Some fathers expect to be revered for life for the simple act of doing something every male from every species on earth is equipped to do no matter how bad their acts are otherwise, and how at odds they can be with creating new life. Mine is one such. I wanted to like him, but he has a lot of unprocessed trauma from being a second generation american born into extreme poverty. I’m really sorry for that, I spend all day thinking about the conditions that created this chain of trauma and abuse and have been an advocate for those affected by it. In fact, the mentor and father figure who kept my biological father out of a life of petty crime and mob running inspired directions in my own career because he stepped in when my indigent paternal grandfather could not do anything but drink and then die in the street.
So too did my father find the dad he needed and maybe there were others. Due to his lack of parenting ability, I was fortunate to have found positive male role models who were responsible for more fathering than my dad did and that’s just how it works out for many people. We might not know when we’re in it, but we can look back and see who we counted on, and who we are today because of it.
A man named Tullis gave me a priestly blessing as a baby. I remember really liking him in my very early life before he moved away. I admired how curly his hair was no matter how short he cropped it and thinking about him as the man who gave me this earthly blessing to protect me. I’ve survived some close calls in my life and I think Tullis really meant what he said.
My friend’s dad Dwayne had her much later in life, a “happy accident”, and she was very loved. I had so much fun staying at her house. We listened to Mariah Carey and Prince, read teen magazines without interruption. Just prior to covid, she developed breast cancer. And the love he and her mother blessed her with was evident in the community outpouring of support from coast to coast. She is still with us. Dwayne had passed on many years before however. His advanced age lent him a grandfatherly quality though he never struck me as “old”, even then! He was very tall and lean, his full head of hair completely white. He would take my friend and I to amusement parks, just us, and it was the best. We had so much fun. He would take us out to eat and talk about his political inclinations in this age appropriate way that we could understand because he wanted us to have our own opinions on matters. He really did make everything political, in the best way possible! And he was the kindest type of person for it.
Roy used to be my supervisor when I was just 21 in sales. He was just old enough to be my father, or a very cool uncle. He had two daughters of his own not that much younger than me, and he was so proud of them, their biggest cheerleader. Roy was rotund in a way that seemed like a conscious decision on his part, always with a knowing grin when he wanted to get you in on something he was up to, and would find any reason to cut up. But, if you fucked with anyone he cared about, watch out. He became a hurricane, you could see the shifting winds in his eyes, deep set and knowing. He had joined the army out of high school and was sent to Iraq in ’91. I did not know what antiwar meant till I met him; I didn’t understand how deep a mistrust of the government could be on a fundamental level until that time in my life. Unlike many “vets” we’re supposed to take at face value in the age of online socialization simulation, he was far from “proud”. He cursed the armed forces at any opportunity. I learned so much from him and will be endlessly grateful for it. All the while we clicked and goofed off in only the way a caring father figure could with someone he viewed as a daughter. We drank black French roast all day long and joked about the imagined super powers it could give us that were really just exaggerated versions of ourselves when we had to go out on a service call or otherwise have a mundane interaction with a client.
Then there is my maternal grandfather, Lynn. A character to be sure. He liked smoking, gambling, and working hard. And then having a long retirement for his gambling luck, past the Vegas casino floor. He never spoiled me too much, just enough, and he didn’t like to live like a king. Just comfortably so everyone else in the family could have enough to establish something similar. I suspect he was financially abused in his last days which is a damn shame if you knew him. There was no other man in my life while he was alive who could recall the details of my aspirations from the last time we spoke in often surprising ways, sincerely ask me questions and offer me well wishes and advice.
kariflack 