“Let’s go out somewhere.” he’d say sometimes, usually on Sundays.
“Where?” I’d say back, too concerned with missing an episode of All That to care that my father wanted to take me somewhere.
“Let’s go.” he’d keep saying in a question-like tone but I always knew I had no choice.
I’d take a few angry, deep breaths. Roll my eyes so hard that they’d hurt for the next hour. “WHYYYYYYYY MUST THIS MAN TORTURE ME!!!?” I’d think inside my head as I got dressed looking forward to another boring night. Why couldn’t my brother go instead? Or at least join us so I could have someone to talk to?
“Where are we goooooing?” I’d ask, desperately, even though I always sort of knew.
“Out” is all he’d say and it drove me mad.
My poor father. Worked every day and almost every hour to give us an okay life. Worked until he had no hair and eventually no body fat. My poor father had to beg me to spend time with him, sometimes. I was an awful, angry teenage human.
My poor father didn’t know where to take me, I’m guessing, because we’d always end up at a casino or we’d take walks along the beach. The thing about these outings was that I always dreaded them but when I was actually in the moment I didn’t mind one bit. The nights usually ended with the both of us feeling rather happy and fulfilled. I knew my dad cherished those moments more than I could understand at the time and with time I realized how important it was for me to be easier on him.
Now I sit and think of those times when I’d be dragged to the casino, the same one I sat at alone tonight because I had a good feeling. And the good feeling won me $25 bucks and so I thought of my father. I thought of his big smile and the way he says “Alriiiight!” when cheering someone on.
I remember impatiently waiting for him to finish gambling because I hated it. I was so jealous of how easy it was for him to give away his money once in a while and that it was so hard for me to get any out of him ever.
And all I can think of right now is how much I wish I could get him on a plane, fly him to me and spend the day with him doing all of the things I used to hate.
I am a mess. I wait until the last minute to do important things. I procrastinate. I am not always organized. But we are all guilty (minus those *few* exceptions) of all of this or at least one and these imperfections bring us together without realizing it. But what sets us apart are the good parts about ourselves. The good things we do for others and how we treat others. I’m trying to stop dwelling on the bad things about myself and look at the “good” things. I am a caring person. Sometimes too caring. But there are times when I slip and I seem like the most careless person in the world. This happens when I get drained or just too stoned. But most of the time I will do anything for anyone.
My dad and I went to Walmart together the other day and he told me the nicest story I’ve heard in a while. He owns a Quiznos in our town and is basically always there. He’s generally a reeeeally nice guy unless you’re complicated because so is he but he just thinks you are and gets annoyed easily sometimes. But most of the time he cracks jokes and gives out coupons and is smiling.
Apparently there was a homeless man that passed by the store and my dad noticed that the shoes this guy was wearing were really old and broken. He told the man he would buy him a new pair of shoes if he came back the next day. So that day my dad went (to Walmart i’m assuming) and bought him shoes. The next day the man showed up and my dad gave him the shoes. He then started talking about how bad he felt that the guys shoes were in such awful condition and when he described this guy stepping into the shoes and jumping around in them happily my dad had this look on his face of pure, raw emotion that he rarely shows. A moment where he’s somehow happy and sad at the same time. He shows this look when he talks about some family members too, I have recently noticed. So- although my father may treat me horrendously sometimes and not understand anything about me really, I should try to focus on the good parts of him and not the negative things that I can never, ever change. Because let’s be serious- if I’m not letting him change me… a 23 year old, how can I expect to change anything about this 56 year old man?
