a brief history of my dad

my dad has had a difficult life... that is, from what i know of my dad's life, it has been difficult. he was the second son of carl & rosemary parker. my grandfather was a hard man. he lied about his age to join the navy as a youngster, & claimed to pull bodies out of the water during the bombing of pearl harbor in world war 2. as a kid, he got evicted from grade school for kicking his teacher. i think my grandpa would now be diagnosed bipolar. but back then, mental illness wasn't well-known & probably ignored. instead, he was just an angry & confused child who grew into an angry & confused adult. he married my grandmother, who was a daughter to an italian immigrant father & german immigrant mother. she had both of her sons by the time she was 20 years old. she & her boys were clearly under the rule of her overbearing husband. my dad has passively told stories of his father beating him, his brother & mother for various infractions, like bad grades or if my grandfather drank too much.

my dad went to vietnam in 1969. he was a helicopter pilot in the southern part of the country. the atrocities that happened to him are something that it is hard for him to talk about even now. he saw many of his bunkmates shot down in front of his eyes. the first time i saw my dad cry was when we visited to the vietnam war memorial in washington dc when i was about 9 years old. he traced a row of names & eventually found one of his closest friends. he stood there sobbing. it was a revelation for me, that my dad wasn't just the man who got up early, went to work all day, came home for 2 helpings of dinner, then chose what boring program to watch on tv that night, regardless of what mindless shows my brothers & i wanted to watch. he went through some serious shit that i, being only a child, couldn't & probably shouldn't have understood.

i guess because my dad didn't have much of a father figure growing up, he didn't really know how to treat my brothers & me. on top of that, anyone he risked getting close to during the war had the strong possibility of dying. so he wasn't one to be vulnerable & caring. his way of being a daddy was to provide financially for his family, & he did that very well. he worked his way up to vice-president of purchasing at campbell's soup company, which required him being at the office long hours & traveling around the globe for long periods of time. he made a great deal of money, but my brothers & i didn't know it. he would never spoil us; yet he supplied us with whatever was needed. i don't remember spending too much time with dad. he would sometimes meet my family during our vacations in chicago, if he could take time off of work. on the weekends he was preoccupied with projects around the house & fertilizing the lawn. he would try to make it to all of my brothers' & my soccer games though. i could hear his voice clearly above the roar of the crowd, always cheering me on, earnestly & proudly.

when my dad left my mom, we were pressured to spend forced & awkward time together. my brothers & i didn't know how to act around our mysterious father; & he didn't know how to treat his growing children. my dad eventually bought a condo about 15 minutes from my mom's house in new jersey so we would spend the night over his bare, sterile home. i remember trying hard just to fall asleep in this strange bed in a room i had to myself, because i didn't want to bear the unpleasantness of being awake. the first christmas we had at my dad's, he took it upon himself to buy us presents that he thought we would like. the only other time he bought me a gift on his own was for my birthday a month after he left my mom. it was a tennis racket. i had never played the sport before. it turns out he & his mistress had played lots of tennis together; secretly i guess when he was supposed to be at work. so that christmas, one of my presents was a puzzle. he said that i used to love putting together puzzles when i was a child. i couldn't remember the last time i attempted doing a puzzle but i didn't say so. it just reinforced how my dad & i were nearly strangers.

my brothers & i were introduced to dad's "friend" the father's day after he left. he took us to the mall for lunch where she coincidentally also happened to be shopping. my brothers & i glanced at each other knowingly. dad told us he was getting remarried when he took us on vacation to myrtle beach in south carolina. halfway through the drive down, he informed us that kathleen would be meeting us there with her 3 kids. by then, it was too late to change my mind. i remember crying when we got there, begging my mom to buy me a flight home. i ended up sticking it out with my brothers, & for my dad. on the beach one evening toward the end of the week, he took us aside & said that he loved kathleen & they were going to get married; would that be okay with us. what else could we say?

steven, mike & i ended up going to the wedding in november. it was a small family gathering at a local new jersey restaurant. the ceremony was preformed by a justice of the peace. there was little celebration & love. it seemed like everyone were acting out their prescribed roles.

"hi, i'm steve's daughter"
"hello, i'm kathleen's twin sister"
"no, scott couldn't make it tonight. he wasn't feeling well"
"i do"
"i do"
"i now pronounce you man & wife"

they lasted only a few years. by the time mike & i were engaged, their marriage was already falling apart, though my dad never told me. kathleen came to our wedding in february of 2005, & that was the last time i saw her & the last time my dad spoke of her. i don't know, to this day, what happened to them.

scottie ran into kathleen a couple times since then. she tried to avoid his gaze, but my brother, having no boundaries with people or fear of confrontation, ran right up to her as if nothing had happened. one time they ended up christmas shopping together. another, he invaded her lunch. i think my dad married kathleen because it was the only right thing to do after abandoning my family. & i guess their marriage never could have lasted for the same reasons my parents' didn't make it. my dad isn't able to get close to anyone. when it comes down to opening up, being honest, being raw in front of another, his other, he is afraid. there is too much at stake, too much potential hurt & loss. my dad has been burned too many times. but unfortunately, he ends up burning other people, his family, the ones he loves in the process.

i have learned to forgive him, as often as i need to. & not just because he is my dad. but because i love him.. because he is worthy of forgiveness, just like i am worthy of forgiveness.. by forgiving my dad, i am not expecting anything from him, like dad finally divulging all his deep dark secrets to me or some miraculous reconciliation. but i'm hoping that through forgiveness, i can help my relationship with my son; to love him with an openness & truth that my father was unable to show his family. & through forgiving my dad, i can learn to forgive myself, as often as i need to, when the occasions arise & to heal.