Come Home, You don't have a father anymore...

First snow in my life. 3rd January 1997. I was six years old. First day of the second trimester of school. I don’t remember school that day, I’ve never seen real snow, and I was delighted. It’s strange what a children’s mind can remember from a tragic day. Could all of them be from my mind or some of them edited by people that told me the story of that day?

My memories start when I arrived home, left my bag inside the house, and I went out to the snow to play. Even today, I can almost feel my frozen hands, nose, and feet from the snow. I was playing with bare hands, alone and happy. It was an unusual day indeed.

Since it was January, soon the light started to disappear – I didn’t know at that time that I would disappear too, my purest self. Darkness would surround me and love would conquer it all.

Since I was wet because of the snow, my mom’s stepmother called me, so I could dry myself by the fire. I don’t know many details from this part on. What I know is that I’ve heard my mom calling me from below the stairs – she was in the middle of the two bunch of stairs: one was on the side of my grandfather's place and right across it was my home.

I don’t remember any words. What I remember is my mother crying her soul out and my 20-month-old sister giggling on her lap. That image became embedded in my mind until today.

“Come home, Elsa Sofia. You don’t have a father anymore…” That’s what my mom’s stepmother alleged to me that my mother had said.

The next thing I remember is something that it’s strange like I was away from my body, and I was watching my mother crying sitting near our kitchen doorstep, crying and hugging my sister while trying to breathe the fresh hair from outside. I was swinging on my mother's stepmother's lap. Just growling while crying, embracing my body with both arms.

I was a daddy girl. That day I’ve become the nothing girl. But that was my feeling at that moment. We were crushed, inside out. My mother became a father too, with a little baby to care for and a kid. I was just a kid, how am I supposed to help her? She was all alone. We have a big family. They were supportive on the day of the funeral, great indeed. At the end of the day, the job to ‘help us’ was done. They could go back to their usual lives. We were left alone to survive.

Even the ones that lived across the stairs, were most of the time there, just across. My lunch was wrapped in papers and clothes so that I could eat something warm after I got home from school. I always tried to reach them, going near, trying to socialize with that family. My relationship with my uncle was good, he was an eternal child. Probably didn't fully understand the support that my mother, his sister, lacked.

My mother was a captain of the ship that never let us all sink. I was devastated, but I didn’t have to put those feelings aside and be an adult. Financially, emotionally… It’s no way to detail the hardships that my mother had to endure from society, just to put food on the table.

She always worked fair, and without complaining of anything. She never married again because of all the not-so-good moments that she had from her experience with her stepmother. We didn’t have much, but love was never lacking.

I was mentally self-helped. Even in death, my father left me a universe of knowledge that he didn’t know that I would need.

Since little, for any problem or stuff that I’ve done wrong, I had time to think of my actions. There I was, alone in a room to think a little. Then, my father would come and talk to me, helping me reflect:

“What do you think that you did wrong?” And he listened to my version.

“I think that you did wrong this or that.” He added after my answers.

“What could you do to change? You can be better. What can you change next time?” He wanted me to think independently, arrange my own answers.

Achieve greatness by observing, and reflecting. We all can be wrong, that is not a stone in our shoes, it’s something that we can use to build our steps!

Darkness came, I wasn’t sure what to do anymore. All my mental support was gone. My way of thinking is so different from my mother's. It was there that I’ve become a lone wolf. Observing. Turning to write poetry to survive my flooded mind.

This writer that you see today is a result of that day. Each word is a dedication to love. My aim is to inspire people, to let them feel.

I write each time to the power of love. From my father that still lives inside. From my mother that I can embrace even today.

My mother's love and support helped me survive. My father’s way of thinking made me heal. Not totally, you can never be the person that you were before. That is not all bad. Don't forget to be proud!