I'm not angry anymore...
"Growing up it was just me and my mom against the world
And all my sympathies were with her when I was a little girl..."
My father was a soft-hearted, absent-minded, musical genius. He was a little boy abandoned by his father, locked out of his mother's room, caring for his sister and brother. He was a young man searching for someone to love and care for him the way he wished his mother could have. He was (and is) a dreamer, an eternal optimist, a man who followed his heart every time. He hurt my mother many times, yes, and she hurt him. He ran from one woman's arms into another's, time and time again. He deserved more than what he found with them.
"Now I've seen both my parents play out the hands that they were dealt
and as each year goes by I learn more about how my father must've felt..."
He and my mother may have been perfect strangers, wedded for 12 years for all the wrong reasons, but he loved his baby girl, his first child. He was proud of me, he played with me, he told me stories at night. I grew up to the sounds of his beautiful voice and the intricate melodies and chords of his guitar. And yet, my parents waged a war with each other through their child's heart, and I gave mine to my mother. It wasn't until I was almost a young woman that I began to see things from any point of view other than hers.
"She taught me how to wage a cold war with quiet charm
But I just want to walk through my life unarmed
To accept and just get by like my father learned to do
But without all the accepting and getting by that got my father through..."
My parents were polar opposites, pitted against each other for eternity, the cool and calm, collected and practical mother. The whimsical, impulsive, flighty father. And yet, looking back, I realize that they were both in search of the same thing. Love. In their own way they both waged epic wars for the sake of love, even though it meant dragging their only child through every battle. I no longer hold this against them. I wish for both of them the joy and happiness of true love. I wish them peace for a past mired in guilt, anger, betrayal, and disappointment. I wish for them to forgive themselves for anything that happened to me that they never intended to.
"I just want you to understand that I know what all the fighting was for
And I just want you to understand that I'm not angry anymore..."
Now, like my mother, I see my father for what he truly is- a survivor, a fighter, a winner. Life has never been easy for him, and every moment of peace he's ever known has been hard-won, but he has never given up. He has always shone with hope, with eagerness for the future, never accepting failure, never opting out of the struggle to make things better for himself. In this way he and my mother have become one and the same, and I hope that I can live my life with their courage.
My father never punished me. He was not the disciplinarian, authoritarian figure of many children's childhoods. He is unafraid to show me tears, to hug me, to say he loves me. He calls me faithfully. He tries hard to be a part of my life, even from afar. He loves to hear me play the piano. Whenever I hear the strum of a guitar, a certain song, sung in a clear strong voice, I remember my father, and that he sang it better. I remember the Clinton Inn, my father entertaining crowds, the way people flocked to him, laughed at his jokes, put dollars in his tip jar. I remember how fast I had to walk to keep up with him, the unfurnished apartments he lived in while he worked 3 jobs. I remember the women who screamed at him, pushed him away, made him afraid. I remember him bringing me chocolates home from work on Valentine's Day, or strawberry shortcake ice cream bars because he knew they were my favorite. I remember him carrying me on his shoulders at Gallup Park.
This post is inspired by my mom's entry about her dad, and it strikes me how absolutely different our fathers were, and how very similar we are. Funny enough, as two completely separate entities as my mother and father are, the more I love one of them the more I love the other.
*Song lyrics from "Angry Anymore" by Ani Difranco