Paul E. MannDear Dad:
I haven't spoken with you in so long. Things are such a mess. And I need your help.
I seem to be crying too much, feeling overwhelmed and broken. I don't really think anyone cares about me. Everyone will say they do...but they don't. Not in a real way. Not in a lasting way.
When you left many years ago, I thought you went to be with a better family, with a better 6 year-old girl. There must be something wrong with me, with us. And I worried, constantly, what bad thing would happen next. You see, when someone leaves you suddenly as a child, you live in a constant state of the "other shoe dropping."
That worry may be killing me, Daddy. And I don't want to die. I don't want to want to die anymore. Life is pretty and I'm afraid I'll miss it.
For much of my adult life, I was very lost. But its alright. I'm beginning to see myself a little more clearly because of all the shit I've been through. I am becoming more whole, as far as fractured people go. I'm trying.
But when people leave me in any way, shape or form, I become so defeated, so distraught. And guess what? It seems as if people do leave me more, as if I'm living out some awful destiny. Like I'm perpetually a little girl losing someone, perpetually in a state of grief. Too many years have gone by like this, Daddy, too many.
I worry that sometimes my heart will literally break. My heart started beating funny last year and I was so scared, Dad! I thought for sure all the heartache and tears had worn away my heart muscle.
That's why I'm writing to you. Change must come. Or I may not make it.
When you lose your father, you don't even dare dream things. You just figure something is very wrong with you and dreams are for little girls whose daddies stayed. Nothing works for the girl whose Daddy left. She's a perpetual Cinderella, sans a saving Prince.
I want to let myself dream again. I want to fall in love, maybe get married, and spend every day feeling wonderful that I found the man of my dreams... big love. I want to be confident and speak my mind without feeling stupid or ashamed. I want to be at peace, not frightened and anxious. I want to laugh so hard, it hurts. I want to feel safety. I want a deep sense of home. You see, when you left, home left too and has never returned. I'm ready for home now.
The year my father leftMaybe we wouldn't even get along had you stayed, I don't know. But I remember you being a very gentle and just man. Kind. Am I wrong? You loved nature, animals, singing. You loved laughing. You were well-liked and humble. Mom was the dark horse but you were the jovial, peaceful one. (You left us with a real troublemaker, I can tell you that. Damn you for that.)
My mom and dad
My father in a comedy skit, with broom
It was embarrassing growing up, not having a father. And now that mom is gone, I'm an official orphan. Now people say, in this slightly patronizing tone that only I recognize, "You can spend the holidays with us. We'd love to have you." The royal "we" that everyone has and I don't. I hate their invitations.
Father's Day...whatever. Another day to feel amiss and discordant with the world. A day like any other.
So how can you help, Dad?
Please convince me of the truth.
You didn't leave me. You died, Daddy - you simply died, like humans do.
Had I been allowed to visit you in the hospital or go to your funeral or visit the cemetary in which your bones lie, had I even felt your spirit around me a little more over these years, perhaps I'd own my life more fully, more richly. I would have grieved once, not constantly.
I so wish you were here, just for a short while. I'd like to show people you exist. You see? I have a father too! A good father!
But since you can't be here, please send help my way. You can do that, can't you? Death shouldn't stand in the way of you being my father.
Until then, I'm just a butterfly, kicked about by the wind.
Love, Beth
The last photo of my father, me in the middle. He died 2 weeks later.
"So save your strength and run the field, you play alone."
(Someone Saved my Life Tonight - Elton John and Bernie Taupin)
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Margaret Hawke
500words
Beth Winegarner
BellemeadeBooks
Are You Talking French?
Lisbeth Cheever-Gessaman
Salon.com
Comments
You have a spirit about you that shines. The two pictures in this post are so poignant. I wish you peace.
Wishing you peace and happiness, Beth. I hope all your dreams come true.
Rated.
This was beautifully written. I wish you big love.
Much love, Beth Mann.
Well said, well written, good stuff and all that it implies...
Deeply,
He would be very proud.
So many things I could mention., but I like this: "I am becoming more whole, as far as fractured people go. I'm trying."
And: "But when people leave me in any way, shape or form, I become so defeated, so distraught." This is how I felt, and still sometimes feel. I truly hope you meet a wonderful man like I did. It doesn't make everything go away, but it helps.
there is so much you clearly know. you're getting there.
I love the pictures, especially the one of the ocean.
You will find that love. It often comes when you least expect it, so I hope you live your life knowing that it can and will be yours.
Like wrapping your lips around a sewer and just drinking long and hard...
But, there are moments of bliss and sometimes you just have to go from moment to moment and hang on.
My dad 'left' me. He denied me. I finally put it all in a post today.
'Men are pigs' and I try to not live the life that my father might have lived.
You are here. You are alive. You have feelings. You have choice. You have control. Do what you want but don't let the baggage get you down. Look in the mirror and say that you are a damn good person and believe it. He missed knowing you and it was his tragedy.
