For twelve years, my daughter, Mary Lou, lived thousands of miles away from me in South Korea.
Family
We were never completely out of touch.
That almost made the distance harder.
We texted.
Marriage
We video-called.
She sent photographs of meals, city streets, changing seasons, and the view from her apartment.
I watched her life happen through a screen.
But a screen cannot hug you.
It cannot sit beside you at the kitchen table.
It cannot replace the sound of someone you love walking down the hallway of the house where they grew up.
And for twelve years, I missed my daughter in all those small, ordinary ways.
Family
Mary Lou was nine when I became a widow.
Her father, Samuel, died suddenly after a short illness.
One month, we were planning summer repairs around the house.
The next, I was standing beside a grave trying to understand how I was supposed to raise a child alone.
Child Care
Mary Lou had always been close to her father.
For several months after he died, she slept wearing one of his old T-shirts.
She would sit at the kitchen table after school and ask questions I didn’t know how to answer.
“Do you think Dad can see us?”
“Do you think he knows I got an A?”
“What happens if I forget what his voice sounded like?”
Those questions nearly broke me.
But I couldn’t fall apart.
At least, I didn’t think I could.
I had a child to raise.
Child Care
Bills to pay.
A mortgage.
A job.
So I did what many mothers do.
Pregnancy & Maternity
I kept moving.
I worked.
I learned how to fix things Samuel used to fix.
I stretched every dollar.
I attended school meetings alone.
I sat in the front row at every recital.
When Mary Lou had her heart broken for the first time, I held her while she cried.
When she graduated, I screamed her name so loudly that the woman beside me laughed.
People & Society
When she found her first real job, I bought a cake even though she told me she was too old for one.
She wasn’t.
She was always my girl.
But Mary Lou had always been restless.
Even as a child, she wanted to know what existed beyond our town.
Child Care
