I've been thinking about my dad a lot the past few days. My dad and I don't have the best relationship. No one awful, terrible thing caused the rift. Just many years of little things. Plus, he's sort of oblivious to the whole thing. If you asked him, he'd tell you everything between us was fine. It's hard and I feel terrible about it, given that he is in such poor health. I hate that I'm carrying around this resentment, but on the other hand I find it really difficult to let it go. (Wow. Got a little deep there, didn't I?)
What brought all of this on was that my uncle posted a bunch of old family photos to Facebook. We're talking old. My dad was born in 1935, and most of these photos are of my dad as a kid, up until he graduated high school. I am so grateful that my uncle posted the photos. I totally see a resemblance between my dad and myself (I have his eyes), in fact, all four of us kids (and some of the grandkids too) looked exactly like the photo I posted here as babies. So cute (if I do say so myself).
It got me thinking that I should focus on good memories of my dad, rather than all the little resentments. Like the time he took me to some historic village in New York one day (we still lived in NY at the time, don't think we hopped on a plane from California just for a history lesson), just because I was asking a bunch of questions about the "olden days".
Or the time he did what N christened "the dance of anger" (which was a whole lot of jumping up and down) over something I had done. It was scary at the time (I was 16, I think, and my dad is a large man), but by about 5 minutes later it was hilarious. Literally, he was jumping up and down. At 6'5" and like 300lbs, I'm pretty certain the whole house shook.
My favorite story about my dad and me is this one though. My mom stayed home with me until I was 3 and they could put me in pre-school full time (back then they didn't take kids until they were potty trained). When I was ready for kindergarten they were kind of worried about what they would do with me in the afternoons, since kindergarten was only half day. I guess it was decided that I'd go to day-care after school and luckily the day-care had a bus that would pick me up at kindergarten.
On the first day of kindergarten my dad was so worried that I wouldn't know which bus to get on to go to day care that he hid across the street from my school crouched down in his car watching me to make sure that I made it. He thought that if I saw him I would demand that he take me home. (He was probably right.)
It was only when he was already there... across the street from an elementary school... hiding... in his car... watching a bunch of little kids leave their kindergarten class... that it ocurred to him what a bad idea this was. Luckily neither the police, nor I, spotted him and I made it onto my bus without a hitch, none the wiser, until my mom told me the story many years later.
I do love my dad. Of course, he's my dad. And it's stories like this, that I will carry with me when he's gone. (Believe me though, he is not going anywhere for a while. Even in poor health, he is convinced, as am I, that he's going to be kicking around for another 20 years.) None of the rest of it will matter.
Awww, I loved reading these stories. I can picture "the dance." And the kindergarten one is classic.
ReplyDeleteWhere does your dad live now? And I didn't know you ever lived in New York.
For what it's worth, I think you're absolutely right though to make yourself think of these stories and try to let the little things go now, while you can. Because there will come a day when that's all you'll remember. The good stuff.
Thanks for sharing these.