Category Archives: family

May 13, 2013 · 2:33 pm

Chaotic Normalcy – Part I

By: Mia L. Hazlett
5/12/13

Routine and normalcy, two things I cherish most about my 9 to 5. I come to work and go home. What fills the hours in between; well that’s where my flexibility shines. Nevertheless, once I leave, I count on routine. I count on being home by 5pm to get my daughter off the bus, especially on Mondays when we rush around to get her to her softball games on time. Not this Monday, this Monday of April 15, 2013 was different. I continued to wear my flexibility cape, even though I was no longer in my office. It was Marathon Monday and apparently, no one had told me that the Sox game was not starting at three, but letting out.

The shuttle slowed to a stop a good quarter-mile from the parking garage, it wasn’t allowed to go any further and take us to our stop. Oh how I hate detours! The streets from Beth Israel Hospital to the parking garage, were nothing but traffic jams, pedestrians, and traffic cops. I weaved in and out of the fans, who treated the streets and sidewalks as their personal photo studio. By the time I reached my car, it was already past 3:30pm. Now I had to drive through all of these people.

I inched down the street, honking occasionally, only to be flipped off and then having to return the gesture, but sometimes the car in front of me carried out the familiar Boston tradition. But as I inched to the intersection, my Boston temper began to surface, this was the third friggin’ cop I had seen talking on his phone and then calling his blue buddies over. What the hell? There was traffic to direct here! And they need to do it now, because someone wasn’t letting an ambulance through somewhere, because the siren was continuous. I had heard it since I started walking.

By the time I hit 24, I was home free. I could still make it home in time to get my daughter to her game. I tucked away my flexibility cape and switched back to my normal commute home. I was off only by 15 minutes. It wasn’t until I was near Bridgewater that I realized my normalcy existed, but somewhere it did not. My entire ride, I noticed nothing but flashing statee cars headed towards Boston. Every minute until I got off the highway near the Cape, a state police cruiser was headed towards Boston.

My daughters’ father was watching the kids and reached me by phone about ten minutes before I arrived home. My phone had been tucked behind my purse, and apparently I hadn’t heard my mother calling or received the three “Are you okay?” texts awaiting me. He asked if I was okay and if I made it out. I began to unload about the stupid shuttle making us walk and I knew I was a little…he interrupted, “A bomb or maybe two or three went off at the marathon. Are you okay? I didn’t think you would be coming home and would probably have to stay at work. I was going to take the girls to your mother’s house because I just got called into work.”

Comprehension of what he was saying didn’t exist as my oblivion bubble burst. I pulled into the driveway adding everything together: all the cops on their phones, the ceaseless siren- well sirens, and all the way home, the state police rushing to Boston. A bomb? Was this 9/11 all over again? How close was I when this all happened? What if there were more? There were so many people in the streets at Fenway. Did I need to go back to work? What would I be able to do? Surely, the medical geniuses I worked for didn’t need me for my expertise in stopping bloody noses and washing scraped knees. Although utter chaos assaulted me, this was Monday. Mondays are softball games. Right now, even though I could answer none of the questions racing through my head, my brain could exist in chaos, but my body had to pull off normalcy.

My ex dropped our daughter off at her game and I dropped our other daughter off at my parent’s house. I tried to call people at work, but got no answers. What I was going to do, go back to work or stay home, was abruptly answered by my daughter’s normalcy. Before I could leave to her sister’s game, she asked me if someone had been shot? I stood motionless, “What?” She looked up at me with an innocence, which was contradicted by her question, “Daddy got called into work, so did someone get shot?” I answered honestly, “No. No one was shot.” I had to allow normalcy to win in the face of this chaotic tragedy. With my brain and body synced to normalcy, I went and watched my daughter win her softball game.

© 2013 Mia L. Hazlett

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April 15, 2013 · 3:09 pm

Conundrum XIII

By: Mia L. Hazlett
4/15/13

Our dinner last night was so special to me. They had all met up before, but I was always the one who couldn’t make it there. I’m so happy I didn’t miss last night. I needed that night out. I hate getting snippet pieces of information from over five or six different phone conversations with everyone. Sitting there last night and hearing what was going on in everyone’s life made me appreciate my circumstances…at least a little bit.

