Connecting the Dots

Whenever a new history is written, the old histories all have to be thrown out. Robbing people of their actual history is the same as robbing them of part of themselves. It's crime!

                             — From 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami

Denial

The girls now had to accept this new way of life as the norm. They had to learn it was best (and safer) not to question what they were being told about their father. Lies could no longer be challenged and secrets had to remain hidden. They were now forced to forget what they had previously known about me and had to start living a life in denial.

PART 4: A WHOLE NEW WORLD

Josie, Mary, and Grace

Our lives had changed — both the girls' and mine — and for the first time ever we were separated from each other, living separate lives in separate homes as separate families. And now it looked like this was going to be permanent. It was as if we had never been a family and never shared a past.

I Lose My Job and I Lose Mary - August 2010

     At first it was autumn; there were red and yellow leaves for Betsy and Tacy to scuffle underfoot. Then the leaves were brown, then they were blown away; that was in the gray time named November. Then came the exciting first snow, and this was followed by more snow and more. At last the drifts rising beside the sidewalk were higher than their heads.

— From Betsy-Tacy by Maud Hart Lovelace    

Mary's Unexplained Changes - July 2010

During the winter of 2010, Mary's friend, Ann, moved in with us. Ann was a girl about Mary's age who had been sleeping in her car because her parents had kicked her out of their house. Mary asked me if she could stay with us, and I told her it was okay until she found a place of her own. We had a small apartment.

The State Threatens Me

It was getting closer and closer to the day I was going to be fired from my job. I had been a security counselor at the Regional Treatment Center in St. Peter for over five years and I knew this was coming to an end. I was being targeted by my boss. I was being fired. And just in case I didn't know this, my co-workers made sure I did. They had seen this too many times at the State Hospital to not know what it looked like. And in my case, I don't even think my boss was trying to hide it.

Mary's One-Year Anniversary! - March 17, 2010

Things were improving — six months, seven months, ten months at home with no major problems, Mary was now looking forward to making it to the one-year mark as well. For so long I thought this would never happen, and now it looked as though I may have saved this girl from what could have been a lifetime lost in institutions, or even worse, as a runaway.