Crow’s Feet Prompt #60 — Father’s Day
Good Fathers
I have to remind myself that they are out there
The relationship I had with my father isn’t worth the time it’s going to take to write this piece. But I felt like I needed to counterbalance all the love and devotion circulating on social media posts about Father’s Day.
Not everyone gets The Dad who supports them. Not everyone gets The Dad who protects them. Not everyone gets The Dad who knows how to love them. Not everyone gets The Dad who will be missed forever.
I never had The Dad.
What I had was a flawed and grief-stricken man-child who didn’t have a clue how to raise a kid or run a household. This man-child had been brutalized by his parents in his own childhood and both of us considered it a huge win for him that he never repeated the patterns of abuse handed to him by my grandparents.
And that is the biggest compliment I can give the man.
My father was never much of a fixture in my day-to-day life as a child. When my mother died, I was 12. And suddenly, I was alone with this stranger whose name was Dad.
So what happens when a lot of your formative years get formed in an environment of neglect?
