Wanna know the funny thing about having a father who fucked you over? The blood money that can be given trying to make it better.
During his recent visit, my NF ("natural" father) wasn't able to produce a card, but he sure could show me the money. $300 cold hard cash. It's blood money. I know that, my husband knows it, and my mom knows it. It doesn't change a damn thing, but I'll take it....right to the store to get my very own first iPod! At least half anyway.
I'm using the other half for hubby and I to take H to a new waterpark that's about 2 1/2 hours drive away. It is consistently voted one of the top waterparks in the country!! She's gonna love it!
Showing posts with label my father. Show all posts
Showing posts with label my father. Show all posts
Tuesday, August 07, 2007
Kids Say The Darndest Things
Kids Say #1
Last Thursday, the Prodigal Father (a.k.a. my "natural" father) came to visit us again. The man isn't what he used to be - in terms of physical appearances - but he still looks like Dad to me. To my 8-yr. old, however, he's Papaw David, and she's not really aware of how he looked 20 years ago or so. In fact, she doesn't know much about him at all because he's so rarely ever been a part of my life since she was born. As she's grown up, especially in the past year or so, she's gotten more curious about where she comes from, where I come from, and how our very branched and blended family works. She knows my mother and father divorced, and that my father re-married, which meant that I had a step-mother. She has asked simple questions like, "Was she nice?" and my commitment to be honest with her (without completely divulging every detail about every incident) has led to me having to answer her question with a "No. She was not nice at all." This, of course, only prompted my oldest child to ask for an example of WESM (Wicked Evil Step-Mother)'s not-niceness. I gave her an example.
While my dad was here last Thursday, we were all sitting in the living room, winding down for the evening, when she randomly bursts out with "My Mom said her stepmom locked her outside." She says this looking first at me, then at my dad. Like a guilty deer caught in headlights, he could only muster a glance at me and ask "Did she?"..... Like he didn't fucking know!!?? Like my brother and I never told him about it when it happened!! I just said "Yep. She sure did." He had nowhere to hide. He said probably the best thing that he could've said (which H would also be able to understand), which was "Well, we don't have to worry about her [stepmom] anymore." (He divorced her you see...then hid from the authorities to avoid being served divorce papers, etc. Quality guy that dad of mine).
Kids Say #2
While my father used to have a full head of curly brown hair in high school, he's now follicle-challenged. It's not shiny bald...but more like a bit of razory shortness in the back and on the sides. He's got nothing on top though. Somehow, H was not about to let this escape her attention and inquiry. As she walked behind the couch on which my father was sitting, she comfortably puts her hand on the top of his head and asks with complete sincerity, "Papaw David, do you want hair to grow here?"
We all had to laugh at that one.
Thank God for the kids, because I don't think I can muster laughing moments with my father anymore. It's hard to be funny when there's so much bad history. But H? She has no history with him...only fun. He took her to the ice skating rink, where they didn't get to skate, but he bought her a fancy skating dress (note: she doesn't even know how to ice skate). He took her roller skating, where she got to wear the dress, then bowling, and then they went to the mall, where my 52-yr old divorcee of a father got his ear pierced at Claire's. This, of course, made him the coolest Papaw in the world to H. It grossed me out...ugh...just ick. But I keep telling myself, this isn't about me: it's about the girls. Letting him take baby steps into our lives is for the girls. And I hope it's them that keep making jokes because it does make the whole situation a bit easier to go through.
Last Thursday, the Prodigal Father (a.k.a. my "natural" father) came to visit us again. The man isn't what he used to be - in terms of physical appearances - but he still looks like Dad to me. To my 8-yr. old, however, he's Papaw David, and she's not really aware of how he looked 20 years ago or so. In fact, she doesn't know much about him at all because he's so rarely ever been a part of my life since she was born. As she's grown up, especially in the past year or so, she's gotten more curious about where she comes from, where I come from, and how our very branched and blended family works. She knows my mother and father divorced, and that my father re-married, which meant that I had a step-mother. She has asked simple questions like, "Was she nice?" and my commitment to be honest with her (without completely divulging every detail about every incident) has led to me having to answer her question with a "No. She was not nice at all." This, of course, only prompted my oldest child to ask for an example of WESM (Wicked Evil Step-Mother)'s not-niceness. I gave her an example.
