To Jonathon, part 1

Jonathan,

Son, I'm writing to let you know how much you mean to me. It's been so very hard watching you grow up in pictures and e-mails. And with my health concerns, I'm not sure if I'll see you grow up, but I'm doing everything in my power to be around as long as you need me to be.

First of all, let me just say this. I didn't find out about you until you were already 2 years old.

Your Mom and I met in July of 2001 and dated until August of 2001. We actually stopped talking around 2 weeks before 9/11, because I remember thinking I was going to be recalled to active duty right after she told me not to ever bother her again.

I won't bore you with the details of our relationship, because I can't even really call it a relationship.

We dated for 6 weeks and made love 5 times. Then she got pregnant.

I made the mistake of asking her "We should do an amniocentesis test" which is a form of dna testing.

Son, I didn't think your Mom cheated on me, but I was concerned that she and I had started dating IMMEDIATELY after she broke up with her previous boyfriend.

And the exact date of conception? I didn't know. But I didn't ask for the amniocentesis so I could find a way to weasel out of my responsibilities.

I asked because it would have killed me to find out after she gave birth that you weren't mine. Now it's killing me that she ran like a spoiled, petty and unsure little girl and took you with her.

Anyway, back to the pregnancy.

Your Mom was working at the DoubleTree Hotel near Northstar Mall in San Antonio when I met her. And I remember after I asked for the testing, she told me to never speak to her again.

Perhaps I was just supposed to be the rebound guy after her previous relationship. Perhaps she blamed me for preventing her from re-kindling that previous relationship. I just find it so hard to believe that such a simple request for a test could have resulted in so much venom from her.

For weeks afterwards I would go to her work and take her lunch, only to be told by your Tia Mayela she wasn't there, or she was busy.

Once, I finally managed to catch her at the front desk, right before my birthday, and begged her to talk with me. She called the Hotel Security to escort me from the building and threatened me with arrest if I didn't leave her alone.

Your Tia Mayela is the one that introduced us and that is what hurts me the most. She was supposed to be my friend. A good friend. Someone with whom I broke bread with her Family. Someone who was supposed to be worthy of my trust.

So I asked her to help. I asked her to convince Lori to talk to me, but it was a lost cause.

Then, as I was counting down the days, I heard she'd had you. April 2, 2002!

I went by your Grandparents house on April 9, 2002 to demand they let me see you. Your Grandfather told me to leave his home or he'd hurt me. Your Grandmother told me that you weren't mine and that I should leave all of you alone. Then they closed the door in my face and left me standing there.

I turned to your Tia Mayela and asked her the same thing. Is this child mine? Had she seen you already?

I figured it would be easy to tell, since your Mom's boyfriend before me was of African Descent, or so I'd been told. I never actually laid eyes on him.

But even without a DNA test a black baby and a mexican baby can be told apart. So I asked for photos and Mayela wouldn't let me see them.

I begged her to tell me the truth...Was the baby mine?

She told me the same thing your Mom and your Grandparents had told me.

She said No.

Now you might be asking yourself, what's the big deal. Or you should have fought harder.

I couldn't. I was devastated.

You see, I had let your Mom in on my only weakness. I told her how to hurt me, the way Samson told Delilah.

I told her the only pain I had ever felt was when your older sister, Victoria, had been stolen right out of my arms when she was less than a year old.

That pain was what she used against me. You can take away my freedom, you can whip my ass or even cheat on me and I can get over it.

But take my child, a part of my soul, and it hits me harder than a bullet.

I've never really recovered from Victoria's loss, and then I saw it being re-enacted with you. I was in a dark spot.

Anyway, time went on. The summer of 2002 I moved to Guadalajara, Mexico to get away from all I'd lost. I wanted to disappear and never look back.

I was there until September of 2004, then I was going back and forth until February of 2005.

Son, I met the love of my life. The woman I was supposed to marry. She had 2 beautiful children, Alejandra and Felix.

All that I had lost in the USA I had recovered in Mexico.

I was scared to love, but she was gentle with me. I was afraid to open my heart, but she was patient with me. I was afraid to trust, but she showed me how by trusting me completely.

Then the business I was working for fell apart. The owner went bankrupt and lost all her clients and the doors closed on the job.

I moved back to San Antonio and was living with a friend named Michael for a while.

Then, in the first week of May 2004, I recieved a letter from the Attorney General of Texas requiring that I take a paternity test.

As I was reading the letter, your Mom's name held no recollection for me. I saw Lori Bailon on the letter and could not for the life of me remember who she was.

That is one of my greatest and worst gifts. I can completely hide bad memories in my subconscious. Pain, put it in the closet of my mind. Loss, stick it in the junk drawer of my mind.

So it took a good couple of hours of thinking to recall who she was.

And at that moment I knew a joy that I hadn't felt since your sister had been born. But I also couldn't figure out how to let my Love know that I might have a son from someone else.

You see, it was our intention to get married in Guadalajara, then immediately try to have a baby together. She told me she wanted nothing more than to be the woman who would give me A SON.

Well, I figured I'd take the test first then tell her, but it felt too sneaky. That is not my way. I am honest to a fault. Even brutally honest, and I wear my emotions on my sleeve.

So I tould Reina about you, and that was the beginning of the end. We tried for the rest of 2004 to make it work, but she was devastated and I was working full-time in Asutin so I was only able to go back to visit her once every 2 months.

In April of 2005 she told me she'd met someone else and that she was going to give him a shot.

That's what I loved about her, she was honest with me. Even Brutally Honest.

I tried to drink myself to death. I didn't want to live anymore. Once again I'd lost a Great Love and 2 children whom I'd begun to identify as my own.

Well, long story short I got 2 dwi's back to back and that pretty much began a downward spiral that I'm still trying to recover from to this date.

to be continued;