so you know.

My girl... Someday he is going to know all about you. I sit here right now with so much to say to you but as soon as I sit down to type, words fail me, if I could just organise all of my thoughts and get them out on here it sure would help my mind feel more settled. There isn't a day goes by that I don't have a low point. I can be feeling so good, so high on life, so excited about something and then like a swift kick to the gut I will see something, hear something, feel something and its as if happy times were never around me. I try, God knows I try not to be in the dumps, I try so hard to do the whole "thinking of you in a better place" but no sooner am I trying to find that place, to try to think along those lines...nope, it just doesn't happen.

 I'm almost positive that life is different now, I know it is, I will walk thru this world with a whole new set of eyes and a whole different mothers heart. I will forever see the sky differently, forever I will imagine you in it, I will see silver linings and feel as though you put them there just to smile down on me, Ill see beautiful sunsets and tell myself that you are sending me a goodnight smile. Ill hear music differently, even more so than I always have, music is THEE best way to feel, to experience, and now, its taken on a whole new meaning for me as well. Music was always a huge part of your life, of our entire family, our home and it will continue to be like that, but now....you've left us with new songs to sing, new lyrics to write, new feelings to feel that out of of those feelings will come newness, sometimes happy, sometimes sadness, sometimes fear and other times comfort.

 I feel you around me. I really do. I pray everyday that someday I will get to sit and tell Jack all about you, how his mama made a decision that she felt she need to ensure he lived a better life than the one that she could provide, I will make sure he knows how so very much you loved him, I will make it my mission to make sure he knows your soul..thru your writing, your art, what your struggles were, what afflicted you, what made you smile, what  made you love, what made you cry...everything, one day he will know everything. Know this. I will tell him all of the little stories about you when you were little, how you read at the most ridiculous early age, how the first thing you ever drew in your little life was a "pumpkin guy", how you loved animals to the point of on your 16th birthday at Sea world you were able to get a penguin to come to you and you picked him up out of the water because you really thought Dad was going to let you sneak him home.

 Ill let him know that when you were younger we lived near a deaf girl and you wanted to be able to talk to her so you learned sign language, and how we had an exchange student from Japan so you taught yourself Japanese, how you loved the fact that you had Italian in you so you engulfed yourself in everything Italian, you taught yourself to speak it and at one point you were trying to teach it to Lucas, when we lived in Florida and how you taped the Italian word for things in the house like, "Stove" and "Desk" your Italian words were all over, you were the only one to ever call Lucas, "Luca"...seriously Alyssa....you just rocked anything you put your mind and heart into. Ill let him know that you loved him forever, and that you named him Jack. Jack Vincent. Perhaps maybe he will grow up feeling you, like he is part of this amazing girl who lived for 22 years 4 months and 11 days...somehow knowing that you were his mama and that you loved him.

 I wish everyone could have known you...but then there are some people who I wished never ever knew you, some people came thru your life and did nothing but leave scars, left your heart broken into pieces and your feelings hurt, your soul damaged and I am so sorry that I couldn't protect you from those people, I wish to God that you had had the strength to fight those demons...sometimes they win. But....in the end you won Lyss, your battle is won, you ARE in a better place and you cry no longer. The selfish parts of me would have kept you here for as long as I could...but perhaps that wasn't your lifes plan, you were here, you left love, you left life, you left me with so many memories, I cant wrap my head around the fact that I wont see you again in this life, I dont know whether I ever will.

 I see you curled up in a little Alyssa ball, on the sofa, with a sketch pad, singing some song, loud and proud..I hear Corbin telling you to keep it down because you are singing so incredibly insanly loud and he is trying to play his guitar, I hear Brenna upstairs in her bedroom pick up the song and start singing it right along with you in perfect pitch and timing, I hear Lukey telling you something about arting and Dominic walks in, joins in the singing of the song but rather than using his own singing voice, he channels Scott Stapp from Creed and I see Eric sitting there looking astounded that our entire family has the knack for all singing the same song when we arent even the same room together...its crazy but it happens all the time in this house. I love it.

 I see you getting up from your comfy spot on the sofa and start turning circles in the living room...light and airy...floating like you did...that was when you were your happiest...surrounded by your family. In the living room...and then your Nico would come home from work and in your baby girl voice you would say..."My neco" Gosh you loved that man...you were so proud that he was your dad. The way you looked at him Alyssa...you looked at him sometimes like your heart would burst because it was so filled. When he would cry for you...it would kill me. It still does. He is the one who released you...at Sunset Cliffs...he is the one who stood right next to me and the first to hold you after they pulled you out of me after an emergency c-section and he was the last one to hold you that day at the cliffs. That day was so hard...I felt like you were there though, I know that you were. Someday Alyssa. Someday he will know.

 He totally has your eyes..and that makes me so happy. Dad said that when he sees him he sees you in his eyes...they say eyes are the windows to the soul, and you proved that in your drawings all the time. When you were sad...the eyes were sad, when you were happy, the eyes were happy. I found a drawing of an eye that you drew that was one of the softest, sweetest, happy eyes ever....I have it. In a very special way, I have it. I love you. I miss you.

New music will emerge...new songs to sing