Dear Dad

Subject: Fathers Day

Dear dad,

Beaver told me he talked to you, but I don't think he expressed it right. I honestly did appreciate your feedback about the vocals on the albums. I think its rather admirable that you can express your opinions about how you really feel about our work like that unlike mom who only has grand opinions of everything we do. Shocking as they were, I thought it was interesting to hear such frank feedback. Although I do think you should have bought the albums to hear what they really sounded like. I think if I had a son, I would probably be buying everything he puts out just to hear where he's at. To cop the whole vibe etc. but again, they aren't necessarily your kind of thing really, and the subject matter of the sleep with you CD I'm afraid would have horrified you for the most part. I told mom not to buy it either.

For me the hardest part about our connecting in real time is what happened when I was 20 and my mom was arrested and put in jail under false pretense by that ‘conveniently just retired’ judge on a Friday afternoon so she was forced to stay there till Monday when the judge could be found, the mistake discovered, and the charges could be dismissed. I reached out to everyone I knew to help mom and you were one of those people. I even called the Scourge, her ex-husband and my ex-step father, who had arranged the arrest as revenge against her for seeking divorce from him, and even his mother to try to talk sense to him, trying whatever I could to get mom out. Because I know how sick mom gets when she gets stressed. And just thinking about this makes my skin crawl and my heart beat fast when I think of mom getting sick.

Regardless of how you feel about St. Theresa in your life, and God knows I know how a man can feel about his ex’s; I know ex-wives and ex-girlfriends suck a lot of the time. And so do ex-husbands and ex-boyfriends, unless we are real lucky and can still manage to stay friends; and I understand your reluctance to want to hang with me and Beav through the years when we were growing up. I have heard that from so many men who didn't have relationships with their kids so I know that's a real thing... and I feel for you for having to go through that in your life. The Beast has a similar thing in his life where he never knew his own kids and it seems a lot of men from your generation do maybe just because they got married and had kids so young.

But my opinion was and still is that you should have thought about me as your son and how that was affecting me. your son’s mom was in jail and there's little worse I can think of a person going through than that. maybe the mom dying or getting raped or something would be worse, but your mom in jail, regardless of the circumstances being illegal or fraudulent – in fact, due to those circumstances being so nefarious and  heinous it made it even worse knowing what a good person mom is. As a dad, as a man, you should have said ‘son, I know how you must feel. me and your mom aren't getting along too well for many years, but I know how this is affecting you. So I'm there for you. give me two hours kid. I'll arrange for the cash now to get her out. And I'm on my way for you.’ jumped in your car and driven down the two hours to help your son through that.

But you didn't. instead you offered me some philosophical and cavalier answer and went about your business that day. I was literally in shock during the whole experience and that made it all the weirder. It took me years to remember that because it was just such a shocking experience that I had blocked it out till last year or the year before. I think it was deeply repressed. that's why I pulled back from our reconnection. Because I remembered it. when I think of that I just cannot see why you are reaching out to us now and why we would want to connect with you. what are we connecting with? How are we to ever trust that you are there for us in any way?

That was your shot to be the hero of the story. After so much pain and sorrow and confusion and weirdness and shame and trauma that we had to go through with not knowing our own father through our lives, this really could have set things straight and started us on a course of some good and some healing. All those guns you have and the fast car and the military training and all that would have made so much sense if you would have driven into town and been the Clint eastwood and saved the day for everyone. A two hour fucking drive is all it would have taken. But you didn't. you just acted like it was my problem and that was that and you didn't even call to find out how it went. She could have been in there for weeks for all you knew.

Everytime I think of that moment I play it over in my brain how it could have been different if you could have just told me those words instead of what really happened and driven down with a bag full of cash to bail mom out and brought me some dinner and sat at that jailhouse to wait with me and my girlfriend and we could have eaten some hot food together and felt safer by your presence. But instead it was a three day nightmare that I will never forget. Even now as a grown man it haunts me and makes my stomach hurt and my heart heavy. And that was years ago.  

I always forget to tell you that. but I owe that much to you. this is why I don't reach out to you on fathers day. and honestly I don't know if I ever will in this lifetime.

I know you're on a good path now and that makes me feel better, gives me comfort. I trust that one day our paths will cross again.

Sincerely,
Fishy