I guess my wife had it easier than the two of us in a way. Her father died when she was young. Ours walked away. Death is final, denial is harder to deal with. Give yourself a hug and know that you matter, to yourself and your family... Peace and chocolate...
MJ
rated
Your sense of confused lost is as sharply felt in these words as it must have been when you were just six. Poor sweet Beth, poor sweet girl.
Oh, Beth, I know this too well, even though my father's death was (hard to say, but true) a blessing. We are core-damaged by the loss. Maybe they should have let you see him, but then those memories would haunt you more than the loving ones and more than your loss.
I swear there is hope, sweet, sad girl who can laugh and live and write so well... when you're really ready, you'll find The One. If I did, you can.
Perhaps I needed to clarify more, but my father didn't leave us. He died. It simply felt like he did because I was too young to understand death. I decided to reveal that at the end of the piece, as a writing device. Maybe that didn't come across so clearly?
One of you mentioned the importance of talking to children about death. I can't tell you how important I think that is now. I'm the product of a generation - or a family - that just wanted to hide it in a closet and not talk about it. And it has caused me much pain and confusion, obviously.
So let's talk about death more freely, shall we? It matters to the dying and it matters to the living.
Once when I was very sad and posted yet another sad poem, you sent me a link to a beautiful poem. I printed that poem and tacked one copy above my computer in my office and I keep one copy in my purse, in the the pocket where I keep my lipstick. Obviously, I read it often.
All day I thought about what I could send you.... and of course nothing will really make a difference. But, do you ever listen to Patti Griffin? Her voice is stunningly real and her lyrics are utterly gorgeous. One song I thought about for you "Rain". It won't likely cheer you up, but it might console a little.
Rain
Patty Griffin
(1000 Kisses)
It's hard to listen to a hard hard heart
Beating close to mine
Pounding up against the stone and steel
Walls that I won't climb
Sometimes a hurt is so deep deep deep
You think that you're gonna drown
Sometimes all I can do is weep weep weep
With all this rain falling down
Strange how hard it rains now
Rows and rows of big dark clouds
When I'm holding on underneath this shroud
Rain
Its hard to know when to give up the fight
Two things you want will just never be right
Its never rained like it has to night before
Now I don't wanna beg you baby
For something maybe you could never give
I'm not looking for the rest of your life
I just want another chance to live
Strange how hard it rains now
Rows and rows of big dark clouds
When I'm still alive underneath this shroud
Rain Rain Rain
I'm sorry I stayed away from this today. I owed you that, and I balked, because I have such fucked up feelings about father's day.
I know that six year old. And I want to tell her something: that love you want, that big love, will happen. Some day. Mine has.
Tomorrow, I hope that you can breathe easier, because it will be another year until father's day. Some days in the calendar are just so fucking hard to bear.
Peace to you. Sleep well tonight.
The only way I can begin to relate to the severity of this tender loss at such a young age is to think of my grandma. I’m sorry to say that even up until her final year—when she reached 82 almost exactly two years ago—she still could not discuss her father without her voice breaking and tears streaming down her cheeks. She was eight when he passed away from cancer. The last year or two was especially difficult for her mother, who was washed clothes for the neighbors to earn enough to care for five children and her ailing husband.
On March 10, 1933, an earthquake struck Long Beach, California. The boiling pot of clam chowder my grandma’s father had been cooking jumped off the stove and onto his foot. This was the last time my grandma saw him out of bed. The injury accelerated his decline, and he slipped away a month or so later. She was at his bedside when he stretched out his arms and offered these final words to his surrounding family, “Father, I thank Thee. Father, I thank Thee. Father, I thank Thee.” And then he was gone.
My grandma was a stalwart tomboy of a woman with a delicious sense of humor and a gift for writing and language—not unlike you. And yet there was a permanent rupture in her heart which she knew would never mend. Perhaps she came not to fear it, but to welcome it as the connective tissue between herself and her departed father. Perhaps you can, too, in time, in time.
That photo of you a year after your father left is extraordinary. I can see the seed of your adult self in that image, and that radiant smile should give you much to hope for. You are clearly a resilient soul.
Finally, if you want some hard-copy reading material (not that any of us have time for those old-fashioned books anymore ;-) you might find solace in reading Rosemary Dunn Dalton’s Lamenting Lost Fathers: Adult Daughters Search for the Message of the Father. And I’m not just saying that because she’s one of my dearest friends. She has taught, written, and lectured on the topic of fathers and daughters for decades, and she has much wisdom to offer on the subject.
Here’s hoping you can find that smile again.
—Melissa
I have to say from reading and learning a bit about you hear that you've got staying power, or as Lou Grant would say, "spunk." There aren't many guys or women who surf the Jersey shore in the summer let alone the winter, who can also to put pen to paper with the skill that you have. If I were you I know my Dad would be proud, and he was a pretty smart guy.
So sad...I'm so sorry, Beth.
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One of my girls lost her daddy in a car accident when she was five. I truly believe she feels just like this. Really.
Haunting. Beautiful. And I know, just know, that BIG Love will come to you.