I guess it hurt me the most that I couldn’t share what was going on in my life. I had to wear this happy mask and make myself appear indestructible on the outside, when in reality my life had been shattered three weeks ago. Absolutely shattered to pieces!

The relationships Tasha and Dawn had with their mother-in-laws was the relationship, which existed between my mother and I. It always had been and most likely always will be. My mother was a housewife and my father was an attorney at a prestigious (I’ve always hated that word) firm in downtown Boston. What was prestigious? His title? His salary? His partners? Whatever it was, I never heard “firm” without “prestigious.”

Somehow, this prestige boosted my mother’s image of herself and how she thought others should perceive us. If there was a point of perfection that existed beyond perfection, than that was how my mother wanted to be perceived. I almost ruined that for our family at the tender age of 15. I was raped by our babysitter’s boyfriend.

I had one older brother and one younger. My parents and their prestige led them to vacation and leave us with one of my father’s fellow attorney’s niece to babysit us while they were away. She was twenty-something and would always have her friends and on this one occasion, boyfriend, over to the house.

Point is, he came into my room this one night, drunk. He raped me and I conceived a child. My mother never believed me and told me I was to never say anything about it. I was home-schooled and never left my house. Literally, I never left our property. The backyard to our pool was the only place outside I was allowed. A home-birth was arranged with papers and a social worker or adoption lady, whoever that lady was who took my daughter or son.

Life continued as normal, for my “prestigious” parents anyways. At least my brothers believed me. They found the guy. I don’t know what happened to him, but whatever it was, was relayed in a quick wink from my brother when I asked why his shirt had blood on it one night. That was the best wink I ever received in my life.

I really never imagined I would ever have to revisit that year in my life, until the letter I received 3 weeks ago. That social work lady took away my daughter that day. The same daughter, who hunted me down and now wanted to know why I had given her away. There was a 25 year-old person I never met, who lost her adoptive parents in the past 5 years and now wants answers from me.

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April 14, 2013 · 10:10 pm

Conundrum XII

By: Mia L. Hazlett
4/14/13

There was nothing like spending time with my girlfriends.  Last night wasn’t enough.  I needed them right now, but I knew we all had our own lives to live.  I always thought my husband was my soul mate.  Really, he was almost my best friend.  We’d been together for 22 years and married for 18.  In our world, we were soul mates, but in my heart and mind, those four women I sat with last night truly knew my soul.

On a scale of 1-10 of being myself, with my husband I am at about 9 and my friends a 10.  I know I sound like a bitch, but I cannot completely be myself with my husband in only one relationship in my life.  He knows everything about work, my friends, my family.  But to keep the peace in my house, I have to watch what I say about his mother.  I couldn’t tell him that I wrestle with being Godly and saying fuck that bitch.  What? He would lose his damn mind.  It felt so nice saying it last night.  I was able to be myself and vent my frustrations to my soul mates.

Now I sat in my room on my lazy Sunday.  Once a month I got a vacation in my house from the other creatures that inhabited it.  I woke up at six, made myself a nice breakfast, and got my coffee.  I returned to breakfast in my bedroom and lounged out on my couch.  My six year-old attempted to interrupt, but my husband intervened.

I honestly think this is what has saved our marriage.  He chose to have one Saturday a month and I chose a Sunday.  We can use it to go out or stay in, either way we get time to ourselves.  Our bedroom became sacred territory.  No one was allowed to come in under any circumstances.  Unfortunately, our new guest felt the need to violate this rule.  She had been in here twice this morning.  “Are you going to stay in here all day baby?  You do have children you know.  I know when I had my kids, I just couldn’t get enough of them.  There was nothing so bad about them that would make me want to hide away on a couch all day.”

How did I put this before?  Fuck that bitch.  Amen.

© 2013 Mia L. Hazlett

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April 11, 2013 · 12:12 pm

In My Head – Part II

By: Mia Hazlett
4/11/13

Dear Diary,

I haven’t seen my dad in two weeks.  I think my parents are going to get a divorce.  My friend Sara at school and another boy Philip, their parents are divorced.  I know a whole bunch of other kids whose parents never even got married.

I miss my dad.  I wish he was here or that I could just see him.  He called a couple of times, but that’s not the same.  He says he and my mommy are just taking a little break right now.  I guess kinda like me and my friend Sara got in a fight that one time and we didn’t talk to each other for three whole days.  We didn’t even sit with each other at lunch or on the bus.  That was the worst fight in the whole world.

