Daddy Dearest

Michael Levine once wrote, “Having children makes you no more a parent than having a piano makes you a pianist.” His words echo in my ear each and every time I hang up the phone after speaking with my father. I call him my father because technically that is who he is. But in simpler terms, he is a sperm donor, a birth parent, a genetic twist of biology and fate that I was somehow dealt. I can simplify his title by using one little but powerful word: absent. One would think after having 40 years to adjust my sails to this reality, the sting of his rejection would lessen.  But in truth, it hasn’t. It slaps me in the face with an open hand every time. I have done my best over the years to give this man, whom I hardly know, the benefit of the doubt. I imagine his life was not exactly the path of happiness and ease, yet it’s the bed he made. Only he refused to sleep in it. If not for his alcoholism, maybe he would have been different. Maybe he would have chosen the path of parenthood instead of merely planting his seed and putting on his running shoes. Every time I think that it’s “me” that he didn’t want, I am reminded that he did not just abandon me but also my brothers. He assisted in bringing four living, breathing, healthy children into this world and didn’t stick around long enough to raise any of us. So, intellectually I know that it’s not me, it’s not Jenny that he did not want. He didn’t want any of us. He was not capable of the kind of love and sacrifice it takes to raise children. I am not even sure that as he sits alone now, in his sixties with no family around him, if he has yet learned the art of loving something beyond himself. I guess that is why I hang on. I have the compassion and love for him that he has never been able to extend to me. To picture him dying alone is too much for this daughter to bear. So, I do my best to close the gap, to somehow connect a non-existent bridge between his world and mine. My brothers have long since given up hope of having him be anything more than an unfortunate reality. But for some reason, I do not have the strength to turn my back on him.

Maybe it is selfish of me but I call my father every couple months merely to remind him that he has a daughter and no matter how he tries to deny me, I will not let him. I also reassure him of how much I love and miss him. I have never quite come to terms with what it is I miss about him or even love about him but I guess it’s the idea of the kind of father I wish he had been, rather than the kind of father he actually was, or wasn’t. I assure myself that I am not being spiteful in reminding him of what he walked away from but I suppose in some small way, I want him to hurt. I want him to know an ounce of the pain I have endured in his absence. But the truth is, I only step into his reality for a few moments and then I am gone again. I doubt thoughts of me linger past the hanging up of his phone. I have learned to be a bit braver than I have been in the past. I don’t usually cry anymore over him. I no longer expect phone calls just to check in with me. I no longer expect cards for Christmas’ or birthdays. I no longer expect him to ask about the grandchild he has had no relationship with. Maybe all he wishes is for me to leave him at peace with the notion that I don’t love him and that I curse the day he left but I cannot muster up the strength to let him be.  The little girl in me wishes to tell him how broken and bruised I have been over the years. I long to tell him what my childhood was truly like without him but the truth stares me in the face, knowing full well that possibly my life would not have been any better with him in it. I have repeated all the “what if’s in my head and I am left with no answer. Would my life have been less abusive, less painful had he chosen to stay? I don’t truly know. Maybe it would have opened a far bigger wound. To wrap my mind around such a fact is far too great and wide for me to understand.

Each time I talk to my father, I tell myself that it will be the last time. I will refuse contact with him unless the first step is made by him. But again, I fall short and give in to this overwhelming need to be loved by him. It’s an addiction of sorts, like alcohol. It takes over the body without you even knowing it. Except with alcohol, the hangover only lasts a day or so. This has lasted a lifetime.

Sometimes the hardest part of my fathers’ absence is to explain to my own child where his grandfather is and why he chooses not to see him. It’s something I have been very up front and honest with Matthew about. There is simply no lie or excuse that would explain it away. I tell him that there are good daddies in the world and there are not so good daddies. Unfortunately I was issued the not so good kind. Thankfully Matthew will never know this kind of pain, even if he is a child of divorce. His father takes an active role in his upbringing and the love between them is evident. So to explain to him why my father doesn’t want me or him has been a difficult process. I think he understands more as he gets older. Mattie keeps a picture of him and my father on his bulletin board, a small reminder that at one time, he felt love from this man. It’s a picture of them at a beach in North Carolina. Mattie can’t be more than 5 years old. Those are the memories he chooses to hold on to. I can’t say as I blame him. But as time passes, he asks about his grandfather less and less and my last conversation with my father, Matthew refused to even speak with him. I mouthed the words, “do you want to speak to Grandpa”? He simply shook his head and closed the door to his room. Matthew is smart; smarter than me. He knows when enough is enough. I do not. I keep picking at the scab the moment the wound has healed. And with raw skin bared again, comes the pain that I don’t think I will ever be free of.