A Letter To My Dad
by Tinker
This article originally appeared in Mirrors, Edition 5, October 2005.
Dear Dad,
I have to give some disturbing views. This issue has to take issue. Bless you, father, for I am about to begin. It has been an age since my last confession. I am angry! I am Fucked off with a capital P & Q. Pardon me if I utter curses, but they will be the ones handed down by yourself. You see this isn't a case of slight irritation; this is about wounds that cut, creep, sleep, deep inside me. Thorns that have festered, scars left unhealed and scares not soothed. Therefore, with out further ado I will begin. Are you sitting comfortably? Because this might make you squirm. This worm has turned a corner and is no longer trapped in one. Your son has a handful of rages, clenched in fists. Ten wrongs, out for the count, knockout punches which I will write about.
1. It hurts me to remember the pain inflicted on my little frame. The slaps, smacks, attacks that assaulted and insulted me, inflame me. Even with lightened strikes, my body still tightened and recoiled from shock and my mind within. Do you recall? Or do you fool yourself that all was sweetness and light? Well, let me set you right you frightened me. You whipped me into a shape that finds it hard to fit in with the world. Your venom has slowly poisoned my blood. I am scarred within and scared without. You bastard!
2. I think of all the distance there was from you with disdain. You existed in my life, but did not live in it. Your shed was your skin, and from within you avoided life and me. I craved, I yearned, and I needed your attention. You carved your space, years on years; you evaded me for I was not allowed to invade your hallowed ground. We did not play, as you stayed aloof. What proof of fatherhood is that? You twat!
3. Authority figures high on your agenda. You set the rules and regulations. The controls in my life. To bend the rules saw me bent over a knee, to break them saw me broken. Was this a token of your love? "Manners maketh the man" but I was just a boy. Where is the joy in always having to mind my P's and Q's? Asking to be excused at the exclusion of everything else kept me on the straight and narrow, but didn't allow me to broaden my horizons. Asking to be pardoned was hard on me when I had committed no crime. You Slime!
4. "Hush, be quiet, dad's got a head" of steam. I dreamt of migrating as your migraines took hold. So cold, so dark, a gloom descended in the house, in every room. To manoeuvre around meant to pussyfoot, to tiptoe, or yours would be attached an arse, you ass! All had to be calm and still. No thrill or shrill of laughter, your will smothering the whole house a bitter pill to swallow. What followed in your wake as you woke was no joke either. Like a bear out from hibernation: all growls, claws and teeth. It was like walking on shells (eggs and bombs) waiting for something to break and an explosion to occur. Hell is a noiseless place like the vacuum of space. Only a jerk would blame work pressures and seek release by venting steam and a stream of abuse at the ones he "loves." I thank ya', you wanker!
5. A small thing that I have to bring to this table, serve up if you like. It's the horrid game you played with your tyke. Trussing me up like a chicken made me one. A phobia of being confined has been created, and dates back to your creative way with sleeping bags and ties. I cried, I screamed, yet you continued to play your game. Being hung like a pheasant wasn't particularly nice! Trussing me up destroyed my trust. This slight has created a fright that remains with me to this day, I'm afraid to say. It chills me to the bone.
6. Did you ever kick a ball or play the fool? No, you ruled with a fist. To fit in with your joy I had to play with your toys trains, the tracks of my tears. What a strain, feigning interest was not simple, compounded my fractured thoughts, confounded my own hopes for play with you. We never played catch as you caught me up in a web of deceit. I thought time shared with your toys would allow, somehow, time with you. No all that went up in a puff of smoke as you stayed playing with them not me. Didn't you see? I wanted some fun, laughs, and time with you. Shit!
7. A mis-spent youth. A pent-up adolescent, ain't that the truth. Acting as a slave, as a serf on a wave of anguish. I was a tool to use, abuse, and dull. Weekends on end not mixing with my peers, sharing the cheers, jeers, and jostlings of youth at play. The truth (struth) is I was your batman, while you were robbin' my life away. The tears I shed, in yours. Truly, you could see I needed to mix my waters with others. To grow well, to learn to compete would have made me more complete. To meet girls find two-week lovers. But you were too weak to let me go.
