As He Always Seems To Do

I probably shouldn’t even write this right now. It’s late and I’m tired and angry and emotionally raw, but I don’t know what else to do except lay in my bed and cry. This seemed a better option somehow.

This morning I woke up happy. Really happy. I wrote my list of things I am grateful for and headed over to my brother’s house feeling sensationally blessed. We had a lovely thanksgiving dinner. Good food, interesting company, lots of laughter. It was wonderful, and I was happy. Really happy. Until he ruined it. As he always seems to do....

Five days ago we fought, as we always seem to do. The truth is, we’ve been fighting for the past twenty years. This fight was different from the rest though because this time, I fought back. The details of the fight were so frivolous that it’s not even worth relaying here. It wasn’t about the specific event that spurred this particular screaming match. It was about the twenty years of fighting, festering and rising within me. We yelled, we parted ways angrily. I didn’t hear from him for five days. My father has always loved to avoid any conversation that might consist of a real emotion, which of course includes all apologies.

Today was the first day I saw him, and I went in perfectly willing to do things his way, to pretend it didn’t happen and just avoid him. Everything was going fine. I was gracious towards him the way one might be to an ex that they happened to run into at a mutual friend’s gathering. He told a few jokes, I laughed. He asked me what was new, I ran off a few details about my weekend. I asked him how his trip to see my sister went, and he cordially gave me her news. It was exactly what I have grown to expect from him, and so I accepted it as I’ve learned to do so many times before.

As we moved to the living room after dinner, the crowd excused themselves to step out for a cigarette while my sister-in-law prepared the coffee. I suddenly found myself alone with my father, a situation I have come to dread more often than not. “I feel bad about the other day,” he started to say. For a split second I thought I might have misjudged him. “We’re both so stubborn.” This was the closest he’d ever come to apologizing and so I nodded politely in agreement and softly said “yeah” hoping that would be the end of it. Of course it wasn’t. That would be too easy.

It’s not that I want it to be easy. I would trade my soul to the devil for one complicated, meaningful, emotional conversation with him, but I know that will never happen. Instead, I’ve learned that it hurts less just to be polite, the way one might be with a stranger. It hurts less to just nod along with him and pretend that everything’s fine. It hurts less to picture him as a stranger and not this failure of a man who can’t love me for who I am.

I know that tonight he wasn’t directly trying to hurt me. He was trying to make a connection between us by pointing out all of my failures and the way they correlated to his own. “You’ll see,” he began, “as you grow up you’ll begin to see how alike we are.” I am not going to say this maliciously. I’m angry right now, but I’ve thought this for most of my existence and just never needed to say it, never thought I’d have to worry about growing into a version of him. I am going to say this because it’s the truth. If I knew that I was going to become anything like my father, I would end my life right now. Not because I think he’s miserable or pathetic, although I tend to think those things, but because he’s caused every single person in his life innumerable amounts of pain, and I simply could never do that to the people I love. I could never hurt someone the way that he’s hurt me.

As he started to continue on with the list of things I need to improve, I began to worry that the rest of the party would return to overhear it. I just didn’t need to be embarrassed like that. Not today. I started to cut him off, telling him we could talk about it some other time, but it was completely unnecessary and inappropriate right now. He persisted. I cut him off again. He persisted. I cut him off again. We went on like this for a bit, before he managed to squeeze out one last sentence about how I need to be more invested in school. I heard the footsteps of people coming back into the house and quickly gathered a few dishes to escape to the vacant kitchen, asking him, pleading with him, “why do you have to ruin everything?” I dashed into the kitchen and stood by the sink, wiping tears from my eyes and praying that no one would come in to catch me in such a vulnerable moment. I took a deep breath, and in those fifteen seconds, tried to compose myself as best I could. I walked back into the living room, playing his avoidance game once more.

The rest of the night I was pretty zoned out. My mind was off in a distant fantasy land where my father liked me. That’s the thing really. I know that my father loves me, but I would much prefer that he liked me. I would rather be his friend than his daughter. Being his daughter sucks. It really just sucks. I’m tired of playing the avoidance game. I’m tired of it all.

I hate that he can’t like me. I hate that I need him to. I hate that he’s so angry. I hate that he’s taking his two failed marriages out on me. I hate that he’s nice to my mother, but mean to me because I remind him of her. I hate that he can’t understand that I have feelings, feelings that can’t be switched on and off at the drop of a hat. I hate that he’s never supported anything I’ve done, congratulated me on anything I’ve accomplished, but rather chosen to concentrate on what I haven’t done, haven’t accomplished. I hate that he couldn’t list three friends, memories or passions that I have. I hate that he has no idea who I am. I hate that he never listens to me, that he talks over me, that he makes snide comments at the few things he listens to me say. I hate that he does it most often in large groups for the soul purpose of making me feel bad about myself. I hate that he thinks I’m a failure, and I hate that I allow him to make me feel like one. I hate that he’s my father.

This morning I woke up happy. Really happy. Until he ruined it. As he always seems to do....