9:19 a.m. - 2005-09-16
Daddy Rant
The day my complex father died began as all others. I rose to yank open the vertical blinds, letting in the crisp March morning sun. I showered listening to vintage Elton John. There was a training I needed to attend, some bi-annual thing required to renew my therapy license. I leaned over the vanity, blackening my lashes, barely looking at the one who daily accompanied me. Mindlessly, I assessed the results, singing under my breath. Goodbye yellow brick road. The training was to begin a bit later than my usual start time. The most significant item of the day was that jeans were permitted, forbidden on my regular job to my often vocalized chagrin. Pulling on faded Levis, I chose a blue cardigan with subtle periwinkle beading around the edges and some black loafer-type shoes. Gathering my purse and Diet Coke, I thought about the weekend. My father had not looked well, had complained of a "strange feeling" he couldn't really explain. I offered to take him to the doctor, but his response was the usual, "What are THEY gonna do? I'll be waiting for hours and then they'll just send me home. If I still feel this way on Monday, I'll let you take me." I told him about the mandatory training and that I would be finished at 3:00 p.m. I promised to leave my pager on and assured him that I would available at any time if he needed me. He agreed to call. He agreed to call. He agreed to call. Looking back, I should have known ... no, I DID know that my father would not disturb me in a training no matter what. No matter what. No matter what. But I believed him. No, I tried to belive him. No, I tried to believe that I believed him. The training was dull, but necessary. The speaker droned and I gulped soda after soda until the clock said 3:00, at which time my pager sounded and my world was never to be the same. With trembling fingers, I verified the number. My father. My daddy. My nemisis, my hero, my champion, my persecutor, my angel, my devil, the ogre under the bridge and the hunter rescuing me on the other side. My savior, my reason for needing one. My everything, although he knew this not. Having been betrayed by this shy girl caught in the headlights of a teenage dilemma for which she was completely unprepared, he would never trust again. Heartbroken by the systematic derailing of the future he envisioned, my desperate default, marriage to the boy with crooked teeth and a fast food job. He never knew, never believed that I just didn't know what else to do. Caught between two breaking hearts, immobilized, distanced from the third, my own. He never knew. We lived with the unspoken ache, decade after decade. Unrequited. He never knew the love I bore. The love I sought. With poetry. Tearful displays. Acts of contrition to a god, blind as a bat. Vigilantly, he protected himself from this prodigal girl trying her best to exist with the terminal disease called never. I never convinced him. He never knew.
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