But this is worse than three days.  It has been two weeks and one day.  I’ve been marking it on my calendar.  I heard my mother on the phone the other day saying she was so happy he was gone.  I don’t want her to be happy he’s gone.  I want her to miss him like I do.  If she doesn’t miss him than he won’t come back and live with us or maybe to even see us.

I heard my mother praying the other night for peace.  I don’t know what that means, but she sure has been happy.  She was in the kitchen the other day making dinner and she was singing and dancing.  A long time ago before my sister was born, she used to do that when she was cooking, but I haven’t seen her like that in like forever.

Then the other night, we stayed up until like 11 watching a movie.  She made us popcorn and not even the whole night did she talk on her phone.  Not once.  Not even to text.  But when she went to the bathroom I looked at her phone.  It was Daddy saying he was sorry and he loved her.

I hope she wrote him back later.  I mean he was saying sorry.  You’re supposed to make everything ok if someone says they are sorry.  But I don’t know if I want her to be sad again.  It has been really fun doing stuff with my mom since she’s been happy.  I just wish I could see my dad too.

From – Me

© Copyright 2013, Mia L. Hazlett

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January 12, 2012 · 5:01 pm

In My Head

In My Head
By: Mia L. Hazlett
1/12/12

This is just weird. Mommy never drives us to school. I can’t really tell, but I think she’s been crying. Her eyes are all red and stuff, but I don’t see any tears and she said she is fine. I think she mostly cries in the shower. I can kinda hear her even though the water is running. My little sister plays with her little toys as we pull up to her daycare. Mommy tells us to stay in the car as she goes and rings the doorbell. When the door opens, I can’t see my sister’s teacher, but I see Mommy talking and then she hugs whoever is behind the door.

We pull off and I wave to my sister. This is not the way we do it with Daddy. I get dropped off first then her. I don’t like this way. There’s no music. At least we usually have music. I want to tell her I know everything. I heard their fight last night even though they closed the door. I hate it when they fight. I don’t think Daddy came home last night and that is why she is driving us. But his car may have been in the garage and that is why I didn’t see it in the driveway.

I’m just gonna tell her I know everything. I’m gonna say I hear her cry in the shower. I’m gonna tell her when she and Daddy fight I don’t like it. And I will tell her that I don’t want them to get a divorce either. I’m gonna tell her I want every day to be like that vacation we took last year. When we went out to eat and took all the pictures and they never had one fight the whole time we were there. They even slept in the same bed and they kissed and held hands at the restaurant. That’s what I want every day to be like.

Once she stops the car I’m gonna tell her everything before I go into school.The car stops and Mommy gets out and comes to my side to open the door. She stoops down and gives me a big hug, “I love you honey.” I wipe away the tear from her eye, “I love you too Mommy.” She takes my hand and we walk up the front steps to school. I hope she couldn’t tell what I was thinking. I mean I know my mom cries, but I never see the tears. I guess I can wait ‘til later to tell her what I want. Because this is kinda nice too, holding hands with my mom as she walks me into school. She never does this. She only comes to my plays and stuff. I wish that every day could be like this too. So for now, I’ll just keep those other thoughts in my head.

© 2012 Mia L. Hazlett

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September 26, 2011 · 6:17 pm

Conundrum (Part X)

Conundrum (Part X)
By: Mia L. Hazlett
9/26/11

The laughter radiating throughout my home left me motionless on my stairs. My daughters created the perfect snapshot of joy, which only needed to exist in my mental memory box, not on film. My two oldest tried their best to make their 10-month old sister’s walking debut come true. Apparently I caught the collapse, as I witnessed the giggling pile taking over the carpeted living room floor.

I sat unnoticed on the stairs with tears in my eyes. A year ago I wouldn’t believe this moment could ever happen. Signing my marriage away, living under the roof of friends and family, and struggling to get my book published, left me with little hope my blessing would ever arrive. Now I resided in my own home with my kids rolling around the living room floor. Finally, after struggling and struggling; I tasted tears of joy.

