Memoir 3: “I Have to Tell Julie.”
The drudgery of my job set in. Five days a week, I walked to work in the afternoon, stocked the cheese, milk, eggs, and butter for eight hours, and then walked home in the dark after midnight. I obsessively thought about my Bellevue Community College failure. I felt like a coward, a quitter, and a disappointment to those who believed in me.
My Canadian cousin Julie became my confidant and counselor. Julie and I were playmates when we were children, always finding each other at family functions and leading the other kids in the world-building joy of make-believe. Julie moved to the east coast of Canada for a time and then to Paris, France. She was academically advanced but also emotionally intelligent. When she returned to British Columbia, we reconnected after I left Bellevue.
When I returned home each night, Julie expected me to call and talk about my day. She enjoyed the stories of my perturbed work peers who got twisted over the Canadian customers. In a silly way, we built a new world as adults, where I was a sympathetic spy to the culturally curious Canadian, reporting the unnecessary abrupt pithiness of my angsty American coworkers. My calls came after midnight, which Julie encouraged. She was a night owl, and our whispery calls acted as a lullaby for us both to drift into a peaceful sleep. At that time in my life, Julie was the only family I was comfortable with hearing my self-doubt and mental anguish.
When I returned home in early November 1991, I found my parents awake, sitting in the living room, waiting to talk to me. In disbelief that they were still awake, I looked at the clock on the wall, which read 12:17AM. This was unusual, and I immediately assumed some great tragedy befell our family. I immediately asked, "Is Sam and Will OK?” I am the oldest of three boys. Sam is the middle child; he is six years younger than me. Will is the youngest; he is eight years younger than me.
Dad nodded and said, “Yes, yes. They’re fine. No one is hurt. We just got off the phone with an acquaintance from San Jose, California. I felt like it was important to share this with you first. I don't know how to say this, so I will just say it."
I looked at Mom, whose eyes were cast to the ground, staring into the tattered green carpet of our home. I looked back at Dad, anxious for the following sentence he would utter. Dad pierced his lips, took a deep breath, looked at Mom and back to me, and said in one continuous breath, "I spoke with an old girlfriend who informed me that she had a daughter six years before you were born and a year before I met your mom and she told me that her daughter, who is now twenty-five years old, is also my daughter, your half-sister." Dad exhaled.
My eyes darted to the phone. My first thought was, "I have to tell Julie."
