I don’t know if this counts as a confession, not really. It’s more… something I’ve been sitting with. For a long time now. I think maybe I’ve done something really wrong, or at least something that feels wrong, deep down. It started a while back, when my sister, well, she just… couldn’t anymore. With her kids, I mean. And the older ones, my other nieces and nephews, they just kind of drifted off, I guess. Or got busy. I don't know the exact word for it. They just stopped picking up the phone, mostly. So it was just me. And the little ones. I was already… doing my thing, you know? With the paints and the canvases. It wasn’t exactly bringing in a lot of money, but it was what I did. What I loved. What I thought I was meant for. But suddenly, there were these little faces looking up at me, needing clothes, needing food, needing rides to school, needing someone to just *be there*. My studio started looking less like a studio and more like… a very cluttered daycare, maybe. I think that’s when I took on the first job. Just to cover the basics. Then it was two jobs. Because the little ones, they grow, and they need more things. Shoes, mostly. So many shoes. And I remember one morning, I was trying to get them all out the door, and I had paint still on my hands from the night before, from trying to squeeze in just a little bit of my own time after everyone was asleep. And one of them, the littlest one, asked me why my hands were always messy. And I just said, "Oh, it's just from working." And it hit me, right then, that it wasn't really a lie. But it wasn’t the whole truth either. It used to be for something else entirely. The other ones, the older kids, they call sometimes. Or they text. And they’ll ask how everyone is, and I tell them everyone’s fine. I tell them the little ones are growing up so fast. I tell them I’m managing. I don’t know why I do it. I think maybe it’s because I don’t want them to feel bad. Or maybe it’s because if I told them how it really was, they still wouldn’t come around, and then I’d just feel even worse. Like it was all for nothing. I used to dream of… showing my work. In a gallery, maybe. Having people look at it and understand something about me without me having to say a word. Now, my days are… structured around school bells and grocery lists. And the nights are for catching up on the bills, or trying to fix something that broke. And then, if I’m really lucky, maybe an hour or two with the paints. But even then, it’s different. The colors don’t seem as bright. The lines feel… heavy. Like the weight of everything else has seeped into them. Sometimes I look at the little ones, and they’re laughing, and they’re happy, and they seem to really love me. And that’s good. That’s more than good. But then I catch a glimpse of my old sketchbooks, tucked away under a pile of laundry, and I just feel this… ache. For the person I was supposed to be. For the things I was supposed to do. I don’t know if that makes me selfish. To feel this way, I mean. To feel like I’ve lost something important, even when I know I’ve done something good. For them. I’m getting older now. My hands, they ache a lot more. And my eyes aren’t what they used to be. And sometimes I think, what if this is it? What if this is my whole story? Just… making sure everyone else is okay. And the other stuff, the art, that just fades away into the background? Like it never really mattered. I don’t know if that’s a betrayal of myself, or if it’s just life. What you choose, or what chooses you. The other day, the middle one, she found an old painting I did. Something with a lot of blues and yellows. And she asked me if I could paint her a picture of the ocean. And I said yes. Of course I said yes. And I will. But when I looked at that old painting, I didn’t just see the blues and yellows. I saw the twenty-year-old me, full of ideas, full of fire, thinking the whole world was waiting. And now… I don’t know. I just don’t know if that person is still in here somewhere. Or if she got lost in all the other things. I don't know if this is something you just learn to live with. Or if I should have done something else. Something DIFFERENT. I don't know.