Lost in Life

Conducting the interview was fairly difficult. My uncle had just been released from the hospital and I worried I would have to search for another subject, not wanting him to feel obligated to do this is he weren't 100% up to it. But, nonetheless and nothing less than the trooper he once was and still is, he promised he felt fit to endure whatever I had in store for him.

My uncle had always been a private man, his exterior is hard and his voice is chilling. He dislikes a spotlight on him and often avoids coming to contact with people in general. Which is why I was so surprised to hear a tint of excitement in his voice when I asked if he would be my interview subject.

When I asked my mom if anyone in the family (besides my uncle) had had any link to a war, and her response was to ask my uncle, I felt defeated. He's not gong to want to talk to me, that was the only thought that clouded my mind.

I walked into the small Mexican-style home, dreading the next hour as I sat in the chair that was placed in front of my uncle in his wheelchair. I prepared to receive little to no information and be out of there in at least thirty minutes, but, when he began speaking about the war - something he was so passionate about - he couldn't stop. An hour turned into two and a half, and there was no room to complain.

I had never been one to enjoy war, even war stories for that matter, but hearing from someone who served so whole heartedly made me wish I could write his story for the world to read.

He found himself in this war, which is why I am choosing to tell his story as narrative. Facing his troubles and obstacles only pushed him to find it in himself to have strength, to have enough faith in himself to make it back home, so he would be able to tell this exact story.

How He Met My Mother

They met at work, a poultry company, while my mom was still involved with my biological father, but were nothing but colleagues until my parents split and he asked her out a couple of months later.

This is the story I got when I asked my mom how she met my step-dad. This, of course, gave me nothing I hadn't already known. So, for a while, I decided to leave it alone.

When I first read the prompt to this story, my main focus was on the suggestion "How They Met", it immediately took me to the show "How I Met Your Mother", which is one of my favorites. It sparked my interest, and I came to the conclusion that if I wanted to know the whole story I'd have to stop going to my mom for the answer. So, I decided to ask my (step-)dad.

I made sure to pull him away from my mom, fearing that he'd look to my mom to retell the story as he so often does with everything else I ask him while she's in the room. I told him I want the full story from the beginning. Had he wanted to approach my mom sooner? What intrigued him about her? She was never an office favorite among the girls, had he heard some of the rumors they had spread about her? Did they change the way he saw her?

It turns out Koen (step-dad/dad) had met my mom way before she could remember. My mother used to have a job, straight out of high school, as a cashier for a restaurant called Pioneer Chicken, my dad worked for Rogers Poultry (a company that delivers poultry to various restaurants, amusement parks, etc.) and he had gone in there a few times to make a delivery. Only glancing at my mom, but never really giving her much thought, considering he was already (unhappily) married with children. Little did he know that he'd be working in the same building just a few years later.

But, before they had started working at the same company together, my mom worked for a company that my dads job shipped to/did business with. My dad still worked for Rogers Poultry and before my mom worked there with him, she worked at another distributer named Canyon as the receptionist. He had seen her and thought she was cute, but much too young, so he decided to leave it as business and continue on his way. His marriage was in shambles, as he likes to say.

A couple of years later and my mom is sitting front desk at Rogers Poultry, having been a victim of in-office bullying, having to deal with a domestically violent relationship and four kids. My mom's baggage was heavy, but Koen saw passed that. He saw a strong woman who was having trouble getting over a few bumps.

After my moms separation with my biological father (he was much too controlling and verbally abusive to both of us, having scared us much too often), she began her rode to recovery, and a few months later allowed Koen to take her out.

It took me two years to warm up to the thought of my mom being with someone else, but almost seventeen years and an eleven year old daughter later, they're still as strong and beautiful as ever.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how Koen met my mother.