CROW’S FEET PROMPT #59
I Thought I Was Mad at My Father
It turns out I was mad at myself, too
I was pissed at my father off and on for the last nine years of his life. Sometimes it was a low-boil annoyance; others, steam out of ears. My brother and I had lost our mother, but it was only his grief that had to be catered to, to take center stage.
Dad taught me how to ride a bike and how to drive a car. I still remember his tip: “Don’t be the first one through the intersection.”
For most of my life, he played second fiddle in my emotional life to Mom. My older sister was the apple of my Dad’s eyes, or so it seemed to me. She’d come home for lunch from her nearby job and Dad would have everything ready for her; they’d watch an afternoon soap, The Young and the Restless, together. I swear that the only reason Dad finally learned to program the VCR was to record Y&R when he and Mom were out at K-Mart’s $1 hot dog days.
During grad school, I was close enough to visit a few times a year. After I graduated and moved to Chicago, I mostly only “went home” for Christmas, an annual ritual that felt more obligatory than anything.
Flying was expensive, I made too little, had too little time off, driving took too long — the usual reasons we give ourselves for not…