While my dad was here last Thursday, we were all sitting in the living room, winding down for the evening, when she randomly bursts out with "My Mom said her stepmom locked her outside." She says this looking first at me, then at my dad. Like a guilty deer caught in headlights, he could only muster a glance at me and ask "Did she?"..... Like he didn't fucking know!!?? Like my brother and I never told him about it when it happened!! I just said "Yep. She sure did." He had nowhere to hide. He said probably the best thing that he could've said (which H would also be able to understand), which was "Well, we don't have to worry about her [stepmom] anymore." (He divorced her you see...then hid from the authorities to avoid being served divorce papers, etc. Quality guy that dad of mine).
Kids Say #2
While my father used to have a full head of curly brown hair in high school, he's now follicle-challenged. It's not shiny bald...but more like a bit of razory shortness in the back and on the sides. He's got nothing on top though. Somehow, H was not about to let this escape her attention and inquiry. As she walked behind the couch on which my father was sitting, she comfortably puts her hand on the top of his head and asks with complete sincerity, "Papaw David, do you want hair to grow here?"
We all had to laugh at that one.
Thank God for the kids, because I don't think I can muster laughing moments with my father anymore. It's hard to be funny when there's so much bad history. But H? She has no history with him...only fun. He took her to the ice skating rink, where they didn't get to skate, but he bought her a fancy skating dress (note: she doesn't even know how to ice skate). He took her roller skating, where she got to wear the dress, then bowling, and then they went to the mall, where my 52-yr old divorcee of a father got his ear pierced at Claire's. This, of course, made him the coolest Papaw in the world to H. It grossed me out...ugh...just ick. But I keep telling myself, this isn't about me: it's about the girls. Letting him take baby steps into our lives is for the girls. And I hope it's them that keep making jokes because it does make the whole situation a bit easier to go through.
Wednesday, May 16, 2007
Law of the Father - Part I
This will be a brief intro post to what will, I'm sure, be several posts on the Law of the Father, in both theoretical and literal terms. The Reason: for the first time in almost a decade (and only the second time ever), my natural father is coming to visit.
The Immediate Context: My father came to my wedding in 2005, and I'd seen him once before at my brother's college graduation in 2004. Before that, I'd only seen him an average of once every year or so, at best.
Broader Context: My parents divorced when I was 10, and my father re-married WESM (Wicked Evil Step-Mother) within a year of the divorce, thinking he'd have a better shot in a custody battle if he had a wife at home to take care of my brother and I should he win. He didn't win, not at first anyway. My mother was granted full custody of us, but several months after the divorce, she was struck with a rare viral illness called
Guillain-Barre Syndrome. She was flown to Capital City Hospital, where her lungs collapsed, paralysis set in, and she was put on a respirator. We were automatically put into my father's care while she was in the hospital for the next six months. I lived with my father and WESM for about 2 years before finally moving back in with my mother, who made an almost full recovery from her illness.
Some Details About My Father:
* he cheated on my mother, nobody knows how many times though, but he wasn't terribly good at hiding it
* when he was home (which was often only a month at a time b/c he works in the oilfield), he was always the Good Cop, giving my brother and I lots of junk food, taking us fishing, hunting, etc. During my childhood, I was a Daddy's Girl; I was the son he didn't get until my brother came along four years after me.
* he has only a high school education, is from the south, and was the local football star/bully in my hometown (his nickname: The Animal)
* when my mother divorced him, he held a gun to her head and threatened to kill her; stalked her; broke into her house and burned holes in all the clothes in her close (this list is not extensive by any means)
* one time he head-butted me for opening a can of soup to eat for a late morning breakfast
* he is a Master Manipulator
* he is now divorced from WESM, though not after putting her through even worse fear and manipulation than he inflicted on my mother
* when I left his house at almost 13, he told me to take every picture of me with me because he didn't want anything to remember me by
I'm sure you're wondering why the hell I'd let this person into my home with my family. The answer, the short answer anyway, is that I forgave him a long time ago for all his past offenses, and I no longer give him the power to create fear in me. I forgave him as part of my own healing process many years ago. I confronted him about his affairs, I demanded an explanation, and I told him I wasn't afraid of him anymore.
