Like he was divorcing me and my siblings.
This behavior did not start with us. First it was my mother in 1987.
Than his brothers both within the next ten years.
Then his mother, Granted she said “You are going to hell.” I would probably be mad at my mom if she said something similar. His lifestyle was in discussion and prompted this statement. To know her, you have to either take the venom out of the statement by adding a lot of passive aggression, or imagine a pious woman in her seventies who sees death on the horizon and wants nothing more than to die knowing that she will meet all her children and grandchildren in heaven.
I have been subject to this discussion with her many times due to my humanistic beliefs. I am going to hell also because I don’t conform to the tight little box of rules she thinks one needs to follow to get into this place called heaven. To write her off and break her heart makes for heartless decision capabilities, though I haven’t spoken to her in almost a year for reason I will not mention as of yet .
A little background, in 1996 after my first year in the Army my father decided it was time to destroy some mythos and release himself from the restraints of the closet in which he hid his true nature.
The nature of a gay man.
Poor guy, I couldn’t imagine sneaking around pretending to be happy knowing that the only norm for a military officer was that of being straight.
And the military is strict on that shit.
When I was in basic training, I was informed, as a member of a mass audience, that it was illegal to engage in any sexual position other than missionary and oral sex was strictly taboo.
Both were offenses punishable by time in Leavenworth.
Being gay would mean a career was over.
So my Dad did his twenty and decided it was time to come clean about who he was. It took a while but it seemed like everyone accepted him for this lifestyle choice.
Maybe that was the opposite of what he wanted. Maybe being unaccepted was his intention. It is hard to know.
And it’s hard talking for everyone as well. I know I accepted his choice, or genetic disposition or whatever the experts are saying, my Dad was important to me, he was the person I looked up to. I joined the Army to be near him. I wanted to be the man he was. When he fought in desert storm as an artillery officer I was in seventh grade. It was the hardest year of my life.
I watched the news day and night.
I wanted to talk to him.
I wanted to hear everything was alright.
He wrote, and sent pictures and basically built up a resentment that never died, because he never got letter one from us.
He never received one letter from his kids. I guess all his buddies did. All the other officers. And those letters probably got hung up with crayon colored pictures on some bulletin board. Maybe he was embarrassed. “Where are the letters from your kids there Major,” his comrades would probably mock.
He would shrug and probably lie about keeping them to himself.
He did not get any.
He hated my mom when she left him. Like it was her fault. I guess she could have been weak and continued to be ignored by a man with no interest in her. Never forgave her. Wished me and my siblings all ill will, just so that one day he could point to her and say see. All he wanted was revenge on her.
My mom didn’t care one or another if we wrote. She would mention it, maybe you guys should write your father.
During that conflict we never did.
I did write one letter as a kid to my dad. I wanted a puppy. My mom wouldn’t let me have one so I wanted to leave Florida. I hated Florida anyway. It was hot and humid and hell on earth. I wrote him a letter and I asked to come live with him. Knowing now what I didn’t know then it would not have been possible, he would have had to give up his career, but I never received a response. We would get pictures and general inquiry letters but never a response came back from Germany addressing my request.
In 2002 with my mother dying of cancer, my dad did several strange things. He got me a cell phone, which I used several times a week to call him and talk and he cosigned a car loan for my brother.
I racked up $100 in text charges. It was an accident, an exgirlfriend, she wanted to rekindle, I wouldn’t have minded, I didn’t know text were so much extra.
We had stopped taking by the time the bill arrived.
He wanted to be repaid.
“Poor college, student no job,” I reminded him.
An argument ensued.
The last thing I ever said to my father was, “You never wanted to be a father anyway!” and the phone went dead. My girlfriend at the time was sitting right there. She said it was harsh. But then my dad changed his phone number and canceled all his email addresses, sold his home and basically disappeared.
I like to think PTSD or Gulf War syndrome played a part.
Gulf War Syndrome does come along with major cognitive functions. If I had my cognitive functions impaired perhaps I would walk away from, if I had one larger than just my wife, my family also.
Not too long after his divorce from his family my brother reneged on an auto loan co- signed for by my father. Maybe he thought if he set the truck on fire and left it in the woods my dad could recoup his expenses with insurance money.
It didn’t happen like that.
I don’t know what my sister did to him, but we were all gone from his life.
Ten years now and not a word.
I keep telling myself, “Maybe tomorrow.” Hope will not die, but I wish it would give the fuck up sometimes.
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