I’ve lived in Colorado for almost three years now, and I’m still struck by the wideness of the skies here. It’s fascinating to me that I can see all the way from the mountains in the west to the plains in the east. Even now, I keep expecting to find a skyline obstructing my view.

Back east, the skies were narrow strips of blue (or, more often, gray) directly overhead. At night, I couldn’t see the stars or the moon. Even from our apartment in New Jersey, with its panoramic view, I could see more skyscrapers than sky.

I loved the city, and I still hope to live there again someday, but I have to admit that often, it felt equally both inspiring and oppressive.

But after reading Felicia Sullivan’s memoir, The Sky Isn’t Visible From Here, I realized that my hard times in the city are a walk in Central Park compared to the difficulties she endured there - first as a child growing up in Brooklyn, and later as a young professional in Manhattan.

Her tales of working-class life in Brooklyn with a single mother who moved from job to job (and man to man) were disheartening at best, horrifying at worst. While I was shocked by the descriptions of the drug use and sex she witnessed even as a young child, I was saddened most by her increasing need to wall herself off from the people closest to her - friends, family, and her own mother - as they continually betrayed her. As I told Felicia, I wished we were back in sixth grade so that I could invite her over for dinner and a sleepover.

Likewise, her stories of professional and social life in Manhattan resonated with me as well. While copious quantities of alcohol were as far as I went, I still struggled to cope with the peaks and valleys inherent to living and working in New York - particularly in a technical field at the height of the dot-com boom (and subsequent bust). It was a time that seemed to push many people toward addictive and destructive behaviors. Some of us got off easy; and some, like Felicia, bottomed out before recovering.

The memoir is written not in strict chronological fashion. Rather, Felicia alternates between excerpts from her childhood and from her young adulthood. This juxtaposition of time periods adds both interest and suspense - at the end of each excerpt, I looked forward to the continuation of the excerpt that had come before - and kept the pace from bogging down (as I’ve found that it often does in chronologically-told histories).

While it’s heartening to me that Felicia has found a father in Gus - her mother’s former fiance, one of many people she has left behind - it’s heartbreaking to read about her relationship with her mother.  As a mother myself, I honestly can’t imagine treating a child so carelessly.  I can’t imagine being the child of such a mother - the conflicting emotions I know I would have were I in Felicia’s position.

Even so, it’s the final chapter, titled “Before Cocaine”, that makes me the saddest of all - a day spent with her mother at Coney Island in 1984.  The fun that they had together is overshadowed by Felicia’s desire to tell her mother that she loves her, but she resists, afraid that by doing so, she will spoil the closeness they’ve shared that day.  The idea that one of my children might ever be afraid to tell me that they love me is almost unfathomable.

I don’t know if Felicia’s relationship with her mother could ever be salvaged, or if the sadness of her childhood could ever be overcome, but I admire her for having the courage to write such an honest account of her pain.  I can only hope that by doing so, she has been able to make peace with her past.

To purchase your own copy of The Sky Isn’t Visible From Here, click here.