My mom has this line she says periodically: If your dad hadn’t of moved us back to LA; if we’d just bought that house in San Diego, we’d probably still be married. Sometimes when she says it, she’s had a few too many glasses of wine. When she’s talking about the good old days. When she has something positive to say about him, which is very rare. That’s when she gets all sentimental. The wine does that. Sometimes she says it sober though, so I do think that she believes it to be true. Or at least a part of her does.

I have my doubts. I, no matter how many glasses of wine, can’t really picture it. I have asked her before and she really has no clue why she believes that. I think it’s because that is the last place she remembers them being really happy.

They were in their mid-twenties. They worked, partied, hung out on the boat. They lived in a rental that they could have bought. They had no kids when they lived there. They moved when she was six months pregnant with me. His theory being, we need to be surrounded by family when we have a baby. His theory is part of what killed their marriage. Or so she believes. This was a long time ago. I’m thirty years old. They were separated when I was four, divorced when I was five. She was never again happy with him, once they moved.

My theory has more to do with them having kids. She wanted kids, I don’t believe she ever asked his opinion on that. Not truly at least. I don’t know that he didn’t, but I am not sure that he did either. She sort of said, this is what we’re doing. He said okay. However, who knows. What I do know, is the responsibility of kids and a mortgage and the life they led when they moved back to Los Angeles, was the end of their happiness together. Which led to the end of their marriage.

I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately. I used to get tired of my mom saying this. I mean, she’s said this every now and then since I was say fifteen years old. And she was the one who left him. I think about it though.

I am not sure I remember when the last time Logan and I were truly happy together. Isn’t that sad? That I can’t even remember?  Maybe I’ve blocked it out. Maybe it’s been so long that I just can’t remember it. Possibly we were each happy at separate times and we both believed the other was too? Maybe I don’t want to know, because then I have to accept the fact that neither of us had truly been happy in years. I like to pretend that this is all his fault, but in reality? There are two sides. He deserves to be happy and I deserve to be happy. Maybe we had it once, maybe we just thought we did. I’m really not sure anymore.

What I do know is that when asked (By my therapist this week. Thank god for mommies, because mine is helping me with the cost for a bit.): when was the last time you two were truly happy together? I don’t know the answer. On the outside we were once. But it’s been a few years. But on the inside? In truth? I just don’t know.

I used to roll my eyes at my mother, every time she said that about my dad. The, we were so happy there, line. Now? I love hearing her say it. Because it reminds me that once, they were happy. That once, long, long ago? My parents loved each other. That they, even if just for a short few years, were happy together.

I wish I could remember when Logan and I were, so one day, I can tell my kids. So one day they will roll their eyes at me. So one day they will be able to say, hey my mom and dad were happy together for a bit.

It’s a small thing. One that doesn’t take away their or my sadness. One that can’t change the outcome of what is happening right now. But maybe it would give them that small bit of knowledge, that small bit of love to hold onto.

We had to of been happy once.