A Christmas Loss

and a few moments of gratitude

It’s the day after Christmas and I learned from a Facebook post that the woman who raised me when my mother couldn’t, passed away on Christmas day—which happened to be her favorite holiday (Leslie even had a huge nativity collection she’d amassed over decades.)

Michele, age 13, standing with Leslie on a log bridge over a waterfall in a forest in the Pacific Northwest.

Despite having four children of her own ranging from the ages of five to 14, she’d agreed to take my brother and I from foster care (I was five.) The tiny three-bedroom house we lived in for the next six years somehow expanded to hold six kids and two (sometimes three) adults.

Thank you, Leslie, for giving me a home address that lasted for more than a year.

Things were often hard for us kids, her four included. She’d struggled with her own generational trauma, abuses, and maternal abandonment at a time when nobody talked about those things. For many years, alcohol became her chosen medicine. Still, I firmly believe she loved all us children. She’d tried to do her best.

Thank you, Leslie, for loving me as your own when your hands were already full.

The biggest gift she gave me came when I was 12 and we moved to the place I still call my hometown. Despite only living there for four years, I formed valuable friendships that have lasted me decades. These amazing friends are the people I still consider my family.

Thank you, Leslie, for taking me to the place where I needed to be to find my forever family.

In her later years, she apologized for the things that had happened to all of us. She got sober, went to college, and gave back to the community as a counselor for juveniles in the local juvenile detention facility. She became an Alcoholics Anonymous sponsor for many people over the years, helping them each on their journey to sobriety.

Thank you, Leslie, for demonstrating it is never too late to take a new path in life.

For whatever reason in the past couple of decades, we only spoke once or twice a year, even though we only lived a hundred miles apart from each other. Our tattered family was complicated, and we each had many hurts we needed to heal from. I hope she knew I appreciate all she did for me.

Thank you, Leslie, for always being happy to see me again when we’d find our way to each other.

Rest in peace, Leslie. If there's an afterlife and you see my Dad and Mom, Chris, Don, Jeff, and Heidi, please give them all my love. I hope you all have forgiven each other for your collective humanity.

It's getting really quiet down here.