Good Deed #10 Pictures of You

My contact with my "dad" has been a little sparse since I finally decided to allow him a little forgiveness and explore the other half of me that had remained so mysterious throughout my life. Apparently he had to replace his computer and that led to his gap in correspondence.

Letting my dad in my life wasn't an easy decision. He and my mother split when I was just under two years old, so I have no memory of being a "family." And I'm not so sure that we ever actually were one. During my childhood, I saw him just a few times... the last being when I was all of eight years old and in the third grade. I only recall one Christmas present, and one birthday present when I was very young, and a couple phone calls when I was 18. Not only was he physically absent, he was financially aloof as well. He never paid my mother a dime in child support. These days fathers can go to prison for that, but back then I guess it didn't seem important to the courts.

When my mother went through cancer in my early 20's, I recall being very bitter towards my father. I was looking for something to blame for her illness and had decided that maybe if he paid child support, maybe if he provided any kind of support... that she wouldn't have gotten sick. And boy was I going to be pissed at God if he took my mother, who loved and supported me as best she could, and allowed my father the blessing of life. He hadn't earned it, in my young opinion.

But time has marched on, and as I have made my own mistakes, I have realized that we are all capable of blunders in life. I realized that my dad certainly wasn't a superhero, and was in fact, simply a human too. All of the years of being swept under the rug had to have taken a toll on him... it had on me... and my brother as well. In fact, when my brother and I spoke the other night, he said, "I just don't get it. Here I have spent all of this time with my paternal grandmother; I have even lived with her, and she never once mentions my father." I'm not sure that we will ever confront my grandmother about the unhealthy silence she has guarded so stealthily for over 30 years. She's 87. Do I really want to unleash the painful beast and risk killing her with guilt that she may already feel? This is what silence does. It corrodes your soul. It leaves you in a state of perplexity.

Despite swearing my father off in my early 20's... and deciding that only a lump sum of back child support paid to my mother would allow him the right to ever "know" me, I now have an open mind, and heart. In his last message he asked for a photograph of me. I can't really explain why, but sending him a photograph of me seemed so very serious. Visions of him "seeing" me for the first time in 29 years conjures up very raw emotion. Will he cry? Will he be proud? Will he be able to still see the curious and happy little girl's face that he once knew?

It took me three days to finally send a picture. And although the resentments have been won over by a healthy mission to truly understand who I am and where I came from, a small part of me is understandibly hesitant to allow myself such a vulnerability. Somebody might get hurt from this. My grandmother. My mother. My father. Myself. However, I just can't be convinced that enabling this bizarre denial of my father... of half of me isn't more destructive.

I decided to send him a picture of me in my cap and gown on graduation day. A classic choice for a "parent." How he will respond, I do not know. Part of me wishes I could secretly be there to see his reaction, but I'm sure he will send some sort of response. I found out he is living in a nearby state, and because my brother is now unemployed and has time on his hands, I'm considering suggesting a trip to meet him by train. I can tell my brother doesn't like the secrecy either, and because my father is in his 70's, opportunities to meet him aren't going to be ample and endless. I don't care to have more regret in my life... and I'm strong enough to handle whatever end this story may bring.