As many of you who follow me in some way, shape, or form already know, I am not really that shy very often about offering details of anything from the big to the small. I had posted some food updates of prep work both Amy and I had done: me with regards to BBQing ribs, her with baking homemade cherry pie, etc. This prep was all in anticipation of a Saturday event that I felt I had to be somewhat low-key about because I did not want certain individuals to feel concern or odd about.
Some people already know about how - after 40 years of no contact - I made an effort to locate and attempt to reconnect with my biological father. At the time I started the inquiries, I had no idea whether or not he was even still alive. I grew up with my mother and - for the better part of my life - my step-father, whose last name I bear after he adopted me when I was 13. I have spoken to my mother many times about this topic. I only knew her perspective, which was not a very forgiving one. One must understand the whole picture to understand. My mother and father met when they were both relatively young. They dated, much to the chagrin of my grandparents, and it was not long after that (when my mom was 16) that she became pregnant with me. This was very difficult for my grandmother to handle; my mom was essentially driven out of her own home. She married my father and they tried to make a go of things, but my father had issues with anger and addiction. We three ended up in questionable living situations surrounded by even more questionable people, many actually dangerous. Physical and emotional abuse were not unknown in the house, mostly precipitated by the drug and alcohol abuse my father was already deeply involved in. Eventually, my mother tore herself away from the situation, pulling us both to safety (to hear her speak of it and she is probably not far off). She went her way and my father went...I don't know where. I did not have any contact or see him again after that for another 40 years.
There is a lot of emotion involved with this. Since reconnecting, I have heard part of my father's story. It is rather grim overall, involving time in prison, various crimes, deep drug abuse before finally rising into becoming clean and working very hard to maintain that new found sobriety. Our reconnection has had as much of a profound effect on him as it has had on myself and we often find ourselves engaging more in small talk in a seeming effort to not always prod the elephant in the room. There is a lot to still discuss, a lot to touch on. But I know it must be done slowly, for both of our sakes, let alone for those around us.
This past weekend was arguably a start in and of itself, even though we have had contact over the past couple of years now. On one level, one motivation for me I will admit was to be able to show everything I have accomplished without him, to show him I did not need him to achieve all that I have through very hard work. I admit that as being present in my mind. However, as the visit progressed, I began to realize that it represented much more. I could see his reactions and see some of his walls come down. I could feel the overwhelming sense of both loss and gain in him as he watched Amy and I with our children, especially when he would interact with Devlin who - being a typical three-year old - couldn't care less about anything other than getting attention from everyone and everything around him. Beforehand, we were both very apprehensive, almost to the point of simply cancelling it altogether. But this was something that needed to be done, a quiet and yet cathartic release of tension. We will have our discussion about the past...but this moment was not for that.
Some may wonder why I, a grown man in his 40s, would care about any of this, would delve into trying to reconcile anything with someone who had chosen to remove himself from my life so many years ago. I have different reasons for why and cannot give anyone any single reason that they may understand. Perhaps it is about learning how to truly forgive. Perhaps it is about trying to get a better idea of my roots and perhaps even understand some aspects of myself that I had no true bead on, to try and get a face-to-face understanding of where part of my past comes from. There are other reasons, to be sure, but I only have so much space available here and I feel I have already expounded on this enough. You get the picture.
If I had to summarize all of this, lets just say it was a good start and take it from there...
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