The funny part of all of this, my ex wanted to move in with us. He told me if he knew I was pregnant, he would have stayed. To my friends that meant something, but to me that meant, my two daughters and I weren’t enough. I cried when he signed us away in the attorney’s office. Now I was so grateful for his ignorance. He gave me complete custody of our children and hadn’t showed his face in the past ten months. My oldest was repulsed by him. My middle child wasn’t old enough to form her own relationship with him, so she copycats her sister. If I decided for an introduction to take place with my youngest, it would be on my terms, not his begging. Having full custody gave me that right.

I wasn’t acting out of spite. This was my family now. He didn’t want us when he had us. Our reward and blessing was not to be shared with those who left the struggle before the storm came. It was to be cherished by those who pulled out their umbrellas and danced in the downpour.

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April 4, 2011 · 3:25 pm

Macy V

Macy V
By: Mia L. Hazlett
4/4/11

How did you survive seeing your father killed? This was more of a follow-up question to, after you’ve seen your brothers killed and sister raped, following your own rape? It didn’t seem logical to even ask these series of questions. But in just two letters my grandmother explained her entire life to me, and our dysfunctional relationship. In just those two letters, twenty-two years were forgiven.

I wasn’t in the mood to read another letter. My mundane routine work day did little to distract the images I carried of the very descriptive lynching of my great grandfather. They haunted my dreams, morning coffee, bus ride, and my two business meetings. Even though my curiosity screamed for the small envelope marked with a number three, I had to take a break. I needed to digest my ancestry.

Combined, the stories as a whole were tragic. But, my mother’s story was most spirit breaking. She existed in silent grace, but the flood gates were finally lifted the other night when she let me inside of her reality. My consoling was not offered to my mother, but to a woman who had suffered the generational abuse from a mother who was defined by a lifetime of tragedy. Unfortunately, my grandmother was actually raising her daughter the best she knew how. She offered her the love that my great grandmother offered her, very little.

And as my mother revealed her upbringing to me, I realized the hero within her. For although she didn’t know it, she had broken the generational curse. Although my grandmother and mother had no one to run to in the midst and anger of their mothers’ tirades, I did. After spending a day with Ms. Macy, I was able to run into the loving comforting arms of my mother. I was showered with kisses and hugs. There was not a day that passed that my mother didn’t compliment my beauty. I never comprehended my grandmother’s hatred, but I relished in my mother’s love.

I sat in the darkness of my living room and called my mother. I wanted to know how she was able to a offer a love she had never experienced. My mother answered and filled my ears with motherhood wisdom. She preached the importance of what I had always grown up with, “it takes a village to raise a child.” Although love was absent from her mother, it was abundant in the next door neighbor that took care of her after school. It was spoken to her through words of encouragement from a third grade teacher. It was “you can be whatever you want to be when you grow up,” from the man at the sixth grade assembly. Most of all it was a grandmother that told her on her deathbed, “Don’tcha be like me. When you have yourself a baby, you make dat baby your heart.” So maybe it was the woman that began it that truly ended the curse. Because there was not a day that went by that I didn’t feel I was my mother’s heart.

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March 31, 2011 · 4:31 am

Conundrum (Part VIII)

Conundrum (Part VIII)
By: Mia L. Hazlett
3/30/11

There was a time in my life that I believed in fairy tales. When I met my husband, I was sure there was a happily ever after ending for us. There was an image of us in our rocking chairs on the front porch of the home we had spent a lifetime building together. We’d watch our grandchildren run about the front yard as we sipped on our lemonade and I rocked my youngest grand baby in my arms. I believed in “till death do us part.”

And even as I sat in the very cold corporate mediation conference room, I still couldn’t accept that this was how it was all going to end. I waited alone at the long highly polished dark mahogany table. Every part of my marriage contradicted the fairy tale I carried around in my mind. Because my entire marriage consisted of the very moment I was experiencing right now, being alone. Even in his presence, I was alone. And now we had arrived at the end and I waited alone.

My loneliness was interrupted by the mediator. Formalities and small talk were exchanged as we waited the arrival of the boy. Time ticked on and the small talk dwindled. And finally after twenty minutes, the little boy entered. He appeared polished from head to toe. His light gait carried an arrogance as he seated himself at the head of the table. So much for our rocking chairs on the front porch.

I remained seated after the short ten minutes of complete devastation took place. Nothing. He wanted nothing. He signed everywhere the mediator told him to sign and left. He left with no wife, no kids, no happily ever after, just an agreement for child support. He initialed and signed it all away.

