Like Father, Like Son?
My father presents a dilemma in my life. To talk with him means to take all my principles and my beliefs and put them in the corner and listen to his explanation about whatever he feels like talking. To say what I feel about something means to incur his wrath. This has been the way I communicate with my father for the past few years, ever since I took the initiative to say what I mean. Obviously, this has not been very beneficial in our relationship. Calls home would be spent mostly talking to my mom, and conversations with my father would revolve around money and studies. This is normal among many families, apparently.
Just because it’s normal doesn’t mean it has to go on that way. People tell me that it’s normal; that men generally have a hard time showing their emotions. My dad tells me that’s how he’s been all his life, and there are better things to be done than wasting time talking to him. I called him stubborn right to his face once; he threatened to throw me out of the house. See, this is the thing: I want to talk to him. He’s my father. As much as I hate him and his decision-making skills at times, the fact that he is my father is an irrefutable fact. I want to know why he thinks what he thinks and why he says what he says. Maybe, that would be the stepping stone for me to understand the man that he is, the man that he has become.
Seeing how my father reacts to things and situations makes me wonder how I would be when I have a family of my own; what kind of father I would become when the time comes. I’ve established, in my head, certain criteria for the father that I wish to become: kind yet firm, open-minded, funny, willing to make a fool of myself in front of my children when the situation calls for it. But then I catch myself thinking like my father; jumping to conclusions, hot-tempered, making assumptions before asking questions. These things are in my thoughts, wondering if I’ll be able to come out of my father’s shadow, to be a different man than he is, forging my own identity.
My dad is a good man, make no mistake about that. Only love for his family would make a man conduct tuition classes after work day after day, coming back close to midnight every night, so that he could gain extra income for the family. Only love for his family would make a man take his sick son to the hospital every night for months on end, without a second thought. That’s my father. But he is also, at times, arrogant. Assertive. Hypocritical. Not open to suggestions or criticism.
That’s called being human, isn’t it?
There is no doubt in my mind that I’ve inherited some (hopefully not all) of his traits, both good and bad. But I don’t want to go through this life always thinking about the inevitable day when my father’s beliefs and my principles clash head-to-head. Boy, there will be complete chaos on that day. And relationships will be changed, probably on a permanent basis. As much as I would like to avoid it, it is inevitable. I pray that I don’t lose him when that day comes.
In the meantime, I guess the only thing I can do is to take it as it comes, criticisms, arguments; the whole package. I wish I could change his mindset, even if just a little, but it takes a person who knows his strengths and his weaknesses to help another person, and unfortunately, I am not that person. Not yet anyway.
He’s my father. In the end, I guess that fact makes it worthwhile.
I hope.
Just because it’s normal doesn’t mean it has to go on that way. People tell me that it’s normal; that men generally have a hard time showing their emotions. My dad tells me that’s how he’s been all his life, and there are better things to be done than wasting time talking to him. I called him stubborn right to his face once; he threatened to throw me out of the house. See, this is the thing: I want to talk to him. He’s my father. As much as I hate him and his decision-making skills at times, the fact that he is my father is an irrefutable fact. I want to know why he thinks what he thinks and why he says what he says. Maybe, that would be the stepping stone for me to understand the man that he is, the man that he has become.
Seeing how my father reacts to things and situations makes me wonder how I would be when I have a family of my own; what kind of father I would become when the time comes. I’ve established, in my head, certain criteria for the father that I wish to become: kind yet firm, open-minded, funny, willing to make a fool of myself in front of my children when the situation calls for it. But then I catch myself thinking like my father; jumping to conclusions, hot-tempered, making assumptions before asking questions. These things are in my thoughts, wondering if I’ll be able to come out of my father’s shadow, to be a different man than he is, forging my own identity.
My dad is a good man, make no mistake about that. Only love for his family would make a man conduct tuition classes after work day after day, coming back close to midnight every night, so that he could gain extra income for the family. Only love for his family would make a man take his sick son to the hospital every night for months on end, without a second thought. That’s my father. But he is also, at times, arrogant. Assertive. Hypocritical. Not open to suggestions or criticism.
That’s called being human, isn’t it?
There is no doubt in my mind that I’ve inherited some (hopefully not all) of his traits, both good and bad. But I don’t want to go through this life always thinking about the inevitable day when my father’s beliefs and my principles clash head-to-head. Boy, there will be complete chaos on that day. And relationships will be changed, probably on a permanent basis. As much as I would like to avoid it, it is inevitable. I pray that I don’t lose him when that day comes.
In the meantime, I guess the only thing I can do is to take it as it comes, criticisms, arguments; the whole package. I wish I could change his mindset, even if just a little, but it takes a person who knows his strengths and his weaknesses to help another person, and unfortunately, I am not that person. Not yet anyway.
He’s my father. In the end, I guess that fact makes it worthwhile.
I hope.