8. Let me delve deeper. You were meant to show me how to be a man. How to stand on my feet, complete and able to compete, that should have been your goal. But you kept me a child, and that makes me wild, for instead of a whole, I have many holes. Gaps in my education that should have been filled by you. No wonder I have been broken and cracked by this world because I lacked the skills you should have passed down. I wanted an adult affair with the world, but I was kidding myself. You had a wealth of knowledge you should have exchanged. I was short changed, left poorly equipped to cope with the grown ups. I was ground down. Cheapskate, you're on thin ice with me.
9. As a role model for fatherhood you weren't so good, but what of a husband and lover? The way you treated mother was not so hot. You blew cold and showed little warmth. Hers was a life of stress and tension. Never knowing her budget, as you brought a new gadget or toy for your self. Not sharing your wealth, no thought of her joys or the boys. The onus was placed on her to ensure the kids were doing well, and she got hell if they were not. Suspended between you and keeping her children from harm, she had to bridge the gap by keeping her trap shut and her eyes open. How well do you think she slept, weeping quietly into a pillow? You never raised your voice or a hand to mum, but you still bruised her with your brush-offs. Running her down, putting her into her place the bottom of the heap. You cheapened her life at the expense of your own. Motherfucker!
10. Last but no means least. You have never said sorry! Never shown any remorse. The course of your actions and inaction towards me has been a curse, yet you have ignored your role and sought to place blame on others' shoulders without accepting any of the burden yourself.
So there they are: ten reasons for my anger. I wonder if you can think of any more. Does it feel strange to be in the firing line for once? In the heat of the fraction? For me to be fuming and boiling, scalding you? I am mad at you, father, but on reflection, the emotion that bubbles most inside me is sadness. I am not thick-skinned: that's scar tissue. I see that your life was rife with mistakes, too. You had no option when forming opinions as you thought they were the right things to do. It was what was left out that was important. Do you remember any of these events? And can you see the thread that weaves between them?
1. Laughing until we cried and hurt at the jokes of Billy Connolly. He was rude but not crude and had us in fits. I felt close to you that night.
2. Walking in the woods the day grandmother died (we did not know at the time) and praising me for the skill with which I climbed trees. I shook like a leaf with pride at that moment. Then we had to run for our lives as we were invaded by aphids.
3. Building a sledge for the snow. How fast it did go, and you at the bottom to catch me. I felt safe with you there.
4. When I broke my thumb and couldn't write with my left hand. You showed me you could. But the good that really came from that was your confession that you had had that habit beaten from you. You shared a secret, a deep truth. I loved your honesty.
5. Driving your car packed with cubs my friends. Chugging our way to the fire station for a talk and a look round. I found it wonderful that you were there as a parent.
6. The holidays in Cornwall. When for two weeks you would relax, play, and say to the family "What would you like to do?". It was fun in the sun or amidst the mist.
7. When you caught me smoking, I thought you would fume. But you said what you said on the level, and didn't accuse or blow a fuse. I nearly choked.
8. When you treated the family to a meal out as thanks for starving the month before for a machine you will recall. We had a ball, mum in a new dress and us kids in our best. We bloated ourselves on dessert and could hardly move. That moved me.
It's sad that I can only think of eight things to try and balance this account, yet the thread is easy you were yourself. Your wealth was your smile, peace, and love. For a while, you did not care what the rest of the world thought of you you cared for your family. And this is why I am sad. For although these events filled me with happiness they were few, and in between were those other events that filled me with dread. It could have, should have, and would have been so much better if you had just shared your love equally, been yourself, and been a man.
With Love,
Your Son.
P.S. Why write in rhyme? It is not a crime: there is a reason. It allows me to portray and relay my thoughts, and not betray the feelings behind them. My mind too often tries to concentrate thoughts, condense them, exact extractions. With rhyme, words flow and I often don't know where they will go, what course they will follow sweet desserts or dry wit? I just let them trigger synapses, relapses, mental collapses what ever comes up! Shit floats, but this allows it to be extracted, clearing my mind, not putting it behind me, but allowing me to look ahead. There is another reason why rhyme seems the way to purvey my thoughts it gets you to think of the lines and what lies behind and unseen between them. Rhyme allows time to seep into the reading, a pace to be set reading step-by-step.
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