21:40 on June 21, 2013. That is the time, and the date, upon which my father died.
The end of the first day of summer.
And the end of a protracted period of suffering for a man that I loved.
And at times despised.
Admired. And often resented.
Feared. And respected.
My dad.
For all of his faults – real or perceived, observed or projected – he was the man who shaped much of the man that I was to become. The man who provided me with the foundations to build those parts that were to become my best, as well as my worst.
Let me tell you a little about my dad.
Dad was driven. Driven to succeed. And driven to excess. A self-made millionaire, he perpetuated the ideology of the ‘dream’ of our neighbours to the south. Starting from the hard-scrabble of nothing – and I truly mean nothing, if the stories that I heard as a child are to be believed – he forged his way into the world of business, proving to be a salesman that laid definition to the term, and discovered that he had a talent. And a tenacity. And that when these were combined – drive, talent and tenacity – my dad always succeeded.
In business, dad was virtually golden.
In affairs of family – and being a father – I thought that he failed miserably.
I learned at a very young age that I would never be able to be ‘good enough’ for my dad. To coin Stephen Stills, “I never failed to fail; it was the easiest thing to do”
And that remained true until the moment that I began to truly take responsibility for myself, and who I was, and began to stop blaming others. Mostly, my dad.
When I entered into the realm of recovery from a life of alcoholic drinking and drug addiction, the entire world in which I live began to change. Because I began to accept things as they are, and as they were. Rather than lamenting how I wished they might have been.
When I began to truly examine some of my own inner demons; my personal failings; my shortcomings and character defects, I began to be see them more objectively in my dad.
In beginning to understand myself, I started to understand a little more about the man who helped to raise me. About the man who tried his damnedest to love me, and managed his failings with anger.
I am 46 years old.
I have a work ethic that is second to no one.
My name is my bond. And my bond is golden.
I have a passion for learning that is nigh-on insatiable.
I am a voracious reader, and will devour everything from Whitman to King, Thoreau to Cervantes, Tolstoy to Koontz.
I am good at what I love. And I love what I am good at.
I am as dependable as a Saint Bernard, and as loyal to boot.
And all of these things I owe to my dad.
But that is not the best part.
No, the best part – the part that raises a lump in my throat and brings a tear to my eye as I type - is the other thing that happened when I entered into recovery.
I met my father. The man within the man who had always been my dad. And we talked, and we talked, and we talked……
We laughed. We cried. We hugged and in many ways we began to get to know each other for the very first time. And to love each other as I thought that we never would.
I have so much to be grateful for in my life. And nothing more so than the friendship that I was able to share with a man that I came to begin to know and understand in these last 7 years.
I am so very happy to know that my father loved me, and to have had the chance to let him know just how much his son loved him.
This one will always be ours dad. I love you man.
Peace
