A Dad would have been nice

Growing up I didn't think much about my father. Or maybe I didn't allow myself to think of him.

Thinking about my "real mother" was painful enough. I would dream about being 18 and finding her. I thought it would take years. But I knew that I would search the globe if I had to. I couldn't think about not finding her. It was far too painful.

I never thought about grand-parents either. Or cousins or aunts or uncles.

I did think about siblings. I thought, could this boy I'm kissing be my brother?? Um, barf.

When my parents found me, it was like I was hit by lightening or something. I never imagined them finding me. Or rather I never imagined my mother finding me.

But when they did, all I really wanted was my Mommy. I was 15 but I was an infant. I felt silly for that, but now of course it makes sense.

From all the reading I've done it seems we all go back to that infant stage. We want a do over. I don't mean to generalize, but this is what I've seen. This is what happened to me.

In normal child development the infant turns into a toddler who turns into someone who wants her Daddy too.

I had very delayed development here.

By the time I would have wanted my Daddy, my mother and I were in an all out war with eachother. I wanted my Mommy, but Mommy hurt me, and she wasn't sorry, and she would do it again, and she kept lying to me, and she kept abandoning me, and she kept verbally abusing me, so hence the severely delayed development of wanting Daddy.

That first year, Dad would come home for the weekends. He was a Very Important Executive, so he had to travel all during the week.

Those first few months, Dad would bound into the house happy and excited to see me, to see us, and yet all I still wanted was my crazy mother. He was mostly kind, but my mother was so abusive, that I didn't notice his kindness.

On Saturday mornings he would make me, us, scrambled eggs and they were the best scrambled eggs ever. That didn't last long, however, because at some point my mother decided I didn't deserve it.

For years I painted my father as the nice guy, the man who just couldn't handle his wife. Who couldn't stand up to her. Who couldn't stand up FOR me.

And I mostly kept these thoughts to myself, because it was too painful otherwise. I had to tell myself that I had one decent parent for my sanity.

I eventually came to the realization, in my 30's, that my father isn't really such a nice guy after all and I had to tell him that his gig is up. He is not a man, no matter what his golf buddies or his stock broker think.

I emailed him a heartfelt letter last year, in one last ditch attempt to see if my father had any kind of Dad in him. He didn't.

All evidence suggests that if he never saw me nor my brother again, it wouldn't be cause any concern. My brother and I do nothing to enhance his net worth.

But driving home from work today, I felt stabbed. I live in a stunning neighborhood these days, and a Dad and his young daughter had set up a vegetable stand along side of the road, with a big sign that said, "Dad and Daughter's farm fresh veggies."

This silly thing made me cry.

It would have been nice to have a Dad.