My Dad and I had a complicated relationship. However, we did little to complicated it. Others, it seemed, sought to make it as complicated as they could..
Despite their best effort, he and I enjoyed a very good relationship. It was one that was all-too-brief.
My mother, a woman with many struggles and problems, kept me from my father after their divorce. I won’t get into details save to say her lies and betrayals caused me to hate him from the time I was around five through much of my adult life. He was, in her delusional description, a horrible man. I thought of him in the most terrible terms for the better part of 30 years.
She’d often tell me how much I was like my father, again in the most terrible terms. I thought I was doomed to a life of suffering all caused by a heredity I could not escape.
It was, however, all a lie. When I was finally told the truth about my father, I couldn’t tell if the lie or the unveiling of that truth was more devastating. It took a some time for me to reconcile the suddenness of the discovering that not only was my father a great guy, but he also suffered greatly in the loss of his children. I had to untangle decades of anger and the hurt of the lie that created it.
Finding Some Truth
Ten years ago I decided to find him. I searched in California first, where I was born. Nothing panned out. Then I learned that he was originally from Philadelphia, and my attention turned more local. Within a couple of days I had found him, and shortly after he came to my home in New Jersey.
It was a glorious meeting and something inside me changed. I suddenly hoped I could be 
more like him, that I wasn’t cursed by my father’s gene pool. There was so much to learn about my ancestry. We talked about my family medical history. He described the trials and pain he endured in losing his first marriage and his children. I discovered he had fought for us over the course of years but in 1970’s family court he stood little chance.
He also confirmed for me that memories I had of him, memories my mother had dispelled as delusions of a hopeful child, were true. The happy times I remembered spending with him and his parents were confirmed. I found myself saddened deeply that this wonderful and meaningful relationship had been ruined for no reason.
I discovered I had two younger brothers and that my Dad had been married to the same woman for decades. They’d lived in Philadelphia all that time. They were all so very close yet so very far away.
We decided that we would keep in touch, and we did. He helped me in some dark moments of my life, challenged me to rise above my thoughts, and taught me that I was so much like him even as I lived as my own man. I was so much different, yet so much alike, the father I barely knew.
This meeting, plus my work in finding my father, further estranged me from my family. My sister, and it seems the rest of them, were angry that I would want to find him. Apparently, such an effort was insulting to my stepfather and offensive to my sister regardless of why the man who was my father had not been permitted in our lives.
I had no desire to estrange myself from my father to comfort those who had never done much in love, honesty or compassion to comfort anyone but themselves. It seemed to be more than a fair trade.
Final Words
There would be no pursuit of a relationship with my brothers, or their mother. I was happy just getting
to know my father on our terms in our time. I didn’t feel that I needed a father, but I loved him. We actually enjoyed being around each other despite our political differences and our long period of estrangement. We clicked, and we could talk for hours.
I have had, to date, no conversations with my brothers.
The last time I saw my father was on his birthday in January, 2019. We met at a diner in Philadelphia and talked over coffee that got cold. He seemed to know many people there, and they all sat and talked with us. It was an enjoyable time.
He told me that he had been to Colorado before on a hunting trip and would really try to get out to visit. I told him he could stay with me, and we could take our time on the trails. He said “What makes you think you’ll need to wait for me?” I replied, “What makes you think I not sensing that I’ll have to run to keep up?”
He had turned 81, still walked for miles every day and went to the gym several times a week. My Dad reminded me that I was “big like my Grandfather but tall like me.” It was hard to believe he was in his eighties. “Movement is key,” he told me. “Stagnation is the death of us all.”
“Don’t worry, Tom,” he continued. “You have good genes on my side of the family. We have longevity.”
I reminded him I had had a stroke a few years before.
“That’s something else you got from me and your Grandfather. Staying power. It takes more than some bad health to keep us down for long.”
I laughed, but I got it.
A Final Call
The last time I spoke to my father was in the Summer of 2019. He called to tell me he had read what I wrote about my Grandfather, and to wish me a happy birthday.
“You nailed your Grandpop to a “tee”,” he said. “That’s the man I knew.”
“Thanks. I didn’t know you read my stuff.”
“All the time. You are a great writer. I enjoy it.”
We talked for a bit, and he told me something I don’t remember ever hearing from a parent.
“I’m proud of you Tom. You’re a good man. I love you, son.”
Today that memory brings me tears. Then, I could only muster a feeble “Thank you. I love you too.” I wasn’t used to hearing that from parents.
His 82nd birthday came on January 4, 2020. I texted him “Happy birthday young man!” He rarely texted back immediately, so I didn’t stress when I didn’t hear back from him that day. He had an old flip phone, and texting wasn’t easy for him. Calling wasn’t easy either for reasons private between the two of us. I expected he would text back or call as soon as he could.
A couple of days went by I had heard nothing. He was an early riser, so I went to bed believing I would hear from him by the time I woke up the next morning.
A Dream Goodbye
That night I had a dream. I don’t remember all of it, but I remember that he and I were walking by a stream in the woods somewhere. I think he was going to teach me how to fly fish, as I remember now we had waders on and were carrying poles with hooks dangling from our silly-looking hats. We shared a love of the outdoors, and we talked as we slowly walked along the trail. I don’t remember anything that was said but one word. One word that woke me from my sleep.
“Tommy.” He said it so clearly. It wasn’t loud. Rather it was like a crystal-clear whisper right into my ear.
I looked around in the darkness, half expecting to see him. That’s how clear his voice was to me. It was 5:14 am.
I grabbed my phone to check my texts. Still nothing. I went straight to Google and typed in my father’s name.
There, I found his obituary.
Sadness hit me like a truck. In the fractured way we lived our lives as father and son I was not there to say goodbye.
He did, though, say goodbye to me. I felt the dream I had was his way of saying “Goodbye, but not really.” We’d still walk the trails together and maybe even fly fish together someday. He no longer had anything holding him back and, for some reason, he knew I’d understand that.
Thoughts
I have daily thoughts about my Dad since our reunion. Happy thoughts. There were limitations to honor, yet I consider meeting him and our brief time together as some of the best moments of my life. I got to honor him, know him, and see him for the man he truly was. In turn, I was able to understand myself and know me through the eyes of someone more like me than not. Years of pain were erased from my life.
We were imperfect men who met each other on unusual terms and made the most of our remaining time. Men who understood each other as two closely related human beings who were together not because we had to be but because we wanted to be. We finally had a choice, and we made it, together respecting each other’s boundaries.
I understood that those who had hidden the truth were angry with me for pursuing it. They can go fuck themselves.
I know that those who cannot understand the importance of a son knowing his father don’t understand my need to know my own. They seem to have been hurt in my undertaking. I don’t apologize, not even for a second. Their not understanding me is none of my concern.
I am grateful that before my father passed I got a few years with him. Those years uncovered a truth and burned the box of lies I was given to ash. I got to see my smile in his, hear stories about his childhood and get to know our ancestry through his eyes. When we sat together I grew to understand that we sat as two men hurt by the delusion and poor character of others but who had decided that would not be enough to defeat us.
Mostly what I got from my Dad was an understanding of our potential. Despite all that had forced us apart we were there, talking and sharing. There was something wonderful between us, and there always would be. It is something I will carry with me for the rest of my days.
I didn’t get to enjoy a lifetime of memories with my father. What I did get was a lifetime of healing. In him I had found a man who understood me and who would not lie to me to make life prettier than it was. I trusted him to tell me the truth even if that truth did not paint him with the prettiest colors. He never violated that trust.
Today, I am proud to say I am my Dad’s son and to say “Goodbye, but not really.”
