(no subject)
My father is dead.
How else can I put it? I don't think there's really another way. I found out a little while ago from my mother, who recieved a call from my half-brother about it. I'm really not sure what to think. At first, I didn't feel anything, but now I'm starting to feel a mix of emotions. I don't normally post personal things in this journal anymore, but I feel a lot of this needs to be said somewhere, out of conversation, and I suppose this is the most convenient place.
Where to begin... I suppose I should start by recounting the kind of relationship my dad and I used to have. Like the feelings you'd have for any kind of parent, they're pretty complicated. I suppose, on the surface, the easiest thing to say is that I hated my father. I hated him without bounds. I hated him openly, I hated him to myself, and I hated him without fear of reprisal. He beat me; abused me physically, mentally and verbally. He beat my mother. We argued every day about everything under the sun, degenerating from whatever little inane spat we started with into vicious name-calling and mud-slinging. He once disowned me in an argument, right in front of my mother, and made no apology for it later. I see a lot of people say that they "hate" their parents, but they're just children. They don't mean it. Often, they're just being petty, getting fussy because they aren't getting what they want. I find it insulting, because the kind of anger and bitterness my father and I shared was as ugly and raw as hatred got. It was brutal, vicious. Unforgiveable. On both our parts.
With all that said, you'd think I'd be thankful he's gone and I never have to worry about him again. But... there's more to it than that. My father came from another marriage, and in that marriage he had four children. Three girls and one boy. And while I've only heard stories, the kind of bullshit that they had to go through when they grew up was even worse than me. Worse yet, they didn't even get the chance to get it out. They didn't have the sanctuary of MY mother, because THEIR mother resented them just as much as their father did, keeping them locked in a cage of religious bondage. And yet, with me, things where... so totally different. While admittedly, just about anything would have been better, dad tried to be a father to me. It ended badly, of course, but he still tried. He tried to listen, he tried to take part, he tried to be friendly, and funnier, and be a good example. He tried to be a dad. He tried to be a good man. I have so few good memories of my father, because for all of his trying, he rarely succeeded. But what could I ask for?
You can't pretend to love a child, just like you can't pretend to love anyone else. You either care about them with all of your heart, or they don't mean anything to you. And as hard as it is to admit it, I did care about him. Even if I had so few "good times" that I can remember, I still had that faith in him, the belief that he could become the father I wanted and needed, the father that everyone else had. I never stopped wanting to love him, because goddamn it, for all the shit he did wrong, for all the hatred we shared, he was still my father! Still the only one I ever had!
We hadn't spoken in over six years. Last I heard, he was living depressed and alone in a nursing home, barely able to sign the support checks he had to give us each month. And now he's gone, dead without reconciling with anyone. Dead without anything to show for it. 65 years for nothing.
I'm so guilty and angry and frustrated right now. These words mean nothing.
I'm sorry, dad.
How else can I put it? I don't think there's really another way. I found out a little while ago from my mother, who recieved a call from my half-brother about it. I'm really not sure what to think. At first, I didn't feel anything, but now I'm starting to feel a mix of emotions. I don't normally post personal things in this journal anymore, but I feel a lot of this needs to be said somewhere, out of conversation, and I suppose this is the most convenient place.
Where to begin... I suppose I should start by recounting the kind of relationship my dad and I used to have. Like the feelings you'd have for any kind of parent, they're pretty complicated. I suppose, on the surface, the easiest thing to say is that I hated my father. I hated him without bounds. I hated him openly, I hated him to myself, and I hated him without fear of reprisal. He beat me; abused me physically, mentally and verbally. He beat my mother. We argued every day about everything under the sun, degenerating from whatever little inane spat we started with into vicious name-calling and mud-slinging. He once disowned me in an argument, right in front of my mother, and made no apology for it later. I see a lot of people say that they "hate" their parents, but they're just children. They don't mean it. Often, they're just being petty, getting fussy because they aren't getting what they want. I find it insulting, because the kind of anger and bitterness my father and I shared was as ugly and raw as hatred got. It was brutal, vicious. Unforgiveable. On both our parts.
With all that said, you'd think I'd be thankful he's gone and I never have to worry about him again. But... there's more to it than that. My father came from another marriage, and in that marriage he had four children. Three girls and one boy. And while I've only heard stories, the kind of bullshit that they had to go through when they grew up was even worse than me. Worse yet, they didn't even get the chance to get it out. They didn't have the sanctuary of MY mother, because THEIR mother resented them just as much as their father did, keeping them locked in a cage of religious bondage. And yet, with me, things where... so totally different. While admittedly, just about anything would have been better, dad tried to be a father to me. It ended badly, of course, but he still tried. He tried to listen, he tried to take part, he tried to be friendly, and funnier, and be a good example. He tried to be a dad. He tried to be a good man. I have so few good memories of my father, because for all of his trying, he rarely succeeded. But what could I ask for?
You can't pretend to love a child, just like you can't pretend to love anyone else. You either care about them with all of your heart, or they don't mean anything to you. And as hard as it is to admit it, I did care about him. Even if I had so few "good times" that I can remember, I still had that faith in him, the belief that he could become the father I wanted and needed, the father that everyone else had. I never stopped wanting to love him, because goddamn it, for all the shit he did wrong, for all the hatred we shared, he was still my father! Still the only one I ever had!
We hadn't spoken in over six years. Last I heard, he was living depressed and alone in a nursing home, barely able to sign the support checks he had to give us each month. And now he's gone, dead without reconciling with anyone. Dead without anything to show for it. 65 years for nothing.
I'm so guilty and angry and frustrated right now. These words mean nothing.
I'm sorry, dad.