Even in absence, a father’s voice can echo and guide.
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A Voice
Joseph Estrada
No place has ever been home for long. Nomadically moving from city to town and back was the nature of my childhood life. Just because my ID says that I am an adult does not mean that I have control over my life. Thinking that life back in Los Angeles as an adult meant stability in that way was wrong, but simply accepting it has made life easier.
Looking back on my life now, it seems that every small move was an upgrade from a bad situation to a better one. Yet, as an “adult,” I am not sure if it was just the hopeful optimism of a child wanting a better life. The earliest memory I have is of crawling around on a dirty brown carpet that inhabited our living room floor. It was a small home, but its backyard inspired my young mind to play when I was alone. However, living with my mother meant living with her and whoever she had gotten tangled up with at the time.
I remember not asking, “Where’s my daddy?” but saying to my mom, “I want to see my dad.”
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I met my real father when I was in kindergarten. He was sent to jail when I was an infant. His crime was trying to strangle my mom. He was high on crack at the time—he became addicted when I was born. I remember not asking, “Where’s my daddy?” but saying to my mom, “I want to see my dad.” At that point I had no memory of seeing his insanity and simply wanted to meet him. And I did. There are definitely fond memories of seeing him after he cleaned up. He was an intensely bright man, capable of making people smile wherever he was, teaching me wherever he could, and showing me that life is a lot what you make of it.
After moving away and back the first time, my dad and I still had a good relationship. Stranger was the fact that he had a friendly relationship with my mother. Then I remember her meeting someone on vacation and I remember her going to visit him once her vacation ended. She always seemed to rush into a relationship and move us again. But later, when I was grown up, I learned my dad had gotten back into drugs and was trying to coerce my mom into a relationship for my sake. Learning that shocked me but sadly it made sense.
We lived in Washington State for seven consecutive years, my mother and I slowly experiencing the mistake of jumping into one bad relationship to escape another. My mom was able to separate from him, and we are now living comfortably with my grandma in Venice, but it’s just another stepping stone.
My dad died shortly after I moved back to California. After not having seen him for most of my life, we were finally reconnecting. I was planning to finally see him at my high school graduation, and I was so looking forward to it. After all, he’d made it to my kindergarten graduation.
I don’t remember the last words I said to my father, but I do remember his voice. Writing is an opportunity for me to make my own voice memorable so that one day I can communicate with others—if only for my own children one day— in the way that he communicated with me.
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Art is a part of the emotional healing process.
P.O.P.S. provides a resource for learning to deal with and to express the deep emotional scars from the imprisonment of family members.
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