Cabot O’Callaghan shares his grief of finding then losing the father he never had.
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What would be true?
Sometimes I see your face,
The stars seem to lose their place
Why must I think of you?
Why must I? Why should I?
Why should I cry for you?
Why would you want me to?
And what would it mean to say,
‘I loved you in my fashion?’
What would be true?
Why should I, why should I cry for you?
Why should I cry?
—Sting, Why Should I Cry For You?
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Father’s Day. Does nothing I feel have a purity? The stream of emotion the day evokes is tangled, complex. Hardly comforting.
The greatest influence in my life was my mother. She raised me, guided me. Loved me. And the greatest irony to that fact is that my absent father, the invisible gravity of his non-presence, in some ways was more influential.
I could bleed about all the ways I grieved his complete rejection. I could tell the stories of how I acted out my father’s abandonment through self-destructive acts and an adrift sense of self.
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I could bleed about all the ways I grieved his complete rejection. I could tell the stories of how I acted out my father’s abandonment through self-destructive acts and an adrift sense of self.
I could.
But I have a better story to tell. I can’t promise it to be completely uplifting—life is more complicated than the rosy lens we often choose to view it through to soothe ourselves.
My first real girlfriend, the one I lost my longer-than-average virginity to, had demons she was too afraid to share. She invited me to an appointment with her substance abuse counselor and I readily agreed, wanting to understand her the best way I could. I thought she was bringing me along for the ride, for support or just to show me off. I didn’t care. She asked, I gave.
Warren greeted us in the waiting room and I immediately liked him. He was short, stocky but not fat, and wore the kindest face. Thick wavy brown hair covered his head. He shook my hand and guided us to his office. “So, how’s life,” he asked as we sat down. Worn paperback books filled the shelves that lined the walls of his office. I scanned them briefly—Sci-Fi and Fantasy seemed his preference. A picture of his wife sat on his desk.
My girlfriend looked nervous. There was some small talk and she and I described how we met and fell in “love.”
Neither of us knew what love was.
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Neither of us knew what love was.
As my girlfriend sat next to me and nervously scraped the polish from her nails, Warren asked if she was ready to tell me something. After a long moment looking at the floor, she shook her head no as she kept the flaked polish in a neat pile and started to cry. Warren handed her a box a tissue. He didn’t pry and neither did I.
I eventually found out what was, a least, part of what she was afraid to share. She had genital warts and didn’t tell me. So, my first girlfriend, my first sexual partner, my first venereal disease. There was more, much more, but I only had a suspicion of the nightmares had she endured and how they manifested in her choices and behaviors. I knew I was at risk with her untamed demons and ended the relationship.
As with many other examples of lows in my life, there was an ironic gift received with the curse. Warren was that gift.
♦◊♦
Some sense was beaten into me that fateful night that I said goodbye to two perfectly functional teeth.
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A few years later, I had decided that I needed to be sober and straighten out my chaotically destructive life after a hulk of a man beat teeth out of my mouth. It wasn’t an immediate epiphany; it took a couple of months, but some sense was beaten into me that fateful night that I said goodbye to two perfectly functional teeth.
Even though I’d only met him a couple of times, Warren immediately came to mind.
I visited his office and asked if I could start to see him. He readily agreed and coached me how to fill out the county paperwork so I could afford the sessions.
This is how he became the only man I can consider a father figure.
Any psychologist worth their salt lets the client figure things out. They save their instructive opinion for when it is crucial. Warren was a master at this. I’d say he was Socratic and his technique was exactly what I needed. He knew I’d rebel against instruction. He knew me better than I did.
One session when he intervened with personal opinion stands out in my memory. My friends and I were headed to a concert later in the week. These friends still used, and they mentioned they were bringing mushrooms. I confessed to Warren that I was temped to share in the hallucinogenic foray, romanticizing my relationship with the drug.
He said only this: “Well, I hope that you won’t.”
A man I respected had shown genuine concern for my choices. He gave a shit.
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It was a simple yet profound statement. He’d never expressed his direct opinion like this and we sat in silence. I imagine he knew that I was processing the moment. A man I respected had shown genuine concern for my choices. He gave a shit. It felt like my heart would pop from the void that had been filled.
The temptation evaporated with the ending of his sentence.
We met for lunch once or twice a year to catch up after I stopped seeing him in a professional setting. He gave me a copy of Ishmael, a book that would influence me beyond any other. When he shared that he was in the middle of a divorce not of his choosing, from a woman he had always described as his soulmate, part of my idyllic vision of him broke away and I began to see him for the fallible human he really was. I called him on his birthday every year. His favorite game was dominos. I deliberately sent him faux pas Christmas cards for Hanukah. Warren officiated my wedding.
Due to cruel circumstances of the most inopportune timing, I found out from his fiancée that he had died suddenly of a heart attack and I’d missed his packed-to-overflowing capacity funeral. I was left alone again, cheated from grieving his loss the way I wanted.
My heart tore along the intersection of painful emotions of my past. I sobbed for the loss of the thing I wanted most—a father.
Photo—http://underclassrising.net/Flickr
Thank you for sharing this Cabot. I am curious – do you have children?
Yes. An eleven year old son.