You’d think that not being able to come out to my father as planned would have devastated me. True, I’m saddened, especially having gone from thinking I’d never come out to him to wanting to beat the door down and jump out with a flamenco band behind me in just over a month’s time is a huge step. I had come to where I was looking forward to it, and then, just like that, my father did what he’s always done and is very good at: He disappointed me.
But then you don’t know my father.
On that note, I don’t know my father.
Or maybe I do. I know there is part of me clamors and wishes for some Cliff Huxtable or Ward Cleaver love. Throw the old ball around and talk about transmissions and what life was like for him in the Navy.
But that never happened, and it’s never going to happen. And me coming out to him isn’t going to undo thirty-five years of what I know now to be true: Dear old dad was just a shitty father. And him being a shitty father doesn’t mean that I love him any less. There were times when he surprised me; getting accepted into an expensive and private art school and rattling off the check to hold my place without batting an eyelash; his love of the outdoors and camping trips we scampered off to as a family in my youth; his arms wide open stance on people of all backgrounds spoke of diversity long before it became a political buzz word; and his love of music induced a puzzling scatterbrained appreciation within me that tests the shuffle limits of my very own iPod. All these are fine memories along with Christmas morning surprises and Fourth of July fireworks and summer beach excursions are all great.
Yet all that can’t undo his arm’s length way of interacting with people. His stark straightforwardness contrasts too greatly with my sense of humor and mirth. Me being the life of the party couldn’t be more different than him holding up the wall by his lonesome. And it is these things that I’m going to have to rectify and will thing about when as I make my peace. I wish I could call him up and say, Hey, I’m coming down..let’s grab lunch or I’ll meet you at donut shop, or grab a cup of coffee. His mind is too rational, too practical, those are things that other people do. The concepts as foreign to my father as the dynamics of aeronautics and wind resistance are to me.
The ebb and flow of trying to make this work have grown too tiresome for me. I’ll reach out and dangle the bait, and sometimes he’ll do the same. But its never the right time–one of us is just a bit off, and we both end up frustrated. I can’t use a template from How Things Should Be to live as my father’s son. Nor should I flip through the manual in trying to find the makings of the father I want in my head. That recipe isn’t there. The ingredients just don’t exist. And if I’m going to live a productive life from this point on, I can’t beat myself up over wanting something that I can’t have.
I will come out to my father, but the heft of what it means is gone. The words will be said, and the truth will be out in the ether to be interpreted or understood. He’ll say he’s always known, or be completely surprised and that will be that. I’ll continue to write and work and share the bits and pieces of my life with him. I’ll see him on holidays and wish him Happy Father’s Day and watch him get older because that’s what we do. But for now I’ll just have to live my life the best I can. With the knowledge and perception I’ve picked up from him over the years, and the father I love and can’t figure out will remain the distant and far off ghost of the man he’s always sadly been.
JNez
Posted on 21st July, 2008
intense. many of us sadly have to come to the realization that are parents are who they are, not who we want them to be. i suppose similarly, parents have to realize that children, although created, are also independent beings. this is comforting and saddening all at once, like many insights that come with age and maturity. you do a great job of expressing them.
spikehug
Posted on 21st July, 2008
hey d-
i love that you’re growing through this. though my father was rarely there (working 7 days a week, to support his parents in HK and ours in NY) when we grew up, it was the best he knew how to do. It was his way of saying I love you and will take care of you no matter what. I had been resigned for a long time, and got so used to it, that I didn’t care. I had always made him wrong for not being available, but after a leadership training course at Landmark (which you oh so love), I got the courage to have a very vulnerable and transparent conversation with him about my feelings. And I didn’t know what was going to happen after that. But what was unexpected was that he had been guilty all through raising me and my brother for not spending enough time with us. He cried, I cried. I told him “I love you” for the first time in my life, which is a huge breakthrough and we have a really awesome relationship, where he confides in me about his thoughts, which is a huge breakthrough for him, because he keeps things inside to the point where he explodes like Chile’s volcanos. But what I got out of that conversation with my dad is the relationship I’ve always wanted to have with him and that we are the cause in the matter to get what we want in life. I also learned that we all do the best we can and what we know how to do. He’s always been there for me, and that I get his unconditional love.
Keep on Keep on my friend. You are doing great. I acknowledge you for your courage to open this door. He’s your dad. He’ll always love you no matter what, except it might not be the way that you want him to.
Ophelia
Posted on 22nd July, 2008
I imagine the genetic line we all carry, from so many generations back, so many lives, places, experiences. All condensed into what we are now. All these choices have culminated into what we are now.
Your father is a product of that and his life is shaped by the generations before him. You are a product of his choices layered on top of that.
You are the sum total of all that was before you. Instinctually you already know what to do, and he does as well. He is only a ghost if you label him that way, he is really just a progression of his self. What will we be like at that age? I hope to be a mellower wiser being.
xxoxoxo
ophelia
ophelia
Posted on 22nd July, 2008
Oh, I did not mean to sound so harsh. I reread it and it’s a comment to myself really. And my family. I have come to accept who they are, and they accepted me a long time ago. It just took a while.
Because I am soooo stubborn and always thinking I am “right”. I am not. I accept my shortcomings and
lack of empathy.
love you.
yours truly,m
Posted on 22nd July, 2008
Um… okay, first of alll, I cannot believe you just pulled a Ms.Barbra Striesand up in here and now I can’t get that heifer’s song outta my head. No disrespect, I luv her. Papa can you hear meeeeee, papaaa. And don’t ever get me started on, Memoriesss like the corners of my mind, misty water-color…. join me ladies and chingus, all together now. Okay I’ll stop. I’m on the rag. Just remember while you judge me, tolerance is a virtue.
Now on a more serious note. I feel you. You know about my own frustrations with my own papa (though the reasons may be different). And we both know, Love is never the issue, so let’s put that aside shall we. With that said, I think you’re right, that inevitable time will come aligned by the universe and you will tell dad you’re gay and he will hear you (like he already knew) and that cathartic moment probably will not come from that. However, talking to him about your actual feelings & your point of view & your desire to connect with him could bring a tiny release and that’s a start. And it goes Both ways. For example, You know what I told my papa. I said, papa or more like apa… you need to Change with a capital C and he said to be, at my age Change is not happening, bang bang. Okay I got shot down. And then I said, Okay I get that, HOWEVER apa you need to change with a lower case c… just a ‘little bit’, just a little bit, just a l-i-t-t-l-e bit (lip smack). We all know the saying, something’s gotta give. And that just a ‘little bit’ can go a looooong ways. Don’t ever ask for the big C, it’s not gonna happen and I’ve changed by accepting that fact & it’s brought down my frustrations a notch. My apa, even with the little c he was strugglin’ and still does, but sometimes those days come when he budges a little and that little release comes and goes, but honey, that little release is sometimes everything on a given day, you feel me. So ask of yourself and of your papa for that little c and book that Saturday apointment for a little tea&cake time with papa & D. And remember inhale exhale (patience, go to yoga if you must, God knows we all need to). It’s somethin’ to live for my dear chingu, he’s not getting any younger. So set-up that ‘little bit’ for sometime this year, it’s better than nothin’
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