I’m not sure what hit the floor first, my tears or the pictures of our…my…new daughter that he had never met. I don’t know what compelled me to think he would want to see her, but as the mediator placed the pictures back in my hands, I dried my tears. She would be better off not knowing him anyways. Because the man at conception, was not the boy that just left this room.

I wasn’t devastated because my marriage was over. I wasn’t hurt that he didn’t want me anymore. I was hurt because today my children were stripped of their fairy tale. Their happily ever after had been reduced to a 50/50 statistic.

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March 14, 2011 · 7:10 pm

Conundrum (Part VII)

Conundrum (Part VII)
By: Mia L. Hazlett
3/14/11

The silence enveloped the room as I breastfed my daughter and gently rocked us back and forth in the large maple glider my parents had given me. Her ladybug light casted a soft glow in the corner of the room. I watched her suckle and with each blink caught the flashback of this exact moment with each of her sisters. With my oldest, I had this moment on my bed propped up against my pillows in my small studio apartment. I did the same with my second daughter, but it was in our house with her father next to me. I now sat in the makeshift nursery in my friend’s home alone with nothing but dreams and hopes.

The only recent contact I had with my husband was the divorce papers I was served the other day. I couldn’t get my head around the fact that I actually felt sad. We were coming up on a year of being apart and I couldn’t tell you the last time we even talked or he contacted the kids. So why was this hurting? Why when I had embraced and accepted that I was doing this alone, did I feel like I was losing him all over again? I consistently prayed that God hadn’t forgotten me. Sometimes I believed I was just having a pity party, and the rest of the time I tried to hold onto the faith that He had me in the palm of His hand.

I signed the papers and sent them in the return envelope. It was against my faith, but I had to let go. Would God forgive me for giving up? I had continually asked myself this question since I mailed my vows away. But unfortunately my time in prayer had to be spent praying for my strength to support this family and thank my friend for her patience with my situation. I didn’t know if God was going to answer my prayers. I guess part of faith was hope, and I hoped God heard my prayers.

So in the dim glow of the makeshift nursery in my friend’s house, I said a single line to a prayer I had always rehearsed in its entirety, “Thy will be done.” I kissed my daughter and placed her in her tiny bassinet. “Thy will be done.”

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March 2, 2011 · 3:47 pm

BFF IV

BFF IV
By: Mia L. Hazlett
3/2/11

My best friend, Rebecca. I loved that woman. She was the only person that could complete my sentences, go to the store a month after me and buy the same exact dress and not know I already have it, and most of all she knew my heart and protected it better than I did at times. I couldn’t think of the past 28 years being any different. She was the love of my life, the only person outside my family, that had known me almost my whole life and still wanted to be my friend.

The history that Becky and I shared was something that my husband couldn’t seem to get passed. Well maybe not just my husband, but Becky’s husband too. I will say at the very least Becky’s husband reached out and became my friend. So while he hated the fact that I knew everything about his life, he also understood that I wasn’t going anywhere and my advice didn’t always work in my friend’s favor.

I guess the problem I had was that my husband really didn’t do any outreach to Becky. He felt the same way her husband felt about our relationship, but I’m not sure that he could get passed his jealousy to reach out to my friend. One of the pacts Becky and I made in our childhood was that boys stink. As we got approached our teens, there was a boy that liked both of us. He got us to stop calling each other for a whole three days. From that point on, we promised no boy was more important than our friendship. Those three days will be held as the longest we’ve gone without speaking to each other.

The other promise we swore to each other was to never keep a secret. I think we both tried and failed at achieving any sort of promise to ourselves or others. Most people who told us not to tell anyone, would always receive my honesty that I would most likely tell Becky. Some shared, some didn’t, but at least they knew not even their deepest darkest secret would make me break my promise to my BFF.

Now I sat in my bedroom wondering how I had gone a week and at least six phone conversations without sharing the news of what my doctor told me three days ago. This was one time in their lives that my husband and Becky had reversed roles in my life. My husband has been there for me the past month as I’ve gone through all these tests. And now I think he was understanding why he didn’t want to be my best friend. It was a huge responsibility. He continued to ask me if I told Becky yet. I told him I wanted to wait for the results. And now, three days ago-the results, and I still hadn’t told her. How could I tell her I have cancer?

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