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The House is Quiet
Loving My Niece While Waiting My Turn at Parenthood
By Mark Stackpole
I hug. I wave. When the truck turns the corner and heads toward the freeway, I hug my wife and blink my eyes as hard as I can. My house is once again quiet.
Alie is her name, and she is sheer joy wrapped in golden brown skin and walking around on big clumsy feet. In her eyes of melted chocolate, I understand why any of us bothers to get up in the morning. My heart dances when she does; my soul sings along when she belts out a tune. "Uncle" and "Godfather" are by far my favorite titles, but I suspect this has something to do with the fact that I have not yet been able to add "Father" to my repertoire. Not for a lack of trying, mind you, but it just hasn't worked out for me and my wife, yet. In the meantime, I am hopelessly addicted to my niece.
My sister, Lisa, struggled with depression and made some difficult choices that did not always work out for the best. I understand that when she found out that she was pregnant – single and broke – she decided to tell me last because she was afraid of what my reaction was going to be. We have always been best friends, my sister and I. If Dad yelled at me, I could count on her to either yell back or console me after the assault was over. If Dad yelled at her, she could count on me to do the same.
In the we hours of every weekend night, we would make late night runs to AM/PM for candy and soda; how else were we to stay awake through all of the horror movies we had rented? When she called me at college to share that someone had either made her heart soar or broken it into pieces, I tried to bridge the miles and comfort her as only a big brother could. As her tremulous voice came over the phone to tell me to sit down because she had big news, I did so. Marriage? Pregnancy? Oh God, please let it not be cancer or something like that.
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