that point yet.

(Music fades in)

But fast forward to me now. And I still carry this hurt and pain. I carry the trauma of having watched my father die, of his ongoing illnesses before that, and the implications of the simple fact that my birthday was his last good day. I carry the weight of all those tears yet to be cried. I carry the weight of so many hospital memories. I carry the weight of invitations to events he’ll never go to. I carry a thousand small shards of glass and reap the consequences of it.

I don’t want to only be the girl whose father died, not just because I don’t want him to be dead. That would be great, but that ship has sailed. I mean I don’t want to be defined by my own heart aches. No one does. Certainly not you. I heard that plea of yours. And you’re not the only one to utter it. I know you came to this session with the hopes that somehow I could tell you that that wouldn’t happen, that you wouldn’t be so changed by this moment, by this grief, that despite how young you are, this is not going to rewrite your life, rewrite yourself, write over your future, forever marring it or outright changing it. You wanted me to tell you all of that.

I want to say it to you, but I don’t know how. I know it can be sa–done. I know it can be done. I know it can be done, okay? It’s just going to take me a while to figure it out, right? For both of us to figure it out.

But there are days I don’t cry for him. That’s something, right? And I have my own life now. I have a career and a relationship. And a way of being in the world. So it can be done, right? You won’t always be the girl whose father died. I just don’t know how to get you there. But I’m coming. And I’ll take you there myself. I promise.

(Music fades out. Beep)

The Oracle of Dusk is a production of Miscellany Media Studios with music licensed from the Sounds like an Earful music supply. It was written, edited, produced, and performed by MJ Bailey. And if you like the show, tell friends about it or the quasi-friends that are still on your social media feeds because social norms evolved before words did, am I right?