I’ve only been writing about my father for the past two years. (Along with a few other topics.) You’d think I could find something fresh to post for Father’s Day.
I thought so, too.
Feeling frustrated with myself.
Yes, I have been writing nearly non-stop through the unfolding sh!tshow that has been my life these past two years. No, I haven’t had time to look back at any of it.
Been trying to write as quickly as life unfolds. Haven’t come close.
How is it I thought I’d have time to look back?
I know there’s plenty in there about my dad. When I find time to look back.
Maybe soon? Maybe one day? Maybe by next Father’s Day? Maybe when the hits stop coming quite so fast and furious?
I know I do not corner the market on hardship. Now or ever.
I have so many advantages. So many things that are vastly easier for me than for others. I have so many more choices even when I hurtle headfirst into hardship.
I am grateful. Every. Single. Day.
But I’ve also just experienced a couple of the hardest years of my life. And I know I’m not done yet.
Unrealistic of me to think I could have a perfectly polished Father’s Day essay to post here today. Despite more fodder than many could ever imagine.
Seems I’ve been setting the bar higher than I could ever hope to reach since I was a very little girl.
Thanks, Dad
In setting the bar so absurdly high I was just following my father’s lead. Trying to win his approval. Hoping to make him proud. Desperately wanting to trust that he loved me.
Each painful and damaging in its own ways.
The times I pulled it off? Hands down among my greatest triumphs.
I want to embody every single one of my father’s very best characteristics. Appreciate fully all he taught me. Pass his deep wisdom onto my own children.
The list of things I admire about my dad is LONG.
And yet there are also things about my dad I’d like to leave in the past. Ways he hurt me, often related to hurts he hadn’t healed from himself.
Some Olympic-level anxiety. Some genetics. Some habits. Some grooming. Some intergenerational trauma he had foisted on him before he foisted it on me.
A faulty—if exceedingly large—heart.
The list of things I’m trying to recover from is also long.
My Pops the Professor
My pops taught me more than many people get to learn in a lifetime. Including how to learn. With this, he gave me the world.
He made that world a lot harder for me in many ways. But he also showed me that life holds more riches than I ever could have dreamed. And he helped me develop the tools I need to unlock them.
I miss him every day.
Happy Flippin’ Fathers’ Day to My Friends, Including Fathers
Sending love to everyone else missing their dads today. To everyone celebrating their dads. To everyone doing their very best to be stand-up dads to their sons and daughters.
It’s flippin’ hard to be a good dad.
Two years of reflecting intensively on my dad (among of few other topics) has definitely taught me that. So much harder than I gave him credit for when he was alive.
It’s also taught me how vitally important it is to be a good dad.
To those of you giving it your all—even most of the time—I salute you.
Your sons or daughters may not ever thank you adequately enough. (Relationships with dads can be damn tricky sometimes.)
The children they grow into and the world they create might be thanks enough.
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