The Jones Legacy~Prelude

I don't remember anything before the age of five.  Most people don't.  I remember it was Sunday, and night time.  My older brother, Landon,  had just left to go to his high school prom.  Apparently going to his prom with his girlfriend was more important to him than staying home to celebrate my fifth birthday.  I remember feeling sort of numb to his non-existence that night, almost like I didn't have another sibling.  On that night I had to remind myself I had an older brother.

Landon wasn't the type of teen to want to hang out with his baby sister.  He used to play with me when I was a toddler, or so that's what I'm told by my mom.  Usually, though, he just did his own thing.  He didn't really have a strong relationship with any of us; me, my mother or my father.  He seemed more concerned on getting himself through school and moving out. On days that he did spend with our family he would just hang out on a swing, or a slide, or doing some other independent thing like talking to girls.  If he couldn't do any of those he would play chess with our father. Anything to avoid holding a conversation with any of us, and playing chess with our father was close enough for him.

My father was a hard working man.  He worked at the hospital and was on call a lot.  He had a better relationship with my brother than I ever did, and that wasn't much.  He always wanted a boy, and his wish came true with his first born, but I will always be his 'princess'.  He struggled with my brother.  Always encouraging him to be more focused on school or whatever. He was always disciplining him for behavior that was less than what was expected of him.  My father was a kind man.  He was well known and loved by the community for his kindness and gentleness, you could see it in his eyes.  He was never the type of man to raise his voice, let alone his fist.  He was the type of person you wanted to meet and become friends with.  His charm won over even the crankiest person.

He met my mother while doing some routine flu-shots when he was first starting out at the hospital.  My mother was the last person to get a flu-shot from him that day, and they got to spend more time together talking than the people before her. My mother told me it took him a while to muster up the courage to ask her out, but once they were on that date, it was like they knew each other always.

My mother was a school teacher.  Going to school and knowing she was one of my teachers was hard on me.  It was weird.  I felt I had no freedom even though I did.  Most kids find freedom from their parents when they go to school.  Not me.  I felt I was always under surveillance because she worked at my school. This was my biggest complaint with my mother.  It's never easy for a kid who's parent is their teacher.  I got picked on by my classmates, but I didn't care.  My mother knew when to butt in and when not to.  She stayed out of my personal life and allowed me to experience being around my friends like she wasn't there.  It was when I was out of line that it became an issue.  She was the next person after the principal to be notified, and since she was right down the hall, she could be there in a blink of an eye.
 My brother doesn't understand.  When he was going to my school our mother was just a substitute teacher, so she wasn't always there.  He had more freedom to rebel than I did. He wasn't under constant surveillance which is odd to me because I am the "good" one.

My mother and I had the strongest relation.  She was my best friend.  As I got older I was able to talk to her about anything like she was one of my girlfriends, which I had a sparse amount of.  She was the one to teach me to talk, walk and use the potty.  She was the one that stayed home with me when I was a toddler. She was the one that would make time for her family and make the family spend time together.  She was the glue that held this family together.  She was quiet yet stern, friendly yet honest, when needed, and everyone in town loved her. She was the "girl next door" type, very open and approachable.  I could see why my father fell in love, and married, her.

I never gave much thought of the man I would marry when I got older.  I wasn't the typical type of girl who dreamed about her wedding day, or what my life when I became an adult would be like.  I never played house, never wished for a child.  Hearing my parents tell me the story of how they met made me wonder, "am I the black sheep?".  My brother would even talk to his girlfriend about what their marriage would be like, where they would live, and how many kids they'd have.  Sometimes it made me wonder, did genetics mess up and take a wrong turn somewhere during the process?  Was he meant to be the girl, and I, the boy?  Even at the young age of five, I felt this overwhelming feeling that I would never have that giddy feeling that they call love.

Little did I know, that everything I was sure of at that time in my life was going to drastically change . . . forever.