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Authors: Susan Meissner
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I reach it. I lean against a wall, waiting with dozens of others who were on my plane for our suitcases to find their way to us. I think about the other times I have been to St. Louis as I wait.
The first time can hardly be counted. Dad and I drove through St. Louis two weeks after Blair, Jewel and I found the baby and reluctantly gave it up. We were on our way to Wisconsin to see his parents, my grandparents. We looked at the famous arch from the air-conditioned confines of our car as we crossed the Mississippi River into Illinois. I don’t remember much about that particular trip. Too much had happened in the preceding few weeks. I do remember Dad asking me, more than once, what I thought of Shelley. But there was nothing to think of Shelley at that point. I had only known her for about a month, about as long as he had.
The second time was about a year later, for my fourteenth birthday. Dad took Blair, Jewel and me to downtown St. Louis where he got us our own hotel room—right next to his. This time we went up inside the amazing arch. I began to hyperventilate when I saw the arch’s shadow swaying in the muddy river below us. Blair thought it was hilarious. Jewel began praying under her breath that I would not faint. I was glad to come back down and touch solid ground. Two days after we came home from that trip, Dad gave Shelley an engagement ring.
The third time was when Blair, who had moved to St. Louis after college, got married and I was one of the bridesmaids. I decided to drive out from Ohio for the wedding. My address at the time was the spare bedroom at Dad and Shelley’s, where I was contemplating going back to college. I was in sort of a mental in-between place. I was twenty-three, not dating anyone and very unsure of what I wanted to do with my life. I still needed eighteen credits to complete the business degree I thought I wanted, but I had no motivation to do anything about it. I had no job then, either. At Dad’s urging, I had returned to the house we had moved into—him, me and his pregnant, second wife—after we left Arkansas.
It was the house where I spent the last three years of high school, where Zane was born, and where Dad hung up his Air Force uniforms after deciding Zane needed a normal, stationary life. His orders to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton were to be his last. My father retired from the Air Force the same month I graduated from high school in Ohio and he began his new career as a lecturer at a medical school. Shelley, who was just a new second lieutenant when she met my dad in Blytheville, gave up her commission as soon as her four-year commitment was up so she could be a fulltime mother to Zane.
Lucky Zane.
So there I was, five years out of high school and I was still looking for my place in the world. I had changed my major three times, had worked part time at an animal shelter, a French restaurant, an antique store and a private school for gifted children. I had moved away from Dayton and come back twice.
My father was very patient with me during this chaotic time in my life. Too patient, really. I wanted him to sit me down and talk some sense into me. He just kept writing out checks to Wright State University for the phantom degree I pretended to pursue. To her credit, Shelley tried to find ways to help me, but she really had no idea what it was like to stare at a big world with no idea of where to go in it. So nothing she said really mattered to me. That she is only twelve years older than me probably had something to do with my indifference to her counsel as well. Not because she wasn’t old enough or smart enough to know anything, because I am sure she was. It’s just I couldn’t—and still can’t—think of her as a mother figure capable of dispensing advice.
So when Blair called me after tracking me down at my Dad’s and asked me to be a bridesmaid at her wedding, I decided a road trip was in order. She offered to fly me out then, too, as she had
The first time can hardly be counted. Dad and I drove through St. Louis two weeks after Blair, Jewel and I found the baby and reluctantly gave it up. We were on our way to Wisconsin to see his parents, my grandparents. We looked at the famous arch from the air-conditioned confines of our car as we crossed the Mississippi River into Illinois. I don’t remember much about that particular trip. Too much had happened in the preceding few weeks. I do remember Dad asking me, more than once, what I thought of Shelley. But there was nothing to think of Shelley at that point. I had only known her for about a month, about as long as he had.
The second time was about a year later, for my fourteenth birthday. Dad took Blair, Jewel and me to downtown St. Louis where he got us our own hotel room—right next to his. This time we went up inside the amazing arch. I began to hyperventilate when I saw the arch’s shadow swaying in the muddy river below us. Blair thought it was hilarious. Jewel began praying under her breath that I would not faint. I was glad to come back down and touch solid ground. Two days after we came home from that trip, Dad gave Shelley an engagement ring.
The third time was when Blair, who had moved to St. Louis after college, got married and I was one of the bridesmaids. I decided to drive out from Ohio for the wedding. My address at the time was the spare bedroom at Dad and Shelley’s, where I was contemplating going back to college. I was in sort of a mental in-between place. I was twenty-three, not dating anyone and very unsure of what I wanted to do with my life. I still needed eighteen credits to complete the business degree I thought I wanted, but I had no motivation to do anything about it. I had no job then, either. At Dad’s urging, I had returned to the house we had moved into—him, me and his pregnant, second wife—after we left Arkansas.
It was the house where I spent the last three years of high school, where Zane was born, and where Dad hung up his Air Force uniforms after deciding Zane needed a normal, stationary life. His orders to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton were to be his last. My father retired from the Air Force the same month I graduated from high school in Ohio and he began his new career as a lecturer at a medical school. Shelley, who was just a new second lieutenant when she met my dad in Blytheville, gave up her commission as soon as her four-year commitment was up so she could be a fulltime mother to Zane.
Lucky Zane.
So there I was, five years out of high school and I was still looking for my place in the world. I had changed my major three times, had worked part time at an animal shelter, a French restaurant, an antique store and a private school for gifted children. I had moved away from Dayton and come back twice.
My father was very patient with me during this chaotic time in my life. Too patient, really. I wanted him to sit me down and talk some sense into me. He just kept writing out checks to Wright State University for the phantom degree I pretended to pursue. To her credit, Shelley tried to find ways to help me, but she really had no idea what it was like to stare at a big world with no idea of where to go in it. So nothing she said really mattered to me. That she is only twelve years older than me probably had something to do with my indifference to her counsel as well. Not because she wasn’t old enough or smart enough to know anything, because I am sure she was. It’s just I couldn’t—and still can’t—think of her as a mother figure capable of dispensing advice.
So when Blair called me after tracking me down at my Dad’s and asked me to be a bridesmaid at her wedding, I decided a road trip was in order. She offered to fly me out then, too, as she had
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