Last night Bear took Wolf's school picture from the living room side table and asked "Is that Wolf?" I said it was. He said "I need this", and took the frame and photo into his room, and ever so carefully placed it on his dresser near the bed.
A month has passed since Wolf walked out our front door. A trip last week to Haines gave me valuable time to gather perspective regarding myself, my marriage, and my two sons. Who are we as individuals and as a family, and what exactly does "family" mean to the four of us? Where does Wolf fit in our landscape right now, and where will he fit in the future? These are difficult questions to answer.
There is no doubt that Wolf is thriving in his new environment; that much is reaffirmed with each phone call and therapy session we participate in. With that security, Yukon and I have been able to reconnect as a couple, perhaps for the first time in a long, long time. Instead of fretting and comforting each other over an event involving someone else, we are able to validate and affirm as husband and wife; it can finally be about us.
Bear, too, is able to build a relationship with his mother that before was full of secondary time. Everything we did was for his brother, and he unfortunately received the dregs, for lack of a better term. We are all healing, the four of us, by our own unique methods. A clear, strong foundation is being constructed to effectively equip us for the day Wolf walks back through our door.
But Bear's actions last night also reminded me that we miss Wolf, terribly, and we cannot ever lose sight of the fact that a few thousand miles away lives a child who misses us, too.
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