It's strange to be able to finally speak on this blog about what I could never discuss as a child. There's an odd freedom when people die and you can say what you like at last -- then sometimes you don't even feel you need to because it's finally all over. I couldn't believe it when my father died -- that at last that strident critical voice in my life was silenced. I thought somehow he would overcome that final obstacle and still be able to get to me.
I wrote a short story in college about my problems with my father that was published in a mag. Here are the first few paragraphs:
An arena -- I am in a huge arena, dressed in white. I look up to see the crowds -- masses of people -- cheering. Cheering what? Where did they come from? What am I doing in an arena? Suddenly, a deafening roar from the crowd; they are pleased. Then I see a lion; golden, untamed, fiercely graceful, coming toward me.
"And the lion is on the 20 yard line, first down and ten," shouts a football announcer.
"Ungrateful child." My father is the official. "Spurn me and take my money anyway." A crash of the whip against my unsuspecting back. "Why aren't you what I wanted in a daughter?" My father becomes the lion.
"I'm sorry, so help me God." I fall to the ground weeping. I am devoured by the lion. Blood, gnashing of teeth.
I don't have the intense feelings about all this that I used to have; I think I'm reconciled to what was. The ferocity of emotion has been replaced with a kind of wistfulness for what might have been.
14 comments:
COMMENTING ON THIS IS DEFINATELY THIN ICE, BUT HERE GOES!! HE LOOKS LIKE A MAN OF THE "OLD SCHOOL",POLISHED SHOES, TRADITIONAL VALUES ETC. WHAT EVER HAS GONE ON, LIKE IT OR NOT HE HAS HELPED SHAPE YOUR PERSONALLITY, AND IN THE END ONLY YOU DECIDE HOW TO REMEMBER HIM.
You're right as usual, Anonymous.
THANK YOU FOR THESE BLOGS, I COME TO WORK (NO BROAD BAND AT HOME, WE'RE IN THE STICKS!) AND LOOK FORWARD TO A QUITE MOMENT SO THAT I CAN CHECK WHAT HAS BEEN POSTED.ITS BEEN A GREAT DISCOVERY.
I wish I was as brave as you are. To be able to express your emotions instead of bottling them up. To write about them, which validates them...to have them "said and done."
Thanks Theresa. I struggle with the thing of always being told not to say anything to anyone about my family all through my life, and then my need to say 'this is what I felt and I'm going to speak up.' Today I thought, the hell with it, I'm going to say what I want. It's my life too & my father did and said whatever he wanted w/out caring what impact it would have on me, so now it's my turn.
Anonymous, that is the nicest thing anyone has said to me today. thank you so much for your vote of confidence in the blog.
I love your blog, too. First thing when I come to work I take a look at what's new. It's like this is what I'm SUPPOSED to be doing here at the office; you know, check phone messages, turn on the computer, review my schedule, read Elizabeth's blog...
Tell me - would you have done anything different?
My father doesn't even know I'm alive. He doesn't know how many children I have or their names. He doesn't know if my sister is alive, either, or a single thing about her three children. He has minimal contact with my brother, and that is only because my brother is so desperate for love that he calls our father from time to time.
People tell me, "You should work this out before it's too late!"
But my father has been cruel to all of us. He doesn't want us in his life (he has a new wife, a new family, blah blah blah). Should I really push myself to "work this out" when really, my father could care less?
Are you sorry you did not?
I'm glad you brought this up. I read in mags all the time about how we should heal these wounds or work things out before it's too late but it's just a load of hogwash. It's just more of a burden on us. People say, when he's dead, you'll regret not mending fences! but you won't. This is the way life is and there's no point in knocking your head against the wall trying to please someone who is unpleasable.
I hate the way books and magazines paint this portrait of the way like SHOULD be but it's just not that way. You get on with building your new relationships and making sure you don't have the same probs with your own kids -- that's the way forward. People mouth things they have seen or heard w/out really thinking about it first. x
FATHERLESS...AT THE END OF THE DAY HE HAS MADE HIS DECISION, AND YOU HAVE TO MAKE YOURS. AS ELIZABETH SAYS, ALL THESE OUTSIDE SAY THIS AND THAT, BUT AT THE NED OF THE DAY ITS DOWN TO YOU AND WHAT YOU LIVE WITH. ITS NEVER EASY.
I am so glad I wrote this morning.
Thank you Elizabeth and Anonymous.
I agree with Blog Imperatrice that it's not only OKAY, but absolutely necessary, to decide, "oh, f**k the old dead tyrant!" Would an abused, whipped dog need to "reconcile" with the cruel master who made it so afraid, scarred it for life, rendered it unable to accept a friendly hand proffered, for fear that hand would smack instead of caress? NO INDEED. You get one chance to be a kind parent, and by golly if you blow it, well, don't look to your mistreated children to wipe your drool when you aren't so vigorous any more, or sigh about how they "wish they'd reconciled."
If that sounds harsh, I am sorry, but the pain a bad parent can inflict simply cannot be measured. Yes, perhaps Leo had "issues" of his own, and may have been deserving of compassion to some degree, but y'know? He was the grown-up, and Elizabeth was the child, and it was his damned job not to ruin her life. He needed to get over himself, bigtime, but he chose not to, and, well...he's lucky he got 2 appearances on her blog.
I had a father who didn't make much money, but absolutely worshipped the ground I trod on, beamed whenever I was near, bragged about my meager infant talents, and sacrificed a lot to make sure I had cute clothes, enough makeup, a good college education, and (once) a pair of ruinously-expensive Italian high-heel boots from a local boutique. I still have them, thirty years later, and wear them every winter. I have to! He said, "Well that sure seems mighty high, but if you'll get good wear out of them, go on and get them."
My dad was an early-to-bed guy, but I'll always remember how he'd drive me to play rehearsals before I got my license. He'd sit there in the darkened auditorium or theater, nodding off (often snoring embarassingly) and after the run-through was over, he'd stand up and clap like a madman, even though he'd snoozed through the whole thing.
My dad, Clayton Ross Ware, died exactly one moth before my daughter was born, which will always be a sadness for me. He was a flat-out fool for little girls, and would have been an incomparable "Pappa" to Lizzy. I cry when I watch that scene in *Godfather I* when Marlon Brando is goofing around in his tomato patch with his little grandson...that would SO have been my dad.
I didn't mean to hijack the thread, but let me say this: Elizabeth, you are so right that we must go forward. You had a dad with a lot of money but no heart, and I completely support you in your decision to thumb your nose at his memory. A little daughter is a treasure, and is (for all his medical knowledge) he was too stupid and selfish to realize it, and give you a happy safe childhood, then...well, again, f**k him!
Edit time: what happened? Should have been "Leo was too stupid" in that last sentence.
Thank you, BWJ. You said it so well. Fatherless in Michigan, the point is, why should it all be ON YOU to 'reconcile' and 'make your peace' or face everlasting regret? You can't change an SOB like your dad to even effect a late-in-life reconciliation. These people who go on Oprah and say things like that are not facing reality.
PS BWJ, your father was such a wonderful man. I remember well how much he doted on you, and when you would exasperate him with something, he'd just sigh, and say 'oh bren,' in that affectionate way he had.
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