WHAT WE MISS
Sunday June 18, 2017
In this confusion ‘getting what we want’ vs. ‘wanting what we get’ – I wonder, did anyone get the father they wanted?
I used to miss ‘who he wasn’t’.
Not wanting a different dad. Rather, wanting a dad who was different.
Hmm … wonder how he saw his dad?
For me, mostly it matters how two people see me – two daughters whose views I don’t pretend to fully understand, in their similarities and in their profound differences, hard to see myself as one person when it seems they see two different men.
Then there is my view.
Could all three be valid?
I don’t wrestle much with Mother’s Day – for different reasons, but father’s day, both being one and having had one, I wonder how some things could have gone so wrong and yet so many things (and people) turned out alright?
Looking at my own role in fatherhood, I realize my daughters have wishes for the dad I wasn’t. The one they wish they had, the one I wasn’t. I can only be who I am, not who I wasn’t. I wonder if other dads feel that way. I guess it doesn’t matter much who we compare ourselves to, or however our memories change – ‘reality is, it’s what we remember’ whether it really was that way or not.
They miss who I wasn’t.
I miss who I never was.
I don’t remember aiming at a target – was who I was, did what I did. Most days it doesn’t matter so much, but today – every year on this day – that seems to matter much more.
I miss mine.
Every day, in every way.
