There are many guys out there who are good fathers. Their sons and daughters learn so much from them, and experience a terrific bonding together. The story of my father is a little different. He was never a good father, and never seemed to figure out how to be a good one, either. The same could be said of my mother as well. She more or less acted like a dumb little 6 year-old girl, laughing at everything, whether it was funny or not, and gossiping, but that’s a different story.
My father was a very negative man. He was an office schmuck who worked in the office of a large bank. He never went anywhere with his career. There’s nothing wrong with that, if you’re happy with what you do, but he never was. He would always moan about ‘how poor we were’, or how some young guy half his age (who would have more education and more ambition) would end up becoming his boss. My parents were in their 40s when they had me, and I was an only child. He rarely ever encouraged or inspired me, but usually told me what I COULDN’T do, COULDN’T have, or COULDN’T be. If I asked him for anything, or about anything, he almost always had a negative response, with some kind of excuse: “No! You don’t need that”, “No! We can’t afford that”, “No! I’m too old to do that”, “No! You don’t need braces. You’re teeth don’t look that bad”, etc. I kind of refer to him as ‘Doctor No’. He was a firm disciplinarian who believed that sparing the rod was spoiling the child, so he was always hitting me, or threatening to hit me, over the most trivial things.
Once, when I was about 3, he hit me just because he wanted to take a picture of me crying. He thought it was funny. I think I still have that picture around here somewhere.
When I was about 5 or 6, we were on vacation in Florida. We were staying at a hotel, and my mother got chummy with a few other women at the hotel, and they were sitting around chatting. I kind of got bored hanging around with them, so I went up to the hotel room, where my dad was hanging around (always shuffling papers around, or something). He was boring, too, so I went back down to where my mother was, and one of the women gave me a sand dollar. I thought it was really cool, as I never had one before. I thanked her, and took it up to show my dad. I told him what it was, and how one of the women talking with my mom had given it to me. He didn’t believe me. He told me that it was some kind of support footer for a washing machine, and that I had stolen it. I told him ‘no’, and repeated my story. He told me I was lying, and I was to return it to whoever I had stolen it from, and apologize. When I tried to say ‘no’ again, he hit me, so I had to take the sand dollar back, crying, and apologize. My mother went back to my father, and she backed up my story. He then got all apologetic to me, but what’s done is done. My father had called me a thief and a liar, and I was humiliated in front of a bunch of strangers. What little respect I had for him up to that point, was now gone.
He was also very uncomfortable with anything sexual, and kind of imprinted that on me, as well. Once, we were staying with my uncle’s family (they were much cooler than my family), I needed to use the bathroom, but my cousin Sally (the same age as me) was already in there. Everybody else told me “just go ahead in”. Even Sally herself, said it was ok to come in, but my father was very hung up about it, and told me, “No! Don’t you dare go in there!”. My aunt and uncle were like, “What’s the problem? Just let him go in.”, but my dad turn to me, with a very threatening look, followed with “No! Don’t you even THINK about it!”
As the years went by, I had become very withdrawn. I did everything at school that was required. Showed up, did homework, took tests, passed to the next grade, and nothing more. I never did any activities, played sports, went to dances, talked to girls, or anything like that. I just didn’t have the guts.
When I was about 13, I’d had enough of him. He was threatening me about something, I don’t even remember what, but I snapped, and pulled a knife on him. It was only a dinner knife, but I came at him, slashed him a couple of times, and stormed off to my room. After that, he seemed to change quite a bit. Instead of being confrontational, he became incredibly smarmy with me. He became disgusting, but in a different way. Regardless, I wanted nothing to do with him.
After the high school years, I got a new job and moved away from my parents, which turned out to be the best thing for me. I did a lot of growing up, and started to do things that I wanted to do. There were days when I felt very alone and depressed, and sometimes I would break down and cry alone in my apartment. As far as dating and relationships, I was starting at ground zero, as I had no guidance, but my growing sense of accomplishment and self-confidence got me to a new plateau, and I was starting to form friendships, and connect with girls.
After being on my own for a couple of years, I had left a lot of old baggage behind, and became a better person. I even got married!
As for my father, he’s been dead for decades. I have a little resentment towards him, but more of a sadness that our relationship was not what it could have been.
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