The funny thing about The Law of the Father though, is one never really escapes it. Not completely. There's always that thing in the back of your head that knows The Law's potential to surveil, control, and punish: in theory, culture, and paternal law. I know I'm in a safe space with my husband and children. And my father and I have talked more in the past year over the phone, though the conversations are brief. He's come to recognize himself, in part, as an old man who will be leaving behind very few people who love him. He knows he fucked up with me. He knows there is no way to ever make it up. He knows (I think) that I will never trust him again the way a child should be able to trust a parent. I think he's very alone. He continues to work in the oilfield business, like he has all his life, yet he's got nothing to show for it. No home. No retirement plans. No social life. No goals. No close family. Right now, I think he's grateful for whatever he can get, and if that's just a two-night stay at his daughter's house to visit with me, my husband, and his grand-daughters, he'll take it. Even if it's tense and awkward. I know he'll die with a long list of regrets. I think this is the best I can do for him right now.
He's coming tonight, so we'll see how it goes. I'll be posting more about him, the visit, and my take on the Daddy-Daughter link to The Law of the Father in the next few days. This is one of the few times where I wished I had lots of readers who could totally relate and could offer tons of helpful advice.
The Immediate Context: My father came to my wedding in 2005, and I'd seen him once before at my brother's college graduation in 2004. Before that, I'd only seen him an average of once every year or so, at best.
Broader Context: My parents divorced when I was 10, and my father re-married WESM (Wicked Evil Step-Mother) within a year of the divorce, thinking he'd have a better shot in a custody battle if he had a wife at home to take care of my brother and I should he win. He didn't win, not at first anyway. My mother was granted full custody of us, but several months after the divorce, she was struck with a rare viral illness called
Guillain-Barre Syndrome. She was flown to Capital City Hospital, where her lungs collapsed, paralysis set in, and she was put on a respirator. We were automatically put into my father's care while she was in the hospital for the next six months. I lived with my father and WESM for about 2 years before finally moving back in with my mother, who made an almost full recovery from her illness.
Some Details About My Father:
* he cheated on my mother, nobody knows how many times though, but he wasn't terribly good at hiding it
* when he was home (which was often only a month at a time b/c he works in the oilfield), he was always the Good Cop, giving my brother and I lots of junk food, taking us fishing, hunting, etc. During my childhood, I was a Daddy's Girl; I was the son he didn't get until my brother came along four years after me.
* he has only a high school education, is from the south, and was the local football star/bully in my hometown (his nickname: The Animal)
* when my mother divorced him, he held a gun to her head and threatened to kill her; stalked her; broke into her house and burned holes in all the clothes in her close (this list is not extensive by any means)
* one time he head-butted me for opening a can of soup to eat for a late morning breakfast
* he is a Master Manipulator
* he is now divorced from WESM, though not after putting her through even worse fear and manipulation than he inflicted on my mother
* when I left his house at almost 13, he told me to take every picture of me with me because he didn't want anything to remember me by
I'm sure you're wondering why the hell I'd let this person into my home with my family. The answer, the short answer anyway, is that I forgave him a long time ago for all his past offenses, and I no longer give him the power to create fear in me. I forgave him as part of my own healing process many years ago. I confronted him about his affairs, I demanded an explanation, and I told him I wasn't afraid of him anymore.
The funny thing about The Law of the Father though, is one never really escapes it. Not completely. There's always that thing in the back of your head that knows The Law's potential to surveil, control, and punish: in theory, culture, and paternal law. I know I'm in a safe space with my husband and children. And my father and I have talked more in the past year over the phone, though the conversations are brief. He's come to recognize himself, in part, as an old man who will be leaving behind very few people who love him. He knows he fucked up with me. He knows there is no way to ever make it up. He knows (I think) that I will never trust him again the way a child should be able to trust a parent. I think he's very alone. He continues to work in the oilfield business, like he has all his life, yet he's got nothing to show for it. No home. No retirement plans. No social life. No goals. No close family. Right now, I think he's grateful for whatever he can get, and if that's just a two-night stay at his daughter's house to visit with me, my husband, and his grand-daughters, he'll take it. Even if it's tense and awkward. I know he'll die with a long list of regrets. I think this is the best I can do for him right now.
He's coming tonight, so we'll see how it goes. I'll be posting more about him, the visit, and my take on the Daddy-Daughter link to The Law of the Father in the next few days. This is one of the few times where I wished I had lots of readers who could totally relate and could offer tons of helpful advice.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)