When I was in PA school, my close friends thought I was crazy for
saying that I wish my dad had cancer or ALS or a physical ailment that took
his body, but sustained his mind. Instead he had Alzheimer's and
continues to deteriorate at a progressive rate, forgetting who the cute
girls down the road are (his granddaughters), who I am and sometimes who my momma is (most recently he's thought she was my
aunt). As I've said before, this disease is a cruel one, one that robs
everyone around you the joy of who you are and who they remember you to
be until those who once called you dad, becomes 'a nice girl who takes
me places'.
As a sophomore in college I befriended a kindred spirit. We both had
fathers who we had lost to 'mental' diseases. Though we had our dads
present in physical form, we lost them in mental form, but for different
reasons. Her father had undergone heart surgery, had a stroke on the
operating table, fell into a coma and then revived, but a different man, his sales and marketing mind was gone. I remember sitting at the computer at our underground housing and food department job expressing her deep sadness for her dad and wondering if he was going to make it through.
This girl became my best friend and now even though we live 20
miles apart and only see each other three or four times a year, we are
still tightly
connected and I love her dearly through all of our trials and tribulations.
If you've followed me on this blog or in real life, you've heard me see that I wish my momma was free of the burden
that my father represents. As an outsider with a disease to please,
I'm constantly looking for ways to save her from him. Then I realize
that it's her battle, I can't save anyone. He is alive and physically
well to teach her a lesson despite his complete dependency on her very
much like an infant on its mother. My best friend empathized with this
all too well, knowing what it's like to have a father shell, but no
father who her mom cared for and watched over constantly. Throughout the last decade I have also told people that I don't have a
dad, which in some form is true. At this point in the disease my dad has
almost completely forgotten who I am. He still calls me sweetheart when
I call, but when I ask him what my name is he responds in his strong
Brooklyn accent "Joanna Bopp-Pie-O" and we laugh, a strong belly laugh
and then he asks what we're laughing about and who I am. It's our own
very special father-daughter interaction. In the past 10 years, I've
latched onto great men- fathers of boyfriends, mentors, employers- and
adopted them as father figures, asked them for advice, allowed them to
take me on 'father daughter dates', let them love me like their
daughters. One of them has played the role so authentically it brought
me to tears when he called me claiming it had been too long since he's
heard from me. My dad never once picked up the phone to call me at any point in his life, it was always my momma who called and then passed the phone to him. I'm really quite envious of friends
who have that relationship, the ones whose fathers call them to discuss
politics or religion or their mother's birthday plans. My best friend
empathized with all this in that she felt the same way, luckily she had her brother
who played the role more many times over the years and actually walked
her down the aisle at her wedding last year.
So what happens when
you've found solace in the fact that you no longer have a father, just a
shell of a person who you call dad? When my father finally passes to the
other side, how is that going to make me feel? I've said goodbye to the
man who taught me to ride a bike and how to camp at Yogi
Bear Jellystone parks. The man who built a loft bed for me and a condo
for my crazy mice. The cool dude who taught me to love music and
dance and the one who ruffled the feathers of the man I thought I was
going to marry in my 20's. That man is no longer there and maybe it's
because I'm older and the lessons that dads teach their daughters are
different, but I'm missing the adult interactions as well. I don't get
the dad who helps build my house, like my newest man had last year.
Or the pops who builds the crib for my non-existent baby. And yes, I know lots of people grow
up without dads, some without parents. I understand this is probably
more becoming the norm now rather than the exception.. My nieces and
nephew lost their dad last year and my newest girlfriends both lost
their fathers at an early age, but I still crave that essential
relationship, desperately at times.
Today my best friend gets to
answer that question. Her dad passed at 12:04 this morning and though I
haven't heard the details of their last moments, I hope that peace was
said and that in his last words he left his children with something to
remind them that he helped bring them into this world. That despite his
unconventional role as a father and then as a man who lived in their
house as a shell, he loved them deeply and was proud of each one of
them. This is my hope for them. I hope he realized his part in the beautiful family that he built, the one that got tighter and stronger with each challenge life presented to them. It's the same hope I have for my sister and I when
my dad's time comes. Though good bye has already been said, I hope the
few moments of final lucidity allow him to become dad, the way each of them had wanted him as dad, one last time.
