I Couldn’t Attend My Daughter’s Wedding In Paris – The Same Wedding I Helped Pay For. She Told Me By Email: “If You Want To Be A Part Of It, You Can Watch Online.” So I Just Said, “Sure. Enjoy Your Big Day.” The Next Morning, She Kept Calling Me.

The next paragraph was about technical details—how they’d set up a private link, how I could watch from the comfort of my home—as if watching my only daughter get married through a screen was some kind of luxury.The kicker came at the end. If you want to be a part of it, you can watch through the Google Earth window. LOL.

LOL. She wrote “lol.”
After telling me I couldn’t attend the wedding I’d helped finance, the wedding I’d been saving for since she was in diapers. My hands didn’t shake.

My eyes stayed dry. Something hardened inside me in that moment. Something I couldn’t name yet, but would come to recognize as my salvation.

I typed back:
Sure, enjoy your big day. Four words. No emotion.

No fight. Just acceptance. I knew it would drive her crazy.

Natalie always needed a reaction from me. Tears, anger—something she could point to and say, “See, this is why we can’t have you there.”
I wasn’t giving her that satisfaction. My phone rang almost immediately.

I watched her name flash across the screen, then set it face down on the counter. I finished my coffee, rinsed the mug, and drove to work like it was any other day. I’ve been office manager at Caldwell and Burn Law Firm for 18 years.

The managing partner, Robert Caldwell, is the kind of man who still holds doors open and remembers how you take your coffee. He noticed something was off the minute I walked in. “Sharon, you look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
I adjusted the papers in my arms and forced a smile.

Continue reading…